product manager interview take home assignment

Cracking the Code: Mastering Take-Home Assignments for Product Management Interviews

Navigating a product management interview, especially with the added challenge of a take-home assignment, can indeed be daunting. However, with the right strategies and preparation, you can approach these assignments with confidence and excel. This comprehensive guide aims to provide you with actionable tips and insights to help you tackle your product management interview assignments effectively. From understanding the assignment requirements to organizing your approach and delivering a polished final product, each step of the process will be covered to ensure you are well-equipped to succeed. Whether it's analyzing case studies, presenting solutions, or demonstrating your problem-solving skills, this guide will empower you to showcase your abilities and make a lasting impression on potential employers. So, fear not! With this guide as your companion, you'll be ready to ace your product management interview assignments and take the next step in your career with confidence and poise.

What's the purpose of Take-Home Assignments?

Take-home assignments serve as an integral component of the interview process for companies seeking to assess candidates' suitability for product management roles . These tasks are designed to provide hiring managers with insight into candidates' problem-solving skills, product thinking abilities, and approach to real-world scenarios. By completing the assignment, candidates have the opportunity to showcase their capabilities and demonstrate their thought process in addressing complex challenges. This practical demonstration allows recruiters to gain a deeper understanding of candidates' potential as product managers, beyond what can be gleaned from traditional interviews alone. Ultimately, take-home assignments serve as a valuable tool for evaluating candidates' readiness and suitability for product management roles within the organization.

Let's take a look at 9 key points to remember for you to master Take-Home Assignments:

1. Decoding the Assignment

Deciphering the assignment begins with a meticulous examination of the brief provided. This involves dissecting the problem statement, objectives, evaluation criteria, and the anticipated deliverables. Paying heed to any specific requirements or constraints outlined in the assignment is crucial as they serve as guiding parameters for your approach. Understanding the nuances of the assignment ensures that you embark on the task with clarity and purpose, setting the stage for a well-structured and targeted solution.

2. Time Management is Key

Efficient time management forms the backbone of successful completion of a take-home assignment. Crafting a realistic timeline is paramount, allocating adequate time for each phase of the task, from comprehending the problem to research, brainstorming, execution, and refinement. Prioritizing tasks based on their significance and potential impact on the final output is essential to ensure that no aspect of the assignment is overlooked or rushed. By adhering to a well-planned schedule, you maximize productivity, minimize stress, and optimize the quality of your solution.

3. Research and Immersion

Delivering a compelling solution hinges on immersing yourself in the intricacies of the product domain, target audience, and user personas delineated in the assignment. Thorough research acts as the cornerstone of informed decision-making, providing valuable insights into user needs, market dynamics, competitor landscape, and industry trends. The depth and breadth of your understanding directly influence the strategic soundness and relevance of your solution, making comprehensive research a non-negotiable aspect of the process. By delving deep into the subject matter, you equip yourself with the knowledge and perspective necessary to devise innovative and impactful solutions.

4. Define Your Approach

A well-defined approach serves as the roadmap for navigating the complexities of the assignment and devising a structured solution. Begin by articulating the problem statement succinctly, ensuring a clear understanding of the task at hand. Breaking down the assignment into manageable components facilitates a systematic approach, allowing you to tackle each aspect methodically. Establishing key milestones enables you to track progress, maintain focus, and ensure timely completion of the assignment. By delineating a coherent and strategic approach, you demonstrate your analytical prowess, problem-solving acumen, and ability to navigate complex challenges effectively.

5. Prototype and Iterate

Prototyping serves as a powerful tool for refining and validating your solution iteratively. Don't hesitate to translate your ideas into tangible forms through sketches, wireframes, or basic prototypes. Prototyping enables you to visualize concepts, test hypotheses, and gather feedback early in the process. Iterating on your design allows you to identify and address potential shortcomings, refine features, and fine-tune the user experience. By incorporating user-centric design principles and feedback loops, you enhance the efficacy and usability of your solution, ensuring alignment with user needs and expectations.

6. Presentation Matters

Presenting your solution effectively is as crucial as the solution itself. Structuring your response in a coherent and logical manner ensures that your ideas are conveyed clearly and comprehensively. Utilize visual aids, such as charts, diagrams, and illustrations, to enhance understanding and highlight key insights. Craft a narrative that guides the evaluator through your decision-making process, rationale, and the strategic considerations behind your solution choices. By articulating your thoughts with clarity and precision, you facilitate a deeper understanding of your solution and its potential impact.

7. Seek Feedback

Seeking feedback from mentors, peers, or industry professionals after submitting your assignment can provide valuable perspectives and insights. Constructive feedback helps identify blind spots, areas for improvement, and alternative approaches that you may not have considered. Embrace feedback as a learning opportunity, leveraging it to refine your skills, enhance your approach, and broaden your perspective. Engaging in dialogue with others fosters a culture of continuous improvement and personal growth, positioning you for success in future assignments and professional endeavors.

8. Stay Authentic

While demonstrating your skills and expertise is essential, it's equally important to stay true to your authentic self in your solution. Let your unique perspective, creativity, and passion shine through, as they are valuable assets that set you apart from other candidates. Authenticity fosters genuine connections and resonates with potential employers seeking individuals with integrity, originality, and innovative thinking. By staying authentic, you build trust, credibility, and rapport, laying the foundation for a successful career in product management .

9. Practice, Practice, Practice

Mastering take-home assignments requires consistent practice, refinement, and honing of your skills . Engage in mock assignments, simulate diverse scenarios, and challenge yourself to think critically and creatively. Actively seek opportunities to apply your problem-solving skills and iterate on your approach based on feedback and experience. With each practice session, you'll gain confidence, proficiency, and a deeper understanding of the nuances of product management. Embrace the iterative nature of learning, remain open to experimentation, and commit to continuous improvement to excel in tackling take-home assignments and succeeding in your product management career.

Approaching take-home assignments for product management interviews may seem daunting at first, but with the right mindset, preparation, and strategy, you can excel in showcasing your potential as a product leader. By understanding the purpose of the assignment, managing your time effectively, conducting thorough research, defining a structured approach, and emphasizing presentation and authenticity, you'll be well-equipped to crack the code and impress hiring managers with your innovative solutions.

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Product Management Take Home Assignment Example

· 13 min read ·

🔥 This blog is long. Answering a take home assignment well will bring you one step closer to your dream job. This blog is detailed to help you in every step of the assignment. So read on! But only if you have some time 🤣

Product Management Interviews can be long and arduous with a lot of stages. Each stage has a specific focus. If you are interviewing for a product manager role you will come across the product management Take Home Assignment. It is unique to product management roles and is used to surface specific skillsets. Over the years I have submitted so many of these that honestly I have lost count. As I progressed in my career and started hiring product managers I also created a few of my own to gauge the skills of prospective hires. In this blog we will look at the different aspects of the product manager take home assignment. We will also walkthrough a product management take home assignment example.

What is the Take Home Assignment

This is an exercise that the product manager needs to do on their own. The assignment is generally sent to you after the initial screen round or conversation with the hiring manager. The email contains:

Every company will tweak the format to meet their specific needs. Some might provide context and information that they’d like the candidate to use. Others might decide to keep it open ended and let the candidate make all the decisions.

What is the Goal of the Take Home Assignment

Through this exercise the hiring team wants to find out how you tackle different problems that you will most likely face on the job. The goal is to find out the following:

The Two Types of Product Management Take Home Assignment Questions

New product or service.

The question will be presented to you in the following format:

“You are a product manager at XYZ Corp and tasked with evaluating and launching a new product. What product will you choose? How will you go about evaluating the opportunity and launching the first iteration of the product.”

Update to Existing Product or Service

“You are the product manager for “X” product. Tell us one feature that you would like to implement to improve it.”

As we said earlier some teams like to keep it open ended to see where the candidate ends up with them. The example above is an open ended questions. Others might be more structured and ask you to include specific information.

Example of How to Structure Your Take Home Assignment

Every take home assignment should touch on the following

Start with Questions

Don’t start with brainstorming ideas! When you read the assignment there will be questions that come to your mind. Jot them down. Frame them in a concise and easy to understand manner and then send them back to the hiring team. You can choose to skip this step and make assumptions as you see fit. But let me ask you this - “Would you do that in the real world? At your current job, if you are not sure about something, what do you do? Do you make assumptions and start solving the problem? The answer is NO! You will talk to your manager or peers to understand more about the problem. So why not ask questions about your assignment! Once your basic questions have been answered you can move to the next step.

Define the Problem

Explain the problem you are going to solve with the new product or update to the existing product. Keep your description short and crisp.

Who is facing this problem?

Is everyone facing these issues? Or is it limited to a subset of users? Define the user persona that is facing this problem.

Why does it need to be solved ?

No product is perfect or solves all problems. Why do you think it is IMPORTANT to solve this problem over EVERYTHING else? Why would you prioritize spending time and resources on this versus other things?

How does it align to the organisational goals?

What is the vision of the company? Does the product team have goals that they want to achieve in the next 12-18 months? Does this align with those goals? You can gauge the organisation goals by looking at their public roadmap , website, releases or while talking to your interviewers. (In case the assignment is about a fictitious company, this may be included in the questions)

Learn 7 Ways to Do Market Research

What is your proposed solution?

How will you solve the problem you have described above? First describe the actions that will solve the problem. Then give a short description of the key aspects of the feature or product that will enable users to take those actions. I would encourage you to put in a wireframe along with the description. This does not mean that you spend hours and hours building high fidelity mockups. Create simple wireframes. You can either use a piece of paper and draw a rough sketch with your hand or use a tool like balsamiq which is simple and easy to use.

What are the risks associated with these changes?

Can your solution cause any unwanted issues for the users or the team? Is it going to make anyone unhappy 🤣 . Think about all the different stakeholders that your update will impact. Once you have identified the risks, try and outline what steps you will take to mitigate them. This section doesn’t need to be crazy long. As long as the hiring team knows that you’ve thought about it you’re good!

How will you measure success?

This is the place where you list out the metrics you will follow in order to gauge the success or failure of the release. It is one of the most critical sections of your assignment and carries a lot of weight. Don’t go overboard here. More is not always better. Think through which metrics truly reflect the performance of the product or feature. Stay away from vanity metrics 🤣 . With each metric add the following information:

30 Metrics Product Managers Should Know

Find out How Product Teams Use Data

The assumptions you have made

While working on the assignment you will have questions that will need to be answered. You will have some data but then it might not be enough to get you all the answers. You will need to make some assumptions in order to come to your conclusions. But that’s ok. In fact that is going to be the case every single time you launch a product or feature. So remember to state all your key assumptions clearly in your assignment. You can do it as a separate section or highlight them wherever they are relevant.

