Program managers* make poor designers, at least in my large company. They often have no training in UX, and all their UX experience is mixed with other stuff that tends to cloud it. Having real UXDs doing the product design is much much better than "design by PM" (its like, do you want your PM to write code for the product also? of course not!)
* I know there is a difference between program and product mangers, the latter being more focused on marketing.
Edit: keeping it classy with the downvotes, clearly I struck a nerve (more citations in child post).
If you think the only difference between project and product managers is "the latter being more focused on marketing," you must work with some terrible product managers...
At my company this is true [1]. I personally don't get to work with product managers (who work in biz dev mostly and do not work with developers/researchers/etc...), only program managers.
From wiki:
> Diverse interpretations regarding the role of the product manager are the norm. The product manager title is often used in many ways to describe drastically different duties and responsibilities. Even within the high-tech industry where product management is better defined, the product manager's job description varies widely among companies. This is due to tradition and intuitive interpretations by different individuals.
* I know there is a difference between program and product mangers, the latter being more focused on marketing.
Edit: keeping it classy with the downvotes, clearly I struck a nerve (more citations in child post).