The Surprising Reason Founding PMMs Fail

When companies hire their first product marketer, they usually want two things:

1. Help with the most pressing problems (launches, messaging, sales decks)

2. Someone to “just figure out” the function because they were told they needed to hire a Product Marketer

And that’s where things get messy.

Most founding PMMs jump into the first bucket. They tackle what’s urgent. They ship docs, answer questions, unblock teams. They work hard and try to prove their value fast.

But while they’re busy solving problems, they’re also making decisions that quietly shape the future of their role.

• What they prioritize

• How they organize things

• What gets shared

• What gets ignored

• Who they align with most

All of that becomes the company’s default PMM playbook (whether they meant it to or not).

I’ve seen this happen a lot, and I’ve lived it too (not exactly as a founding PMM but as a founding Competitive Intel practitioner). You get a few months in and realize you haven’t actually written down what PMM, or your respective function, is at your company.

You’re solving problems, but you’re also the source of new confusion… e.g. Sales wants more enablement. Product wants you in every sprint. Leadership isn’t sure if PMM owns the narrative or just supports it.

And now, instead of building a function you can scale, you’re stuck reacting to expectations you didn’t mean to set. Oopsies!

But here’s the fix, and it’s not complicated:

Alongside your “real” work, carve out a little time each week to document the function itself.

• Write a PMM charter. Even a draft is better than nothing.

• Start a running list of customer insights with tags you’ll reuse.

• Turn your last launch into a checklist.

• Make a short explainer for how you think about positioning.

• Keep a “decisions log” for when you say yes or no to a request and why.

These are small habits, but they compound fast. And they’ll save you when the next fire drill hits.

If you want a head start, my friend Jason Oakley just built a free PMM Starter Kit that covers all of this.

It includes five templates:

• PMM Charter template

• Customer Insights Tracker

• Positioning + Messaging Canvas

• Competitive Battlecard

• Launch Playbook

All free. All clean. All built for solo and founding PMMs trying to get ahead.

👉 Grab the Starter Kit here

Even if you only steal one of them, you’ll be better off than most.

Stay healthy my friends,

💚Andy