What skills and abilities are required to be head of product? How do candidates set themselves apart during an interview?

• Ownership of a key business metric/s: Almost all head of product roles involve ownership of one or more key business metrics.

• Cross-functional partnerships with experience of successfully managing up: As PMs grow in their career, it becomes critical for them to identify the right cross-functional partnerships for their teams, align on common goals and outcomes, and inspire their teams to accomplish said goals. It also includes building skills to manage-up by ensuring C-Staff/leadership visibility on the most important projects or initiatives their team is driving, building a business case to get the required funding/staffing for it, working with their teams to drive the project, unblocking the team as and when required and ensuring that the outcomes are well communicated to create confidence in the next project/initiative they undertake.

• Asking the right questions: As HoP, you will most likely not know the details of either the problem or the solution your teams are working on. Plus, you will make multiple context switches across various critical initiatives throughout your day. Hence, it's important for you to ask the right questions in the limited time you have to get a good understanding of what your team is working on, such that when you are asked to make certain decisions, you have enough context to make an informed decision.

• Mentorship: For HoP roles, it's important for a hiring manager to know that you can inspire and lead your teams. Skills in managing high- and low-performing PMs, inspiring PMs and teams around an important but difficult outcome, and mentoring PMs and/or other team members can describe a HoP's skills in this area well.
  

Previous experience with anecdotes specifically addressing the above skills can help candidates in interview settings.