6 Key Stakeholders for Product Managers

You have cleared the screening round for your dream product management role in Amazon. You get an email from the recruiter on a take home assignment you need to complete. It looks something like this:

“You are the product manager for the Amazon app. What new feature will you add to improve the product?”

On the face of it this is an open ended question. This doesn’t necessarily mean that they want you to just pitch them whatever idea you might have 😀 . So don’t jump the gun yet and start brainstorming on the coolest idea already 🤣 .

“You are the product manager for reviews on Amazon. Recent feedback from customers has shown that they are not happy with how reviews on the site work? How will you go about solving this issue?”

This one requires you to look at a particular section of the platform.

Solution For Take Home Assignment

For the purpose of this blog we will use the open-ended question example.

First things first  let’s think about what questions come to mind after you have read the assignment?

Send over these questions to the hiring team to see if there is any additional information that the team can provide you. They might send you hard data or insight on which you can base your assignment. Or they can come back and tell you to make your own inferences.

Let’s assume that that the team comes back and tells you the following:

“Our data shows that reviews are an important part of customer conversion. In fact listings with more reviews are 5% more likely to sell than ones with less. However recent surveys have surfaced frustration among users with how reviews work. We don’t have any other information to share regarding the assignment.”

Alright, so this information answers some of your questions. For the remainder we will make and state our assumptions clearly. So let’s start building our assignment step by step as discussed in the last questions:

Users find it difficult to browse through reviews on Amazon.

Who is facing this Problem

All users are facing this problem. We are assuming that this problem is not limited to a particular category.

Why does it need to be solved?

Reviews play an important role in the buying decision of users. Recent feedback has shown that people are frustrated with how reviews work.

What is the proposed solution?

Empower users to search faster and find the right review.  This can be done by adding a search bar to reviews that let’s user type in a specific query. The reviews would filter in real time based on what the user types out.

Assumptions

Minimum Viable Product(MVP)

Will this cannibalise an existing feature?

This update will cannibalize the usage of smart tags in our search results. Overtime we can analyze if one or both features are needed by the users.

What are the risks associated with the update?

Reviews have a high impact on conversion. An update that doesn’t work can negatively impact GMV

How will we mitigate the risk highlighted?

The release will be A/B tested first to validate its effectiveness before making it available to everyone.

A Practical Approach to A/B Testing

Additionally it would be useful to analyse if the user is using the search bar when the same search terms is present in the smart tag

What organizational factors do we need to consider before the release?

Before we start work on the update we need to align different stakeholders on proposed changes. And consider the following during these conversations:

Scheduling the A/B test at the right time across the right category is important for this update.

Disclaimers on the Take Home Assignment Example!!!

Common mistakes to avoid in take home assignments.

Not Asking Questions

Sometimes we are in a hurry to get started. Sometimes we are lazy. Sometimes we are so burnt out with all the interviewing that we decide to skip this step. Sometimes we just want to get it over with. Please ask questions 🙏

Overshooting the length

We can get a bit too excited and try to cram in too much information into our submission. It’s quite understandable. You have done all the hardwork and want to make sure that the hiring team sees that. But please stick to the length. Generally it’s 2 pages with font size 12. Being succinct and presenting information in a concise manner is an important skill that product managers need to posses. So when you turn in an assignment that’s too long it sends the wrong signal to the hiring team.

Not Using Appendices

This is true for any work that you present. Cramming in too many graphs or designs in the middle of your documents makes it difficult to read. Use the limited space you have to highlight the important findings and conclusions you have drawn. Leave all the grunt work out of the main submission and attach them as appendices.

Finishing in one sitting

Don’t try to hash out the entire assignment in one sitting on a Friday night 😆 . Take breaks! Come back and have a look at your assignment with a fresh set of eyes often.

Not citing references

It’s ok to search on the internet. You do that in the real world too. If you are using certain frameworks or citing data make sure to add the references as part of your submission.

Spending too much time to find the most kick*** innovative idea

We don’t want to discount the fact that outstanding ideas will get you brownie points. But your idea is only one of the factors in your submission. I’d rather see a mediocre idea that’s built on a structured approach rather than what sounds like a great idea but ends there and is not backed by logical reasoning, thinking and research.

Not balancing Quantitative and Qualitative data

Product Management isn’t binary, I wish it was 😀 . You can’t focus on only data or only qualitative feedback. You have to use both. You have to look at the hard data but also look at the organizational impact of the updates you propose. In order for any update to be successful it requires a cross-functional effort. So make sure that your assignment is balanced. It shows your ability to think analytically while leading pragmatically.

We hope that you have found the information we shared useful. If you are reading this blog you are probably starting to write your take home assignment.

Download The Take Home Assignment Example Template

Hopefully it will help you structure your assignment.

Remember - there are no bad ideas! So pick one and ask the right questions. Break a leg!

Checkout some of our other blogs that will help you prepare for your product Management Interviews

Product Management Interview Format

Product Management Interview Questions

6 Ways to Prepare for Product Manager Interview

RICE Prioritization Framework

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Table of Contents

How to quickly and successfully complete a take-home assignment.

• September 15, 2020

Richard Chen

The take-home assignment has become more popular and important than ever in the Product Manager interview process. At Product Gym, we receive numerous questions from our members about case studies. Most of them are confused about the vague nature of case study prompts or lack of details about what is expected from the candidate.

If you do not have support, you just might be spending all your time working on these time-consuming take-home assignments. Since job hunting is a numbers game , you do not want to spend more time on one case study project than you need to!

let’s break down the take-home assignment with an example. We’ll be going through this case study assignment in the form of a conversation. We’ll go over the candidate’s work and ask them guiding questions to assess if their approach is the best approach to solve the problem.

Dear Product Gym, I am interviewing with a big-name tech firm, and I am on the final round. They have sent me a challenge, and I have to send it back by today at 5. Next Monday, I have to present it in 60 minutes with a 45-minute Q&A afterward. They said it is not necessarily 60 minutes of me presenting, but instead 60 minutes of chatting with the people in the panel. The Q&A is with a different group. The problem that they sent me is very open-ended: Create a product that would improve the health of an obese patient. Go through the problem, solution, product design, product development, product launch, and product rollout strategy. Include a research allocation plan because there is a $50,000 budget and put on the team.

The Take-Home Assignment Conversation

PG: That is a lot for someone to put together, especially in such a short amount of time. And, they are looking for lots of information. How far have you gotten so far?

Candidate: I decided that the problem I am going to solve is that there is too much information out there for patients to figure out the right plan. I created an app to connect patients to dieticians directly through text.

PG: Is it an SMS app where patients can go, “Hey, I am looking for this dietician,” and it would just connect them to that dietician?

Candidate: I was thinking more so that the patients would state what their needs are, and the app would give them a few dieticians to choose from. I am basing the model off of TalkSpace, an app that connects patients to mental health therapists.

In my app, the dietician would chat with the patient and come up with guidelines or a plan for them to follow. The patient would send pictures of their meals for the dietician to review at the end of every week. It would be based on a monthly subscription business model.

This is the basic version. Eventually, I want to make it so that people could share pictures of their food for others to comment on, like a chat forum.

Tackling Case Study Assignment Questions

PG: Is it a chat app or an SMS chatbot?

Candidate: It is not a chatbot because there would be real people on the other end. The reason it cannot be through simple text messages is that with dieticians, it has to be HIPAA compliant.

PG: If your budget is $50,000, why create an app for the take-home assignment when you could create a simple web app? 

You are breaking down the barriers and making it easier to communicate, and so people do not chat through web apps. That is my thought process now. However, I am open to creating a web app.

Candidate: The need is that patients are trying to lose weight, but the overwhelming amount of information makes it difficult for them to seek the right help. My prompt was to create a way to connect patients suffering from obesity with expert advice.

PG: Your reason behind the app solution is that it makes it easier to connect?

Candidate: I talked to a couple of patients and friends who have gone through significant weight loss. A recurring pattern I saw was that they had trouble figuring out who to talk to and were discouraged by the intimidation of having to set up an appointment, go into an office and see someone.

I believe that an app would break down that barrier and make it easier for patients to start that connection.

The Take-Home Assignment Process

Already confused about the candidate’s thought process how they came up with this idea? Make sure you watch our case study solution video with Roman, our case study instructor, to understand how the process works:

Finding an Easy to Use Solution

PG: In the research phase of the take-home assignment, did you ask them if they would install an app on their phone or use a web service?

Candidate: They said that anything that was not phone-based would complicate their daily lives.

PG: The reason I am asking is that if a client came to me wanting to develop this app and told me they had a $50,000 budget, they should know that at least a third of the costs would need to go into the marketing for this.

You would need a solution that is simple and easy to use. You would want to have a mobile web version or a simple website version of it with the accounts and everything set up to chat on there. That solution would be cheaper for you since you have to account for the budget.

The app would work, but you would still need the website because some people might find it easier to go onto their computer at home. In terms of convenience, the most convenient place might be your home.

How to Create a Budget and Timeline

Candidate: I have worked more on web-based products, so I struggle with budgeting. What sort of timeline should I give for creating something like this?

PG: I generally create a scope document first. It should outline the features that I need to have, the features that it should have, and those I want to have in this.

Once you have those need-to-have features figured out, that determines the shortest amount of time in which the app could be built and the minimum amount of money spent.

A need-to-have feature would be the ability to chat with a dietician. A should-have feature would be the ability to choose your dietician.

Candidate: So, the “need” feature would assign whoever is available, and the “should” would let them choose their dietician from a list?

PG: Yes. The “want” would provide a platform that helps them track their progress with the meal plan.  And for the “needs,” you would want to add accounts to collect data from the patients.

How to Present Your Take-Home Assignment Solution

PG: You want a slide that details the solution you came up with. In this case, that is the chatbot. Those are the core features which you wish to include in a section of your take-home assignment presentation. It should state:

• Here is what the solution is.
• Here is what the solution looks like.
• Here is how a user would go through the process within this solution.

Candidate: Should I state them through a wireframe?

PG: Yes. What you can do is create a simple wireframe process that shows everything from signing up, selecting a dietician, and chatting with that dietician.

