What a Head of Product in the cycling industry really needs to bring in 2026.

What a Head of Product in the cycling industry really needs to bring in 2026.

I’ve supported several Head-of-Product searches in the cycling industry over the past few years. In quite a few cases, the candidates we presented failed at the same point — and it never appeared in the job description.

When managing directors ask me today why the role is so hard to fill, I usually answer with a question of my own: what does your job spec say? The reply is almost always a variation of the same theme. Several years of cycling industry experience, exposure to Asia sourcing, an affinity for sport, leadership experience, fluent English, ideally a mechanical engineering background. Sometimes a mention of e-bike experience.

All of it correct. And all of it is why the search keeps going wrong.

These requirements describe a product manager as they functioned in 2015. They don’t describe the person a manufacturer needs today to compete over the next five years. And the difference isn’t gradual. It’s fundamental.

THE INDUSTRY HAS SHIFTED — JOB DESCRIPTIONS HAVE NOT.

Ten years ago, a Head of Product could focus their attention on product development and supplier management. Seasonal cycles were stable, components reliably available, competitive pressure manageable.

That world no longer exists. Supply chains have become volatile — and product decisions now depend on availability as much as on market demand. Consolidation pressure is forcing sharper positioning: range management today is about subtraction, not addition. Margins are thinner — the Head of Product makes more financially relevant decisions than the CFO. And end customers have become more informed, more critical, more willing to question quality.

WHAT REALLY MATTERS — AND WHAT YOU WON’T SEE IN A CV.

When I talk to managing directors about what the role actually requires, it comes down to six characteristics.

First: the ability to think across segments. Classic product managers tend to specialise in the segment that matches their personal interest — sport, cargo, trekking, urban-mobility e-bikes. They ride gravel themselves and most enjoy planning gravel bikes. A Head of Product cannot afford that comfort zone. They carry responsibility for the entire portfolio across every segment, and need to make qualified decisions in each — including the segments they don’t personally ride or care about.

Second: the ability to reduce a range without damaging the brand. It’s the hardest discipline in product management. A good Head of Product in 2026 cuts more models than they introduce — and has the courage to defend that to sales and leadership.

Third: managing suppliers at eye level. By which I don’t mean negotiation tactics, but the ability to stand on a factory floor in Cambodia and recognise within two hours whether the promised quality standards will hold — or whether a nasty surprise is coming in Q3. That capability isn’t built in boardrooms. It’s built on the ground.

Fourth: portfolio planning across multiple seasons, combined with an early-warning system for component trends. Anyone who only sees what’s coming at Eurobike is nine months too late. Anyone chasing the competition will never win that race. This sense for what’s next can’t be learned from market reports — only from sustained, confidential conversations with the right people in the industry.

Fifth: honest willingness to push back against sales. Sales wants more models, more options, more special configurations. Product management has to say no to two-thirds of those requests — with sound reasoning, without damaging the relationship. Anyone who shies away from that conflict ends up de facto replaced by the sales director within 18 months, even if the role never officially becomes vacant.

Sixth: a willingness to be wrong — and to spot it early. The industry has become too fast for heroes who defend their decisions. It needs practitioners who re-examine their assumptions every three months and correct course without losing face.

CORPORATE OR OWNER-LED — AND WHY THE TWO RARELY MIX.

One characteristic is missing from that list, because it isn’t a characteristic of the candidate at all. It’s a match criterion between candidate and company. It’s regularly overlooked — and it accounts for roughly every third mishire I see.

In a corporate group or matrix organisation, the processes are standardised. Component purchasing runs through procurement, compliance reviews, QA signs off. The product manager contributes technical input, but the levers sit elsewhere. In an owner-led business, it’s different: decisions are short and direct, the product manager handles purchasing personally — negotiates prices, defines SKUs, sits across the table from suppliers.

Someone moving from a corporate group into an owner-led business suddenly carries responsibility without a department behind them. Some find this overwhelming or frustrating. Conversely: someone moving from an owner-led business into a corporate group clashes with procurement because they want to lead “their” negotiation. They experience approval processes as obstruction and quickly become known internally as the one who doesn’t follow the rules.

