What are the most common mistakes you see candidates make during an interview for a product management position?

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5 Answers

Product Management Interviews

Lizzy Masotta

Shopify Senior Product Lead | Formerly Salesforce, Google, Nest, Cisco Systems • 3y

There are 2 main types of interviews for Product Management roles: Product case interviews Behavioral interviews (by cross functional partners like UX or Engineering, or by the hiring manager) With either interview type, the surest path to failure is when a candidate shows up and waits to be asked questions. A one-way dialogue doesn’t expose enough about a candidate to make a strong impression. Engaging in an interactive, two-way dialogue helps the interviewer get to know what it would be like t ...Read More

2,019 Views
Karishma Irani

Scribe VP of Product | Formerly LaunchDarkly, New Relic • 1y

Approaching every question with the goal of "getting the answer right". When in reality, there is no "right" answer and it's impossible for most of us to even come close without actually being in the job and having all the data and resources that a PM would have to make an informed product decision. The goal of these questions is to assess how you'd break down the problem and approach it from first principles. Using a "one size fits all" framework for every situation. While I'm not the biggest f ...Read More

2,058 Views
Brandon Green

Buffer Staff Product Manager | Formerly Wayfair, Abstract, CustomMade, Sonicbids • 3y

I have a few simple ones: Not being able to clearly denote what they (the candidate) did to achieve something of impact, as opposed to the team/partners/etc. they worked with. In a case-style interview, not having conviction behind your ideas. I'm always disappointed when really bright folks dance around a few ideas on shaping or tackling a problem but don't commit to them, and therefore misses a key insight or opportunity for an interesting solution. (Also - it suggests a lack of conviction whi ...Read More

633 Views
Rodrigo Davies

Figma Product, AI • 1y
- Only talking about things that went well, and either glossing over or not having concrete examples of things that didn't work out
- Talking about their theoretical approach to situations, without giving deep examples of how they have/haven't applied their approach in practice
- Not explaining how their product work connected to business and customer goals, focusing on "local" wins (e.g. making an individual feature successful)
656 Views
Lisa Dziuba

Lemon.io Head of Growth Product Marketing | Formerly LottieFiles, WeLoveNoCode (made $3.6M ARR), Abstract, Flawless App (sold) • 3y
Some typical mistakes to avoid on the PM & PMM interviews:
- Not having your story tailored to the job requirements.
- Not having your homework done: the less you know about the company, the less you are motivated to be part of our team.
- Not having practical use cases prepared: "give me an example of how you did [xyz]" is such a typical question to showcase how candidates do the actual job.
- Being too fuzzy: smart terms, not clear answers, repeating the same story over and over.
311 Views