Candidate: Once I have the wireframe, I say, “Given this is how the app work, let’s figure out how to prioritize within our budget.” Is this when I bring out my scope?

PG: That is when you bring out the scope. Detail the core features you are going to build within the $50,000 budget and what you will have with that budget.

Present Your Go-to-Market Strategy

PG: Once you get past that, they are going to ask you about your go-to-market strategy. You will probably want to do some beta testing with a small group of users to refine the process, get feedback, and adjust before you go on to create, say, the analytics process. If you are collecting analytics, but you do not know what exactly you are collecting, then it does not make sense.

Candidate: How do I say that I am going to get to this small group of users?

PG: That would be your rollout plan. The first plan for any product is to get the core evangelists, the people who will rave and rant with your product and be happy to share it with others. This is to get some traction out there.

Figure out your target market. In your case, diet support groups might be an excellent place to start.

Candidate: I would give them the product for free and ask them to test it out for a month?

PG: Exactly. You are going to take all their feedback, learn from it, and make adjustments to your product .  

Then you can go into the beta phase, where you branch out more and even consider a small advertising budget to get a wider audience with more helpful feedback. By the time you are ready for version one, you will have enough data points and functionality to start collecting analytics.

Candidate: Should my evangelists be identified before beta?

PG: Yes, that is the initial rollout strategy. You want the evangelists to validate that what you have created makes sense. They would have been with you from the start to be more sympathetic towards what works and what does not work. 

From there, make adjustments based on their feedback and come up with a beta version. Evangelists can comprise up to 30 users, and the beta can have 500-1000 users.

Rollout Strategy vs Product Launch

Candidate: What is the difference between the rollout strategy and the product launch?

PG: The product launch would be after the beta. That is when you put in the money for the marketing to reach a broader audience who are not from your initial group of users. Once they come on, they should see the immediate value and expect a functioning product.

Candidate: One thing about dieticians is that they can only practice within the state, meaning I would have to launch the app state-by-state. How should I go about this?

PG: This would also be a part of your rollout strategy. You can test the app in one state, see how it goes, and then release it in others. You can replicate the model you created in, for example, New York in terms of the rollout, and make sure you are abiding by whatever specific rules for each state there are regarding dieticians. By that point, if you are rolling out to New York, your goal would be to get dieticians on board from the local state.

Candidate: I do the wireframes, and as far as the development part, should I have a roadmap or just a scope of the needs that I am addressing?

PG: I would select the technology you will use to build it out instead of a full-blown roadmap. For your budget, I would go with something like React Native. It helps create a mobile application framework. You need to have a back-end and a front-end working, and an API that connects both of them.

How to Manage Your Budget

Candidate: Should I put the $50,000 budget allocation before I go onto technology?

PG: It depends on the style. I would probably mention it first, and then define the budget for each phase throughout your presentation.

Candidate: How would I deal with paying out the dieticians beyond that first beta?

PG: That is why I said you should have evangelists. You could have the dieticians work with you without paying them, as they are the initial set of influential users on there.

You can say that the initial set of dieticians agreed to be part of the pilot program once the app has rolled out, you can consider what to pay out to the dietician.

The rest of the marketing should go towards   paid advertising .  You want to have a focus group to get feedback from the users, collecting that data, and making the right adjustments.  I would suggest reading up a little more on the rollout strategy to align with what you have come up with so far.

Candidate: Should I include the website as part of my rollout?

PG: Yes. The reason behind choosing React Native is that you can build both the website and the app simultaneously. That would make for more efficient use of your $50,000.

For the back-end, you could quickly build something on Firebase, at least for the first version. Firebase would speed up your development, and everything will be free as far as infrastructure costs. 

You would need a developer for the front-end and one for the back end. Since you have a designer, that would make it around $7,500 for each of those people for the project’s entirety.

Go Above and Beyond: Get Your Take-Home Assignment Reviewed by a Professional

You’ve worked through the assignment and put your solution into a slide deck to present to a panel of interviewers: congratulations! But if you want to go above and beyond to impress the hiring team, dedicate some time to getting your take-home assignment reviewed by a professional.

A fresh set of eyes may catch typos and grammar errors, but will also be able to point out the areas where you can improve the solution overall. A Product Manager who’s gone through multiple technical interview rounds is going to be able to assess your take-home assignment and solution from the perspective of the interviewer and use their experience to help you polish it.

At Product Gym, our interview coaches routinely check over members’ case study presentations, offering insight, constructive criticism, and tips on how to make their technical interview round a success.

Solving take-home assignments isn’t just a good practice for acing your interview — it’s also an excellent way to develop applicable Product Manager skills . That’s why we include classes on case studies in our program. Our case study curriculum was developed and continues to be taught by Senior Product Manager for Atlassian,  Roman Kolosovskiy .

Because we’ve been working with Product Manager job hunters for the past five years, we’ve had ample opportunity to test and perfect the strategy we teach our members on how to ace a take-home assignment. We’ve even compiled a bank of case study prompts that aspiring Product Managers have received in their interviews so that members can exclusively access to hone their problem-solving and storytelling skills

Nail Your Take-Home Assignment

Beginning to end, your take-home assignment should demonstrate how you approach a problem. You’ll want to do your research, have a clear understanding of your target market, and demonstrate how well you prioritize and plan with a structured approach. You got this!

Want one-on-one help solving case studies and acing the Product Manager interview? Product Gym’s coaches are available to help our members at every stage of the job-hunt. Schedule a free consultation with our career coaches to see if the membership program is the best fit for you. We’d be happy to answer any questions you have, and get you on track to landing the Product Manager job of your dreams.

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• Product manager interview: real questions plus guide for employers and candidates

Whether you’re hiring or trying to be hired yourself, the interview process is always a challenge. Here we present the typical flow together with revealing questions to help both interviewers and aspiring product managers.

There are no hard and fast rules for what it means to be a product manager . Every company has their own vision of their product and work process.

So there’s no one-size-fits-all way to evaluate applicants for a product manager position.

But no matter what, the hiring process should be structured and carefully thought out.

In this article we will be detailing:

• Stages of the interview process ( # )
• Topic areas and examples of interview questions ( # )
• Pre-interview research for applicants ( # )

This material is intended for teams needing to hire product managers as well as for applicants wanting to prepare for their own interviews.

→ Test your product management and data skills with this free Growth Skills Assessment Test . → Learn data-driven product management in Simulator by GoPractice . → Learn growth and realize the maximum potential of your product in Product Growth Simulator .

Stages of the interview process

The interview process consists of several stages. The specifics will vary at each company based on resources, needs, and other factors.

Larger companies, for example, will tend to hold on-site interviews lasting for the better part of a day. During that time, the applicant performs (and might discuss feedback on) a test task and undergoes a few rounds of interviews. Big companies go to this effort and expense in order to keep the hiring process humming along smoothly.

Many companies these days—especially startups—are fully virtual. For them, the entire hiring process happens 100% online, just like everything else at the company.

For those aiming at the top of the corporate ladder, remember that the higher the position, the more stages you will have to go through.

The main stages usually include: 

• Phone screening with recruiter

Call with hiring manager

On-site interviews and final decision.

Let’s go through each of these stages in detail.

Phone screening

The purpose of the phone screening is to see how well the applicant meets the requirements of the position. Questions will usually be at the level of the applicant’s resume and prior work experience. The recruiter might also try to get a feel for the applicant’s salary expectations, why they left their previous job, and whether they are currently interviewing at other companies.

Typical questions:

• What makes this position interesting to you? Why do you want to work with us?
• Why do you want to leave your current job? (Why have you left it already?)
• What are your career plans?
• Tell me more about this item on your resume…
• What are your salary expectations?

The recruiter might throw in a few basic job-related questions to filter out applicants who are clearly underqualified.

Recruiters ask each of these questions for a reason, not just for the sake of a checklist. If a question seems vague or strange to you as an applicant, don’t be afraid to ask for clarification so you can give a thorough and relevant answer. The recruiter, accordingly, should be prepared to explain what they have in mind.

If the applicant is being actively hunted by the company, the recruiter will usually also try to sell them on what makes the company so great.

Questions from the hiring manager will be more specific and examine how well the applicant’s experience fits the position.

The hiring manager wants to measure the strength of the applicant’s key skills as well as overall knowledge and understanding of the business. They might discuss a case study with the applicant to see how they would approach it.

While all this is going on, the hiring manager is also trying to gauge whether the applicant fits in terms of soft skills and corporate culture.

The applicant might be asked to perform a task or assignment at this stage. We won’t go into detail in this article, but you can read a guide for hiring managers on the topic here .

Sometimes this stage might be skipped entirely at large companies. When the company is not looking at a team-specific position, they can simply let a successful applicant work on several teams and pick one later. But applicants should always be ready for this stage just in case.

Like we noted earlier, applicants won’t necessarily be invited into an office. Some companies perform the entire hiring process online. Either way, employers want to take a deeper, final look at the applicant.

Frequently, this is when the applicant performs a test task. If the task included a take-home assignment, the applicant might be asked to explain and defend their solution.

This stage will often also include one-on-one interviews with potential colleagues, who will be eyeing how well this person fits the team, as well as heads of other departments and business units. 

Here’s one example:

A large company is making a fintech product and they need a senior product manager. So besides the recruiter and hiring manager, the company’s CFO will likely be sitting in. This is important because besides hard skills, the applicant also needs to know the business side—in this case, the financial industry.

→ In his interview with GoPractice , Dmitry Vasin as the Product Owner responsible for launching Revolut Trading discussed how to balance between technical skills and industry knowledge when it comes to product creation in heavily regulated industries like fintech.

After all these interviews and test tasks, the company makes a final decision on which applicant to make an offer to. Read this article for more on how employers can choose between strong candidates.

Interview questions: topic areas and examples

Now that we’ve summarized the main stages of the hiring process, it’s time to talk about the kinds of questions that would-be product managers tend to receive. It’s important to understand the purpose of these questions, which is why we’ve included a number of examples. These questions either come from real interviews at major tech companies or are heavily inspired by them.

The questions below might come on a call from the hiring manager or during an on-site interview with a potential colleague:

• If you’re the one interviewing , think about using these examples to create questions tailored to your specific company and product. Know what you are trying to elucidate with your question and how you intend to evaluate the answers.
• If you’re being interviewed , treat these as a way to prepare for the type and subject matter of questions that you might hear at a real interview. Have some interesting “answer templates” filed away in the back of your mind.