Few candidates have genuine experience on both sides. That needs to be verified in advance — before someone accepts a role in which they structurally cannot function.

PREMIUM OR VOLUME — WHAT THE PRODUCTION MODEL REVEALS ABOUT THE REQUIREMENTS.

The company’s own portfolio also dictates what qualifications the Head of Product needs to bring. More specifically: the production model.

In the premium segment, manufacturers often operate on an Open Book basis. The manufacturer creates the Bill of Materials itself — defines every component, negotiates every price, takes on the complexity of currencies, customs, and supplier management. That BOM is then handed to the producer who assembles the bikes. Frame development in the premium segment is also often done in-house or in close cooperation with the producer. This is demanding, bureaucratic, and requires deep technical and commercial knowledge. But it is also the only setup in which a manufacturer can deliver real innovation — because every component choice is deliberate, rather than whatever the producer happens to have to hand.

In the volume and mid-price segment, Close Book dominates. The manufacturer specifies the strategic main components — drivetrains, motors, batteries, tyres — and leaves the rest to the producer. The producer compiles the BOM and quotes a negotiated final price per bike, without disclosing the individual component prices or suppliers. In the mass market, the frame too comes from the producer’s platform programme. Less effort, less detailed knowledge required, faster scaling. Margin is actually more predictable, because component price fluctuation risk sits with the producer — what’s lost is innovation. Anyone who doesn’t shape their own BOM cannot build a product that truly distinguishes itself from the competition.

For hiring, this means: a Head of Product for an Open Book operation needs BOM experience, supplier negotiation across multiple currencies, technical understanding down to component level, and the stomach for bureaucratic effort. A candidate with only Close Book experience will drown in an Open Book environment within the first six months. Conversely, an Open Book practitioner in a volume operation will keep trying to improve things the company has strategically decided not to improve. None of this appears in the job spec. But it determines whether the appointment will hold.

SIX QUESTIONS I ASK IN THE FIRST CONVERSATION.

When I interview Head-of-Product candidates, the CV serves as a starting point. I’ve reviewed positions and formal achievements before the conversation. What matters in the first conversation are questions only someone who has held the role themselves, in operational terms, can ask:

Which product did you have on the roadmap and pulled — and what was the signal? Anyone who hesitates here has never worked under real cost pressure.

When were you last personally at a supplier’s factory in Asia — not for an audit, but to solve a problem?

The answer separates operational practitioners from concept thinkers.

Which three component trends do you see coming in the next 18 months that the competition isn’t yet aware of?

Anyone who delivers only generic answers has never built or maintained a real network in the industry.

Which decision did you take against sales that you’d take again today?

This shows how seriously the candidate takes their role as a counterweight to sales.

Which assumption about the market have you corrected in the past twelve months? Anyone claiming to have got everything right is either dishonest or learning too slowly.

And finally: when did you last negotiate a BOM — yourself, or through a procurement department?

The answer tells me within two minutes whether the candidate is structurally compatible with the company that wants to hire them.

WHAT MANAGING DIRECTORS SHOULD CHECK BEFORE SIGNING OFF A JOB SPEC.

If the job spec for your next Head-of-Product search looks like the one for the last, something is wrong. Specifically:

Strike “several years of industry experience” and replace it with a concrete question about what the candidate brings from their most recent industry role that will benefit you.

Strike “fluent English” — that’s a hygiene factor, not a requirement. Instead, write down which markets the candidate will need to build personal relationships in over the next five years.

Add a statement about your production model — Open Book or Close Book, in-house frame development or platform programme. That pre-filters candidates who structurally don’t fit.

And strike anything that sounds like a generalist. “Strong communication skills”, “hands-on mentality”, “entrepreneurial mindset” — these words say nothing.

What remains are the six characteristics — and an honest look at your own organisation: corporate or owner-led, premium or volume. Both are harder to assess than any formal CV. But both determine whether the appointment will hold.

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A question to colleagues in the industry: which of these six characteristics do you consider the decisive one?

And do you work Open Book or Close Book — has that shaped your Head-of-Product searches in the past?

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Feel free to share it with colleagues currently planning a Head-of-Product search.