Does it really matter what job title the company has put you in?
This is my thing as well...
I've had an argument with an agent about this before.. job titles are specific to a company, but responsibilities and such are transferable.
Precisely.... Then again, if an employer only looks at your title before deciding whether to interview you or not they're probably not really a great company to work for.
I've found that in small companies, titles really don't matter much (and more importantly, don't indicate any level of competency to the outside world): the CEO has 30 people who report to him, the V.P. of Engineering has 10 reports, some Directors have 2 reports, the Senior IT Solutions Architect is 23 years old and the CFO is a Doxon named Colin.
However, bigger companies really try to standardize a lot more, especially within an industry/sector. A Director at Intel, is very much similar to a Director at AMD or Samsung, etc., an Associate in Bank A, tends to have similar responsibilities to an Associate in Bank B, etc. This occurs naturally, since the larger companies tend make up large chunks of the industry, and therefore these standardizations affect the whole industry, and tend to transfer when employees move companies. In contrast, smaller companies often use titles like currency, especially ones that aren't in a financial position to pay competitively - they may not be able to pay "money", but they can make you the Grand Vizier of IT to compensate.
From a recruiter/HR/Hiring-Manager's perspective, there are only a few things on your resume that don't allow for "flexibility", and your previous job title(s) is one of them. People tend to over-inflate their responsibilities, their skills, and their experience (remember, this is all
pre-interview) - your title was given to you externally, which (assuming the company is large, and uses industry standard titles) effectively means that this is the company's perspective of your role/seniority/competency/etc.
It is silly, to ignore someone with an unknown or ostensibly junior title, but they have to prioritize, and the order that they will tend to place experienced employees in is "title match", then "unknown", then "possibly too junior" (FYI, for new graduates, they will prioritize in order of "well recognized education", then "unclear/foreign education" and then "less well regarded education" - essentially, putting "unknown" between "known" and "probably not right"). Occasionally, you may have a good recruiter who can recognize the better candidates from projects/skills/hobbies/etc., these are rare, but do exit (most people who would appreciate these skills, won't be working as recruiters).
Some advice for the OP: I don't know if you are at a big company, or want to go to a big company, but assuming you will encounter this somewhere in your career, I suggest going with a simple, and less descriptive title (the more descriptive it is, the more likely it is to sound like an opaque, company-internal title). How about just "Product Manager", or "Senior Product Manager" ( if you're up for a promotion.
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