If you are curious about real questions from interviews at a specific company, check Glassdoor regarding the employer and position in question.

Product sense / product design

These questions show the applicant’s train of thought when they face the task of creating a new product or improving an existing one. The hiring manager observes how the applicant prioritizes, what they do in the absence of complete information, and how they would evaluate the outcome.

Examples: 

• Name three of your favorite products. Pick one and tell me how you would improve it.
• Name a couple of products you consider bad but which are successful anyway.
• Design an alarm clock for deaf people.
• How would you improve a microwave?
• Build a product for sports fans on Facebook.
• Design a food delivery app for kids.
• Design a product for learning a new skill.
• How would you improve restaurant discovery on Google Maps?
• Design an ATM for international terminals at your local airport.
• Build a new car dashboard from scratch. 

Execution / analytics

These questions help to show how the applicant sets goals, tries to accomplish them, and evaluates the outcomes. The answers suggest how the potential product manager checks hypotheses and follows through to confirm causation and take appropriate action.

• You are the PM of Instagram stories. What goal would you set and how would you measure success?
• As a PM, what NSM would you choose for a food delivery app and why?
• How would you measure the success of a weather forecast app?
• How would you expand Duolingo into math education?
• The churn of a hyper-casual mobile game you’re working on more than doubled during the last week. Describe your steps for improving the situation.
• As the PM of Google’s front page, what goals would you set for your team for the next quarter? 
• How would you go about designing the onboarding flow for an e-commerce app?
• You’re working as PM for a popular ride-hailing app. There’s a bug that affects 1% of your users. You can throw all your engineering resources at fixing the bug or roll out a new feature to meet the deadline. Which option would you choose and why?
• How would you define key metrics for a dating app, e.g., Tinder?
• As a PM at a social media platform, make a list of pros and cons for autoplay videos. What would make you abandon the idea? 

Product strategy

Questions about product strategy will be similar, but with a greater focus on business and product monetization. This makes the product manager zoom out and look at the product’s wider context.

• Why did Facebook build Marketplace?
• You have an e-learning platform for aspiring and junior product managers. You want to expand to emerging markets where people (a) do not know about your product and (b) are not able to pay the price you’re asking. Describe your steps.
• There is a new AI-driven messenger app with automatic reply suggestions as a core feature. Explain why this app is not going to succeed.
• A bike sharing company is considering a freemium business model. Should they do it?
• In 2014, Facebook decided to spin off its Messenger app, and Foursquare made the same step. Explain why the first split was successful and the second one didn’t go so well.
• Should Google start its own ride-hailing service? Why?
• You are PM at WhatsApp with an unlimited budget. What would you do?
• What company should Amazon have bought five years ago and why? 
• Why did Microsoft Teams overtake Slack in 2019 in terms of DAU? 
• You’re an investor. Name several companies or markets you would invest in right now.  

Behavioral / communication

How does the product manager act in different situations, including high stress? What about leadership and communication skills?

• Tell me about a time your project didn’t go as planned. What could you have done better? 
• How do you resolve disagreements at work? Give an example from your experience.
• Tell me about a project you have done outside of work. How did you approach it and what did you learn?
• What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?
• Tell me about a time you received harsh feedback from your exec. How did you react?
• What’s the most interesting project you have done at work?
• Imagine you’re working on a product and, to meet a deadline, the management team decides to launch it before it’s ready. How would you convince them not to? 
• Tell me about a time when you took a large risk at work. Did it pay off? What did you learn? 
• The C-suite asks you to prioritize a certain feature you deem unnecessary. What would you do? 
• Tell me about a time you proposed a novel idea for the product you worked on. 

Technical 

While of secondary importance for the PM role, technical questions can reveal how well product managers interface with developers. Oftentimes this means asking how different services work under the hood. The precise technical details matter less than the PM’s ability to articulate their logic. These questions can vary widely, so we will give just a few examples.

• What has happened since the 1990s that allowed the internet to become faster?
• What happens when you type a URL in your browser?
• What is the most complex system you have designed or contributed to?
• How would you improve Google Maps to work with poor connectivity?
• Describe how GPS works.

Pre-interview research for applicants

Applicants shouldn’t forget that the questions they ask are just as important. Product managers need to be able to perform in-depth user interviews for their job, after all.

The applicant should start by researching the company and taking notes. Interviewers should be prepared to have the tables turned a bit.

Applicants should try to look at a company like a would-be investor: “Am I prepared to put my time and effort into this company? Do I believe it has a future? Does the company’s product have product/market fit? Can the product be scaled?”

Here are a few starting points for getting a better understanding of a potential employer:

Company website and social media

Start with the basics. When was the company founded? Who owns it? What industry is it in? How big is it?

See what the company’s declared values are and what mission it proclaims.

Take a look at the company’s social media and YouTube channel, if any.

Social networks are a way for companies to broadcast their values, share news, and notify of big updates.

This information will provide grist for your own questions—and in any case, the employer should appreciate your interest and initiative in finding out.

Recent news

Take a look at recent mentions of the company on Google News. How frequently does it hit the headlines? What important events have happened? Maybe it’s a startup that has recently gotten serious investments in order to prepare for serious expansion. Or maybe it’s a big company with stagnant metrics.

Simply checking the news can be an excellent way to find the information that companies are reluctant to publish themselves, especially when it comes to setbacks or problems. 

Public filings and reports 

If a company is publicly traded, by law it must file reporting for investors. These reports consist mainly of financial information but also indicate the company’s near-term intentions and plans.

Such documents can make for heavy reading. However, they offer a great deal of insight into the true state of affairs because of the strict legal requirements that publicly traded companies must follow.

You can learn about the company’s outlook and risks, as well as get inspiration for questions about big-picture plans. For example, how important is the product you plan to work on for the company’s long-term future?

↓ Take this one for example:

→ Reading between the lines: what Slack didn’t disclose in its IPO filing

Product study

Does the company make a B2C product? Be sure to try it out. If the product is inaccessible for whatever reason, ask friends about their experience.

Also, if you can, try to learn about the development history of the product. And then repeat this for products from the company’s main competitors.

↓ Take a look:

→ How to estimate the revenue, downloads and audience of a competitor’s app?

Market / competitor research

Now comes the logical continuation of the product study you’ve just done: instead of looking just at products, learn about the market and main competitors.

What are the trends on this market? Is the market growing or stagnating? What role does the potential employer play? Has that role been increasing? Has the company been involved in any acquisitions?

Once you have done this for the potential employer, repeat this for competitors as well.

↓ You may want to read this:

→ Using data to understand competitive and market dynamics

Employee reviews

Reviews from former and current employees may mention salary bands for different positions, the company’s corporate culture (and perhaps how it differs from what’s claimed publicly), and growth opportunities that may exist. 

You can find this information on sites like Glassdoor .

Bring your own questions

After making notes at each stage, create a list of questions to ask at the interview. Your goal should be to understand how well the potential employer fits your needs and what opportunities you stand to gain from a specific position.

Don’t forget to add questions about product work at the employer-to-be. For example: 

• How is the performance of the product manager and the product team measured at your company? 
• Who can influence the product strategy within the company?
• How is the relationship between the product team and other teams structured? Particularly with regard to engineering, marketing, UX, and sales. 
• What does the product development process look like? 
• What metrics are being tracked at different stages?

Hiring a product manager the right way requires a lot of work from both sides. It’s easy for important points to get overlooked. By referring to these stages and questions, employers and candidates can be better informed about each other.

Don’t forget that interviews cut both ways. Besides the employer making sure about candidate fit, candidates should equally be sure that the employer is right for them. 

Got suggestions?

If you can think of other key steps or questions that belong here, we look forward to incorporating them here so that employers and candidates can make the best decisions. Reach out to us at [email protected] .

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15 Product Manager Interview Questions to Help You Prepare

Learn common questions employers use to identify the skills of candidates. To ace the interview, prepare for these 15 product manager interview questions.

Interviews give product managers the opportunity to highlight their skills, talent, and experience to prospective employers. Critical to the creation, execution, and evaluation of new or improved products or features, product managers are responsible for developing new ideas, creating a strategy for product manufacturing, and determining if improvements can be made. Unsurprisingly, then, employers use interviews to better understand how product managers would perform critical job functions, which will greatly impact their future business. Hiring managers will likely want to see that you're a strategic, skilled, and creative leader with a passion for helping customers and maneuvering challenging situations. 

In this article, you'll review 15 common product manager interview questions and explore strategies for answering each one. Whether you're just entering the field or are a many year veteran of the industry, practicing these questions will help you to confidently enter your next interview.

1. What do you think is the main role of a product manager?

Employers ask this question to understand how you see the role, in order to identify whether your vision of the position aligns with their own. As a result, employers use this as a way of gauging how realistic your expectations are – and to subtly tease out how you might be as a product manager.

How to answer:

Start by quickly outlining the basics of the role. Explain your knowledge about the position's responsibilities, starting with brainstorming for new products or improvements and moving through the process of production and success. Employers may want to know what you value the most. This could be the design process, planning strategy, managing a team, or analyzing data to see how the product could improve. There's no wrong answer if you've researched the position.

2. What's appealing about becoming a product manager at this company? 

Employers ask this question because they want to see how much you know about the company and whether your interests align with their own. At the same time, they also want to see if you'd be enthusiastic about working there and on their products.

Start by demonstrating an in-depth understanding of the company, mentioning the leadership team, how they stand within the industry, and an overview of your favorite product offerings. It’s suggested to pivot to where they're focused: the target audience. As a product manager, your role will include meeting the needs of the company’s customers. Connect your answers with your passion for their mission and customers.   

3. What would your ideal day as a product manager look like? 

Hiring managers like this question because it gives them a glimpse into the ideal working culture of their applicants. As a result, though, this positive question can easily underscore the role’s pain points, so be careful to focus on your favorite parts of being a product manager rather than the most potentially negative qualities. 

Share your favorite aspects of the job, whether it's brainstorming for a product design, overseeing a development plan, launching the product, or pouring over the customer reviews. Keep it light and positive, focusing on concrete details that can give your interviewer a glimpse into your work approach.

4. What changes would you suggest for our main product?

Product managers consistently seek new paths for improvement to meet the needs of the company's customers. As a result, hiring managers like to ask this question, so they can gain a sense of the kind of ideas you might bring to the table if you were hired.

Your answer should show that you’ve studied their product line by describing why their main product has already been successful if that's the case. Discuss what doesn't need to change before getting into a critical review. When sharing any ideas for improvement, connect your suggestions with their customer's pain points. If you don't see room for improvement, be honest and explain why you feel the product is perfect as is. Let them see your creativity and practical reasoning behind your ideas. 

5. Tell us how you'll incorporate data into your role.

Product managers must be comfortable with data analysis since it’s used to understand customer response to a new or improved product. Interviewers ask this question, consequently, because they want to hear about your technical skills and strategic thought process.

Data is used to analyze whether the company has maximized its return on its investment (ROI) of the product. Employers want to see what metrics should be used and how you’ll determine a positive or negative change in that metric. Discuss different metrics—Meta’s Saved Items list, Instagram comments, email list sign-up statistics, and customer interviews—and explain your plan to track and respond appropriately.

6. How do you know if a product is well designed?

Hiring managers ask this question because they want to have a better understanding of your design ethos and thought process. As a product manager, you'll be tasked with shepherding a product from conceptualization to roll-out, so the judgement you use throughout each step of the process is critical – and employers want to know if they can trust you with such a critical role.

Start by talking about the customer since they determine whether the product is designed well. A product is successful when it meets a customer's needs; your experience helps determine that. Share what top product managers look for in terms of excellent design.

7. If a redesign of a product is needed, how would you coordinate it?

This question is about your workplace skills and your ability to strategize within a team. Even junior-level product managers must handle project coordination and have leadership qualities, so use this question as an opportunity to highlight your teamwork and process-think abilities. 

Take your interviewer step-by-step through the redesign process. Start with defining a vision for the redesign using market analysis . You'll then need to use effective communication skills for delegating responsibilities among specialists on your team. Explain how you’ll get the stakeholders to agree and move forward for a better customer experience. 

8. What major challenge will our product department face in the next 12 to 24 months?

All employers want forward-thinking employees, and that's especially true for product managers. This question allows you to highlight your understanding of the industry and any competitive analysis research you've conducted.

It's likely the employer is looking for any trends you've found through your industry research. Discuss the competition and where you see customer preferences and desires in a year. Utilize this chance to place yourself within the company, strategizing dynamic, systematic improvements. Let them see how you're ready to be a member of an evolving team.

Read more: Competitive Product: Definition + How to Analyze One

The AI product development life cycle can differ from the standard. Building AI skills can be an excellent way to set yourself apart from other candidates and stay current with the evolving tech landscape . With IBM's AI Product Manager Professional Certificate , you can learn to apply your leadership skills to the AI product management lifecycle. You'll examine real-world case studies of successful AI integration and develop or strengthen your knowledge of Agile concepts and methodologies . By the end, you'll have earned a Professional Certificate from an industry leader in technology.

9. What's more important: getting a product done on time or getting a product done as planned?

Product managers must juggle the responsibilities of getting products launched according to schedule while having the products meet their design goals. Your interviewer wants to know if you consider deadlines or quality more important. At the same time, they're also testing how flexible or inflexible you are.

Both! A product isn't done if it isn't done as planned, and it's crucial to work within the structures of the company to launch products customers will love. Describe how you will create customer journey maps, roadmaps for your team, and an appropriate overview during the development process. Show how you keep your specialists on track with smaller deadlines and quality control mechanisms.

10. How would you describe our product to a customer?

Employers want you to demonstrate clear communication skills and ability to market to theirs customers. They're also looking to see how you well you understand their product, because a clear grasp of their product is critical to doing the best possible job.

You'll want to connect with the customer's pain points, explain directly how the product can help, and share any quick features that will make them want to learn more. The more you practice answering, the easier it will be during your interview.

11. What aspects of being a product manager do you find most rewarding?

This question is another opportunity to discuss product management from a big-picture perspective. Especially at smaller start-ups, you'll work closely with the people conducting the interview. Be personable and share what motivates you every day. 

Highlight your strengths. Discuss why you're good at balancing the user experience, technical issues, and business-focused decisions. Provide an example of a time during your career when you were successful. Mention how you supported your team during the process and any specific metrics showing how the company benefited.

12. What aspects of the job do you find challenging?

Employers know every candidate will have strengths and weaknesses and they use this question to better understand what yours are. While pretending you're perfect is tempting, the reality is that no one is, so it's best to be honest – while also being strategic.

When responding to this question, make sure to highlight your challenge as well as a solution for it. For example, if you're a go-getter who can get inpatient when projects are delayed, then note that you're starting to build-in more realistic expectations throughout the process. Whatever you say, though, make sure to pair the challenge with a proactive response to how you are working through it now.

13. If people disagree over a product's most important feature, how would you handle it?

Product managers must be strong leaders and decision-makers to develop products as envisioned. How you make decisions will define you as a leader, so employers ask this question to get a better idea of how you would respond to this common workplace occurence.

Discuss how you can use your mediation skills with your team so they can work through the problem rather than have a top-down decision. Disagreement often seeps into emotion, so describe how you can use specific metrics to determine the best direction.

14. What's your strategy for working with engineers and designers? 

Product managers, especially in larger firms, will work with a wide range of specialists. With this interview question, they're asking about how you handle different types of different personalities and positions.

Show your prospective employer that you’re respectful to your team of different professionals. This means you can have a hands-off approach that allows everyone to feel empowered in their roles. As a leader, you'll need to build the confidence and abilities of the people you work with. Share how you plan to communicate in a way that supports everyone.

15. What do you need from the executive team to be successful in this job?

If the company has an executive team interested in product management work, they'll want to support you. But, they won't know what you need to succeed unless you tell them, so use this question as an opportunity to tell them.

Always close your interview positively, so answer this question as if you're already on the team. Keep in mind what the company needs; this may include a budget for online training programs for members of the product team or regular meeting opportunities for strategies and goals. Sometimes, asking for a discussion is enough. Talk about how your goal as the product manager is to work collaboratively to help both the company and its customers find success. 

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Take-home assignments for product management candidates

Jens-Fabian Goetzmann

13 March 2022 ‧ 7 min read

I've recently gone through the process of designing a product management interview process for RevenueCat. This is not the first interview process I've set up from scratch, but one of the questions that comes up every single time is whether a written take-home assignment should be a part of the process.

RevenueCat uses written assignments in most interview processes. However, they are not without criticism . Therefore, I wanted to be deliberate about the whether and how to ask for this kind of homework. In this article, I will walk through some of the pros, cons, and ways to mitigate the cons. At the end, I will also share what I ended up doing (spoiler alert: I did ask for a homework assignment, but it was a little bit different than the usual "design a solution" homework).

The drawbacks of take-home assignments

Let's start with all the reasons that speak against giving candidates written assignments.

Firstly and perhaps most obviously, take-home assignments require time , and often the response will be better the more time the candidate was able to invest. This biases against anyone who has less free time at their disposal – candidates with children, for example. Therefore, take-home assignments could be considered non-inclusive.

These assignments can also feel like free work . I am personally of the opinion that they never actually are free work , because the responses are unlikely to contain truly novel ideas and even if they do, the hard work is not the idea but fleshing it out and implementing it. However, the candidate might feel differently and therefore you might put off some good candidates by giving an assignment.

Assignments can also feel like an uneven burden . In interviews, the candidate and the interviewer spend the same amount of time on the interview. In assignments, the candidate spends much more time writing than the recipient will spend reviewing.

There is also the risk of cheating on an assignment by soliciting help, which might reduce the validity of the signal you get from an assignment.

There are also some specific points that make the responses to a written assignment not comparable with how a product manager would work in real life. Firstly, the candidate will have much less context than any real life product manager would have. Perhaps most importantly, they will not have access to customers to discover actual problems and solutions to those problems, which is arguably more important than having good-sounding ideas in isolation.

In addition, the more domain knowledge is required for (or helpful in) responding to the assignment, the more you might inadvertently filter out candidates who are great product managers (or have high potential for it) in favor of domain experts with poor product management skills.

Written assignments also completely disregard the fact that product management is a team sport . Asking a product manager to design a solution in the absence of a product designer is something that wouldn't happen in any but the smallest teams. You want to hire a product manager who can effectively collaborate with a designer to discover and design a solution, not someone who believes they have to know all the answers themselves.

The benefits of take-home assignments

Let's now look at what speaks for giving out take-home assignments.

Firstly, written assignment give better signal about how candidates think and deliberate . Interviews only give you signal on how well candidates can think on their feet. Most actual product management work, however, is done with the ability to research, reflect and form an opinion, not having to come up with solutions on the spot. In most circumstances, you would rather hire someone who comes up with great solutions with a bit of time than someone who comes up with just good ones on the spot.

Written assignments also test structuring problems and written communication . These skills are always important for product managers, but particularly so in today's remote and asynchronous work environment.

The assignment also acts as a filtering function for the candidate's interest . While this is to be taken with a grain of salt (because of the fact that different candidates may have different levels of free time available), you can say that candidates who are more interested in the domain will be naturally more diligent and thoughtful about their responses.

An interesting corollary to the previous point is that for candidates who are more interested in the domain and the problem you are solving (the “missionaries”), the assignment can actually generate additional excitement about the opportunity. These candidates will likely find working on the problem so intrinsically motivating that it gives them energy rather than draining it.

Lastly, take-home assignments can be a great way for candidates who are not currently in a product management position to show off their potential and their product sense. The best way to ask interview questions is often behavioral (“tell me about a time you…”), which can be tricky for candidates that aren't currently in a role where they can showcase a lot of product sense.

Alternatives and mitigation

Some of these drawbacks can me avoided or mitigated depending on how the take-home assignment is designed. Here are some options to consider.

If you just want to test written communication, you could just ask candidates for a writing sample , which allows them to reuse a work product they've already produced and therefore reduces the time investment that's required. Of course, this approach limits some of the benefits of the take-home assignment.

In a similar vein, you could ask candidates to give a presentation about one of their previous projects instead. This is often done in interview processes for designers ( portfolio review ). The biggest challenges with this approach are that product management can differ widely between different companies, and it also biases against candidates who haven't been in product management before.

Several of the drawbacks can be addressed by assigning a problem that isn't related to the company's own product, but rather a third party product . This makes it clear that the assignment isn't “free work”, and it also levels the playing field in terms of domain knowledge. However, it makes it harder to filter for candidates with enthusiasm for the space.

To reduce bias against candidates with less free time, it generally makes sense to time-box and/or length-box the assignment (i.e., “spend no more than 2 hours on this” or “submit no more than 2 pages”). Of course, you can't enforce a time-box, and a length-box is an imperfect substitute (in general, short documents are harder to write than long ones, so the more time you invest, the better a short document will get).

To make the assignment more alike real product management work, you can provide contextual information as part of the assignment that candidates have to analyze, for example, customer quotes or data points. On the flip side, the more information you include, the more time it will require from candidates to process that information before even starting to write.

More generally, it is often a good idea to limit the amount of domain knowledge required in the assignment (unless you absolutely need to hire a domain expert). Even if the assignment is about your own product, there are surely some product questions that are easier to answer without deep domain knowledge than others.

To avoid asking for activities that a product manager would never do without collaborating with their team members, consider not asking them to design a solution . Instead, you could ask for researching an opportunity, drafting a strategy, or writing up a one-pager for a mission or initiative.

Lastly, let's talk about some ideas to avoid the assignment feeling like “free work” or an uneven burden where the candidate invests a lot of time without receiving anything in return. Placing the assignment step late in the process (i.e., after panel interviews) is one way to achieve this. It does, however, reduce the leverage it provides for the process.

You can also make sure to provide detailed feedback or ensure to always have one face-to-face discussion after the assignment, even in the case that the assignment wasn't strong.

Finally, as an even more extreme measure, you could monetarily compensate people for their time spent on the assignment.

What we ended up deciding at RevenueCat

As with any tradeoff decision, there isn't a perfect solution for product manager take-home assignments. You can optimize for one aspect or another and give different weight to the various pros and cons. Here's what we ended up deciding for our recent product management role at RevenueCat.

Firstly, we did ask candidates to complete an assignment. Being a fully remote, globally distributed company, the ability to communicate well in writing was too critical a skill to not test for. We did not go for one of the alternative ways to test written communication (writing sample, portfolio review), because it makes different candidates harder to compare and it also biases against candidates who may not have something as impressive to show for reasons unrelated to their own performance.

We also chose to make the assignment about our own product, mostly for the reason of filtering for as well as spurring additional excitement for our domain. We did, however, push the assignment back in the process past the panel interview, so that it would feel more like a conclusion of the process instead of free work. Interestingly, the filtering function worked quite well in the sense that one candidate withdrew his application after seeing the assignment, stating that he didn't have as much interest in the space as he initially thought. I consider this a feature, not a bug – better to have found that out by means of the assignment than after joining the company!

In terms of the actual content of the assignment, we moved away from the typical "design a solution" prompt, because that's not something a product manager should ever do in isolation. Instead, we asked the candidates to come up with a 1-2 page proposal for how to break down and start operationalizing one of our strategic focus areas. The candidates had been given some context for the focus area in the interviews, and the assignment itself provided additional context as well. In addition to that overall prompt, we also included some guiding questions that we expected the candidates to cover (for example, “What information would you collect and how?” or “What risks do you see and how would you mitigate them?”).

The advantage of this kind of assignment, from my perspective, is that this is precisely the kind of work that I would expect product managers to do independently when tackling a new area. In real life, they would of course have more time and access to more information, but they would still have to start somewhere. This kind of assignment gives the candidates the ability to show how they would break down such an ambiguous and big problem into pieces that are small enough to handle.

Asking this kind of assignment question was a bit of an experiment, but one that turned out well so far. We will probably keep experimenting with this approach and further refine it.

Before wrapping up, I want to share one last aspect about written assignments that I have found absolutely crucial. Before looking at the first completed assignment, develop a list of questions to grade the assignment by. I don't just mean the general assessment rubric (e.g.,”clarity of communication”), but concrete and specific questions (e.g., “does the candidate identify trade-offs and do they make reasonable trade-off decisions?”). This allows a more objective assessment and comparison between different candidates' responses. It also ensures that compelling writing doesn't paper over the fact that a candidate hasn't covered all crucial aspects of the assignment.

I hope you found this article useful. If you did, feel free to follow me on Twitter where I share thoughts and articles on product management and leadership.

About Jens-Fabian Goetzmann

I am currently Head of Product at RevenueCat . Previously, I worked at 8fit , Microsoft , BCG , and co-founded two now-defunct startups. More information on my social media channels .

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101+ Product Manager Interview Questions You Should Know About

There’s no doubt that the product manager interview process for everyone has changed over the last year. Gone are the days of lunch meet-and-greets and office tours.  Although Zoom may have taken the place of those in-person meetings, the product manager job interview process itself remains intact at a fundamental level. 

To help navigate the journey of finding a new product manager job, we’ve compiled this list of the most popular product manager interview questions of 2021.  With over 100 questions to practice with, you’ll be prepared and ready to rock your interviews.  

What to Expect from a Product Manager Job Interview Process

Product manager interviews (and the processes for those interviews) can look different at different companies but, at its core, you’ll find yourself following the same steps.  Let’s start from the top. 

Taking the Leap: The first step in a product manager interview process is arguably the most important.  Deciding WHERE to apply is not only how to kick off the interview process, it’s how you determine what the next chapter in your career is going to be.  As for me, I look for a company whose mission and values align with my own and a company whose product I’d be excited to work on. Find what you feel is right for you. 

Phone Screen : Once you’ve chosen where to apply and sent out your resume, you can expect an email with either (basically) “thanks, but not at this time” or a request for a phone screen, likely from a recruiter or HR rep.  This is where you’ll discuss your background, what you’re looking for as a next step, and why you were attracted to that particular product manager role. The purpose here is to filter out candidates who can be identified as not a good fit right away. 

Product Manager Interview with Hiring Manager : In what now feels like “the olden days” (am I becoming my grandparents?), the next step would be some sort of on-site interview with the hiring manager and several others. In a COVID world, this step will be a video interview.  Some companies will split the hiring manager and other team members into two or more days/steps, but a lot try to get it done in a single day in order to save time in the overall product manager interview process.  This is the step where you’ll showcase your product manager skills and strengths.  You’ll answer product manager interview questions and discuss what value you can add to the company. 

Take-Home Assignment : Not all companies incorporate a take-home assignment but if they, this is the place in the product manager interview process where it would likely take place.  As someone who has interviewed frequently, I’ve encountered only two companies with a take-home assignment.  What the hiring team is looking for in a take-home assignment is your ability to strategize, create a plan, and the process you use to identify and solve problems. 

Final Interview : If you’ve been given a take-home assignment, you’ll likely have a follow-up interview to walk through it.  The interviewer (likely the hiring manager) will discuss the assignment with you and give you an opportunity to explain your process in more detail.  

You made it! : If you’ve made it through and the team sees you as the right person for the job, you’ll get a call from either HR or the hiring manager.  This is the part of the product manager interview process where you’ll discuss numbers and benefits, what your specific title will be, and negotiate.  Congratulations! 

What do companies look for in a new Product Manager?

Whether you’re looking for a junior product manager or the Chief Product Officer, the qualities of a good product manager remain the same: customer obsessed, empathetic, strategic thinker, collaborative, analytical, a great communicator, and insightful.  The product manager is the glue that holds the organization all together.  As a product manager, you touch sales, customer success, development, customers themselves, user experience, leadership, pricing, and even depending on the size and structure of the organization. A company hiring a product manager at any level will be looking for a mixture of these skills. 

The Ultimate List (100+) of Product Manager Interview Questions

We’ve compiled over 100 product manager interview questions to give you an idea of what you can expect in a product manager interview.  These questions will help the interviewer understand your skills as a product manager, the processes you use to solve problems and strategize, how you work with a team, and your technical knowledge. 

General Product Manager Interview Questions

• Describe a situation in which you had to arrive at a compromise or help others to compromise. What was your role? What steps did you take? What was the result?
• Describe a time you wish you had handled a difficult situation differently with a colleague.
• Tell me about the first job you’ve ever had. What did you do to learn and acclimate yourself to the environment/role?
• Describe a time that a project failed and what you did to recover?
• Tell me about a time of change over which you had no control and how you adapted?
• Tell me about a time your responsibilities got a little overwhelming and you couldn’t complete everything on your list. 
• When you set a goal for yourself, what steps do you take to get over the finish line?
• Describe how you have balanced a situation that required you to do a number of things at the same time. 
• Give me an example of a business decision you made that you ultimately regretted.  What did you learn from it?
• Tell me about a particular work-related setback you have faced and what you did to turn things around?
• What is a piece of negative feedback that you’ve received and how did you react?
• Give me an example of a time when you were told ‘no’ by a manager and how did you react?

Product Management

• What is one way you impacted a previous company as a product manager?
• What has been a mistake you’ve made as a product manager?
• How would you explain the role of a product manager to a stranger?
• What do you love most about being a product manager?
• What don’t you love about being a product manager?
• What do you believe are the best qualities of a product manager? 
• What is something you’re actively working on to improve your skills as a product manager?
• Walk me through a successful product launch and the steps you took to get there. Is there anything you’d have done differently? 
• Talk to me about how you manage a feature from conception to launch.
• How do you define an excellent user experience?

Roadmap/Prioritization

• How did you manage the roadmap for one of your previous products?
• What do you do when you and a member of leadership disagree about the roadmap? 
• Imagine a member of leadership comes to you and tells you to add a new feature to your roadmap.  What do you do? 
• How do you make sure that every team member is aligned regarding the product roadmap?
• What information do you use to inform your roadmap?
• How do you prioritize customers’ varying needs?
• Give me an example of a time when you had to make a decision on prioritizing two equally important features. How did you determine which to do first?
• What was the hardest decision you had to make regarding priority/roadmap?
• Have you ever had to cut a feature, even if it would make your product more usable, for priority reasons? How did you approach the subject with stakeholders?
• How do you know when to cut corners to get a product or feature shipped? How do you decide what gets cut?
• Imagine you are mid-sprint and the CEO comes to you and asks for a new feature/change to be made to an existing feature.  What do you do?
• How do you avoid scope creep?

Customer / Users  

• What is your process for gathering feedback from product users? 
• Have you used any tools or frameworks to gather feedback/survey customers? 
• What motivates you to build better solutions to people in our industry?
• Give me an example of a time when you did not meet a client’s expectation and how you rectified the situation?
• Give me an example of a time when you had a frustrated customer and how you diffused the situation?

Communication

• How would you describe product management to someone that doesn’t work in technology? 
• How do you communicate with different audiences, e.g. executive leadership or a development-focused engineer?
• Describe a time when you were able to successfully persuade someone to see things your way.
• Give me an example of when you failed to convince your manager of something?
• Describe a time when you were the resident technical expert and you had to explain something in a way everyone was able to understand you?
• Tell me about a time when you had to rely on written communication to get your ideas across to your team.
• Tell me about a time you needed to get information from someone that was not responsive.
• Tell me about a successful presentation or demo you gave and why it was well-received.
• Have you ever had to “sell” an idea to your team?
• How do you tell someone no?

Cross-Functional Teamwork

• How do you motivate your team?
• How do you involve the development team with the product vision?
• Tell me about a project that required you to influence people that did not report to you.
• Tell me about your role on your current (or a recent) team and how you work together to achieve a common goal.
• What’s your favorite product you’ve ever worked on and why?

Product Leadership Interview Questions

• What was the biggest mistake you have made when delegating work as part of a team project?
• Tell me about a time when you had to help settle a conflict between team members. 
• Describe a time when you saw a problem and took the initiative to correct it.
• What have been the greatest challenges you have faced in building/growing a team?
• Describe a time when you were not only responsible for leading a team, but also for taking part in the day-to-day responsibilities and how you were able to balance your time.
• Describe your management style.

Analytical Product Manager Interview Questions

Guesstimation.

• How do you balance gut feeling with the use of data?
• Have you ever had to make a decision without all the information you needed?  How did you handle it?
• How would you go about determining how many cat owners there are in Ohio?

Product Metrics

• What is the most important KPI for your product (or a recent one) and why?
• What metrics do you use to measure a product’s success?
• What tools have you used to measure KPIs? 
• Give an example of a project or situation that demonstrates your analytical skills. What was your role?
• What is one thing you learned from your last product launch?
• Tell me about a time when you had to analyze information to make a decision/recommendation. 
• What is an example of a problem that you have solved in a unique or creative way. What was the outcome?
• How do you develop a product strategy? What frameworks/processes do you use?
• What is an example of an innovative idea you brought to the team? 
• Tell me about a project you initiated and the outcome.
• What’s something you’d change about a product that you love?
• How do you go about determining a pricing strategy? 

Technical Product Manager Interview Questions

• What level is the importance of including the engineering team as a stakeholder? 
• What is a technical solution that you designed with engineers that became a product or feature? 
• How do you incorporate quality assurance (QA) practices into the product development process?
• What process/framework do you use to translate strategic/roadmap ideas into technical requirements? 
• What development methodology do you have the most experience with?  What is your preferred methodology? 
• How do you ensure that stakeholders and business teams fully understand technical challenges?

Product Manager Interview Questions: Interpersonal Skills 

• What types of people do you work best with?
• Describe a situation where you had to work closely with someone with a different personality than yours.
• Give me an example of a time you faced a conflict while working on a team and how you worked through it.
• Tell me about a time where team members disagreed with your ideas on a project.
• Think about a manager you’ve worked well with. What about the relationship that made it successful?
• Think about a time when you had to work with someone who was difficult to get along with. How did you effectively work together and how did the relationship progress?
• How do you build relationships with business partners and team members?

Amazon Product Manager Interview Questions 

• From start to finish, explain what you did to complete a project. 
• How can you translate your skills towards Amazon? 
• Explain a time where you faced a difficult task and had to choose between two competing results.
• Tell me about the most innovative project you worked on.
• Tell me about a time when you gave a simple solution to a complex problem. 
• Give me an example of when you made a decision without all the data necessary to make the decision. 

Source: https://www.glassdoor.com/Interview/Amazon-Interview-Questions-E6036.htm  

Product Manager Career Development Interview Questions

• When you set a goal for yourself, how do you go about achieving it? How do you measure your progress along the way?
• What obstacles have you encountered in your career progression and how did you overcome them?
• Tell me about a professional goal that you set for yourself that you did not reach and why.
• How does this opportunity fit into your overall career trajectory?

Product Manager Interview Questions: Ask the Interviewer

• What top 3 skills are you looking for in a candidate? 
• When was the last time you talked with a customer?  How often do you typically talk with customers?
• What was the last feature you launched?  How did you measure its success? 
• What do you envision a “day in the life” looks like for this particular role? 
• What does the product team/org look like here and how long has it been this way?

Conclusion/Final Points/key takeaways

Whew, that’s a lot of questions!  You won’t get asked all of them in a single interview, but having a prepared answer will give you the confidence to ensure you’re showcasing your value as a product manager.  When you get ready to sit down for a virtual interview, make sure you’re in a quiet space free from background noise and distractions.  (Side note: This can be difficult for parents trying to balance childcare.  A tactic I have used is literally locking myself in a room since my husband is also working at home and can take over for a while.  If you can’t do that, screen time for the win (thanks, Pokemon). Bottom line – just do your best. We’re all working with what we got.)

Once you’ve gone through the product manager interview process, you’ll want to send a quick follow-up email to your interviewers (or, the recruiter if you don’t have everyone’s email addresses).  Keep it short and sweet, thanking them for the opportunity to chat.  

Best of luck on your hunt! 

daniekaraplis

About the author

Danie Karaplis has been a member of the Cleveland tech family for about 10 years. As a Product Manager, she has launched products in both large corporations and start-up SaaS companies. She’s lead teams through product transformations, launched products that improve lives, and built product departments and teams from the ground up. Currently, she is Treasurer of getWITit Cleveland, a speaker, and homeschool teacher to her 5-year-old son.

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Product Manager Interview Guide - Questions & Tips

Looking to prepare for Product Manager interviews but don’t know where to start? Don’t worry, you’ve come to the right place!

This article summarizes all you need to know about Product Manager Interviews – from recruitment criteria, interview process, interview question types, to instant performance-hacking interview tips. Of all these parts, I deep-dived into interview question types by explaining the logic behind each type and showing you detailed steps to tackle them. Let’s dive in!

Table of Contents

What do recruiters look for in Product Manager interviews?

As Product Managers are responsible for creating new products or features that fulfill both customers’ needs and key business objectives, at the minimum, recruiters look for candidates who exhibit intuition for customer needs, and can combine it with data insights to make informed product decisions.

In addition to these basic skills, other criteria include: exceptional problem-solving skills, prioritization skills, leadership skills, strategic decision-making skills, and design thinking. Of course, you’re also expected to understand the organization you’re applying to and their products. 

Before going into Product Manager interviews, you should have a clear understanding of what Product Managers do, and what separates the average from the exceptional, which I cover below. I’ve also linked to two insightful articles going more in-depth into the roles and qualities of great Product Managers.

No.1: What do Product Managers do?

A Product Manager (PM) creates new products or features by first identifying customers’ needs and key business objectives. Based on these criteria, they design a vision of success for the product or feature, then assemble a team to realize this vision. While Product Managers oversee many steps of the process, from research, design, testing, to go-to market strategies, their key function is to decide what to build and in what order.

So what does it take to become a great Product Manager?

No.2: What makes a great Product Manager?

At the minimum, every Product Managers should be able to (1) draw customer insights through customer research (customer knowledge), (2) make data-driven decisions (data proficiency), and (3) create clear product requirements that match the capabilities of their team members (product requirements). Great product managers exhibit exceptional problem-solving skills, prioritization skills, leadership skills, strategic decision-making skills, and design thinking, in addition to these foundational skills.

Source: What makes for a good product manager

Product Manager interview process

At large tech companies (Google, Facebook, Amazon), the Product Manager interview process typically lasts 2 weeks. Most companies require four interview rounds: Phone screening (15 minutes), video interviews (45 minutes each), take-home assignment (3-6 hours to complete), and on-site interviews (45 minutes each). You should expect additional coding interviews at some companies.

Round 1: Phone screening (15 minutes)

The purpose of this round is to filter out candidates who do not meet the minimum requirements of the job. Often, an HR team member will contact you for a 15-minute call, and ask questions pertaining to your background/ resume. The screener may also discuss job requirements and inquire about your expectations for the job. The phone screening will unfold more in a conversational manner than an interview manner.

Round 2: Video interviews (45 minutes each)

If you’re deemed a right fit, you’ll go through one or more rounds of video interviews that last around 45 minutes each, usually with your potential manager. The interviewer will often assess your skills and experiences against specific job requirements in this round. Questions for PMs will usually fall into the following categories: behavioural, technical, analytical, product sense, and strategy. 

Round 3: Take-home assignments (3-6 hours to complete)

If you successfully pass your video interviews, you’ll be given take-home assignments, consisting of 3-4 questions, which you’ll typically submit before the on-site interviews. A typical take-home assignment presents several product problems, sometimes with associating data packs for highly data-oriented roles. There are three main types of problem-solving questions in take-home assignments: behavioural questions, product design/improvement questions (case-based), and analytical questions. 

Round 4: On-site interviews (45 minutes each)

Finally, you’ll go through on-site interviews – the most decisive part of the interview process. This is basically an interactive version of the take-home assignments, containing case-based problem-solving questions that evaluate your analytical problem-solving abilities.

Afterall, what Product Managers do is essentially persistent problem-solving. Below, I broke down the different problem-solving question types frequently asked in Product Manager interviews. We’ll look at the logic behind each question and how you can approach them. Let’s dive in!

Product Manager interview question types & examples (with answers)

Now that you are clear about Product Manager interviews’ expectations and process, let’s look at the different types of frequently asked questions in on-site interviews. Broadly, there are two main categories of interview questions – problem-solving questions and behavioural questions.

Below, I further broke down the problem-solving questions category into two types (type 1, type 2, type 3). This is because each type tests different skills, has different logic, and hence different approaches. For each type of question, we will look at what different skills are tested, some example questions, and how to tackle each question type. What is the share of each question type?

Type 1: Product design and/or improvement questions

1.1. Purpose:

This question type tests your creative problem solving ability, analytical thinking, and communication skills. When asking these questions, interviewers mainly assess your problem-solving process, or how you approach the problem. This is similar to case interviews, the type of interview used by management consulting firms.

Oftentimes, you will not be given questions in familiar areas, such as “Design a new food-ordering app”. Companies often choose areas out of your comfort zone to observe how you react to new product problems, and how creative you are with the solutions.

1.2. Sample questions:

For example, here are a few product design questions often asked at Google and Facebook, according to Glassdoor:

• Design a navigation product for blind people
• Design an app for the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV)
• Design a pen for an astronaut
• Design a phone for deaf people
• Design a dictionary lookup for scrabble
• Design an app for a community of Celiac’s disease patients
• Design a bike-based delivery service
• Design an elevator
• Design an alarm clock
• Design a new computer keyboard
• Design Google radio
• Design Google search 
• How would you improve Facebook?
• How would you improve Google Pay?
• How would you improve coffee machines used in offices?
• How would you improve throughput at an airport?
• Pick your favorite app. How would you improve it?

 1.3. How to tackle:

For this question type, interviewers will most likely want to see a structured and coherent answer. Because you’ll likely be given difficult questions, a well-structured, clearly-communicated answer shows your ability to think analytically, solve challenging problems, and deliver solutions under time-pressure.

Whenever you need to structure an answer, I recommend using frameworks. A word of warning: always customize frameworks to the specific question asked, and never mention the framework’s name (framework-vomiting) in actual interviews. Otherwise, you’ll come out as extra rigid and bookish.

Specific to the product design/improvement question type, you should follow the 3-step BUS framework, which stands for Business Objective, User Problems, and Solution. The approach here is to start with the business objective in mind, analyze user problems, then recommend solutions. 

Step 1: (B) Business objective:

Whether you’re designing a new product or improving a product feature, the first step is to clearly understand what the business is trying to achieve, or knowing the overall business objectives. Designing a new product with clear business goals in mind ensures that it will satisfy these goals.

For example, suppose the interviewer asks you to redesign an app for deaf people, what clarification questions relating to business objectives should you ask? Here are three:

• Why does redesigning this app matter to the business? Is the current state of the app affecting revenue, or cost? 
• How do we know that’s a problem? (low conversion/retention/engagements, etc?)
• What are the business expectations for product redesign? (increase engagement/ downloads/retention, ect?)
• Do we already have a target user in mind or is that something we should explore/discuss?

Step 2: (U) User problems:

The second step when designing/ improving a product is to identify possible user problems. And I’m talking about the big, fundamental problems, not the symptomatic ones. For example, if you’re asked “How do you improve Gmail”, a big problem to look at should be storage, not the fonts or sidebar colors.

It’s also not very effective to list out user problems in an unstructured fashion. Instead, you should approach them with the following steps:

• #1. Select a user type: identify the different types of user for your product and select one that is causing the business problem. You can find these answers by doing user interviews, ethnographic studies, diary studies, quantitative metrics, etc.
• #2. Identify user problems: after selecting your user type, list out some problems you believe this type of user is facing. You can confirm your beliefs using the methods mentioned above. It’s important to understand what really constitutes these problems by being aware of surface-level problems.
• #3. Prioritize user problems: finally, you should prioritize user problems using some kind of metric, for example, how painful the problem is to your selected group of users.

Step 3: (S) Solution: 

Keep in mind that if at this point the B or U of your framework is wrong, your solution is almost guaranteed to fail. If you don’t fully understand what problem you’re solving, you will most likely make something nobody wants!

After having a clear picture of what you’re trying to solve and achieve, you can generate solutions by following these three steps:

• List solutions: draw a table with two columns, one listing the problems you’ve identified and one listing out potential solutions for each problem. 
• Prioritize solutions: a common way to prioritize solutions is to grade each of them on two criteria: (1) how much value they would deliver for the user, (2) and how easy they are to implement. After deciding on solutions, you should also talk about tradeoffs – the forgone benefits of other solutions that you did not choose. 

Type 2: Analytical questions (market sizing and/or guesstimate questions)

2.1. Purpose:

  The purpose of this question type is to test your analytical thinking skills. As a Product Manager, you’ll constantly make decisions based on reports, numbers, data, surveys, especially at the beginning research process, which requires analytical skills.

Companies test this by giving you estimation problems ( market-sizing and/or guesstimation ) to see if you can break them down into smaller parts and solve each of them, in a structured fashion.

2.2. Sample questions:

Before moving on, I highly recommend you to check out this video where I explain everything you need to know about estimation questions. With that said, here are some examples of market-sizing and guesstimation questions:

Example market-sizing questions:

• How many pick-up trucks are sold in the USA each year?
• What is the total annual sales of the global laptop market?
• What is the size of the second-hand car market in Japan?
• How much revenue does your favorite restaurant make each month?
• If you open a lemonade stand, how much money can you get from it?

Example guesstimate questions:

• How many tennis balls can fit inside a Boeing 747?
• How many trees are there in Manhattan’s Central Park?
• How many bottles of champagne are there in France right now?
• How many weddings are being performed in New York at the moment?
• How many liters of white paint does it take to paint the White House?

2.3. How to tackle: 

There are 4 steps to answer market-sizing and guesstimate questions, which I briefly summarize below. Alternatively, check out the comprehensive guide here.

Step 1: Clarify all unclear terms in the question to make sure you’re on the same page with the interviewer on every detail of the question

Step 2: Break the number down into 3-5 small, easy-to-estimate pieces

Step 3: Estimate each piece using math and background knowledge

Step 4: Consolidate the pieces to arrive at the final result

These steps will only make sense under the context of a problem, so I’ll walk you through each step using the following example. Let’s assume you’re asked this question:

What is the smartphone market size in Germany?

The first step is to clarify the ambiguous points. In the given example, at least four points need to be clarified.

• What is a smartphone?
• What is the unit of measurement?
• What is the timeframe to measure the market size?
• At which point in time is the market size measured? 

For the sake of demonstration, suppose we receive these clarifications:

• A smartphone is a phone exclusively using a touchscreen, i.e without a physical keyboard.
• The unit of measurement is the number of smartphones sold to end consumers.
• The timeframe used is annual.
• The question concerns the German market size at present.

The second step is to break the problem down into pieces small enough to estimate reasonably. Each small piece has to be easier to estimate than the big piece – if you can’t estimate the small pieces, you’re not breaking down enough, or you’re doing it wrong.

In the example question, we can break down the “number of smartphones sold to end consumers” into four determinants:

• The size of the German population
• The percentage of mobile phone owners within the German population.
• The percentage of smartphone owners within German mobile phone owners.
• The average lifespan of smartphones in Germany.

The growth of the market will not be included because Germany’s population is stable and the smartphone market there is already saturated.

The third step is to solve each piece independently.

Here are some quick guesstimates for the German smartphone market:

• Germany’s population is 80 million
• The percentage of mobile phone owners is 80% (assuming German life expectancy is 80, the population is evenly distributed across age groups and they own mobile phones from age 15)
• The percentage of smartphone owners is 95% (assuming only 5% own mobile phone owners choose a “keyboard phone” since Germany is a developed country)
• The average lifespan of smartphones in Germany is 2.5 years (so the average consumer “uses” 0.4 phones every year)

In the fourth step, we will use calculations to consolidate the pieces into one final answer. Quick mental math is essential for this step – if your math is too slow, you will bore the interviewer to death. I wrote a separate article to help you with just that.

Here are the calculations for the example:

• Germany’s population: 80 million
• The number of mobile phone owners: 80 million x 80% = 64 million
• The number of smartphone owners: 64 million x 95% = 60 million
• Total annual unit sales of smartphone in Germany: 60 million x 0.4 = 24 million

In reality, 22.9 million smartphones were sold in Germany in 2020.

Getting this close is good, but in a real case interview, don’t try too hard to get the right number. I repeat: the only thing that matters is a structured approach.

Type 3: Product strategy and roadmap questions

3.1. Purpose:

  A  product roadmap encapsulates the product strategy. It showcases how the organization will implement plans. Hence, product roadmap & strategy questions ask you to (1) set product vision for key user problems and (2) roadmap to deliver it. These questions assess your ability to think through the wide range of aspects good PMs need to take into account when making product decisions. This includes competition, pricing, marketing, time to market, etc. Interviewers will expect you to take a structured approach to these aspects and be creative.

3.2. Sample questions:

• Imagine you’re a PM of Flipkart, can you build a 6-month or a 12-month roadmap for this product with your vision given what you know about payments products?
• Google has invented a technology that makes air travel 4x cheaper and 4x faster. What do you do with it?
• You are the CEO of company X. What new products would you launch and why?
• How would you increase the number of users on Youtube?
• If you were CEO of Microsoft, how would you increase usage for Internet Explorer?
• How would you prevent cyberbullying on Reddit?
• Why is Android strategic for Google?
• Tell me about a competitive move by a company in the past six months and what you think about it
• Should Samsung enter the gaming console market?
• Why is Google well-positioned for emerging markets?
• Should Google go into the ridesharing market?

3.3. How to tackle

Strategy questions basically ask you to do two things: (1) develop a vision for your product with good justifications and (2) describe the steps to realize that vision. This is equivalent to answering two questions: (1) “What is your product vision and why?” and (2) “How are you going to implement that vision?”.

Sometimes, the answer to the first question is given and your job is to figure out the second, but sometimes you need to answer both. Here’s how you can approach each question:

• For the first question, the key is to base your vision on the most pressing user problems, i.e. you need to prioritize key user problems. Two factors to logically think about prioritization are “how much impact is this going to have on my user” vs “what are the difficulties in implementing a solution” .
• For the second question, the key is to not worry too much about the implementation timeline. Instead, focus on visualizing every step of your product implementation plan in a structured manner. I recommend drawing an issue tree as you explain your roadmap to the interviewer. Issue trees are great visualization tools, and will make your solutions sound instantly structured.

For example: A restaurant business wishing to increase its profitability may look into the following ideas:

Type 4: Behavioural questions

4.1. Purpose:

In Product Manager interviews, behavioural questions are meant to assess whether a candidate exhibits the required traits to perform well in the role of a Product Manager. Additionally, they will also evaluate a candidate’s fit with the company culture and values (such as leadership ability or achieving mindset).

4.2. Sample questions:

Examples of behavioural Product Manager interview questions are:

• Tell me about a time when you used data to influence/persuade people.
• In layman terms, describe your day to day activities as a Product Manager.
• How would you keep Developers working on a product motivated and turning out quality work?
• You are a PM and you are about to enter the product launch meeting with all stakeholders. How would you prepare for that meeting?
• Tell me a time when you influenced engineering to build a particular feature.
• Describe a complex topic like I’m a high school student. Assume I don’t know anything about it.
• Tell me about a time you failed as a product manager.
• What product would you build if I were to write a blank check for an idea you have?
• Tell me about a time you had a disagreement with a team member.
• How do you know when to cut corners to get a product out the door?
• What is the toughest problem that you have solved as a Product Manager?
• How did you turn an adversary into a confidant?

4.3. Three tips to tackle:

When it comes to behavioural Product Manager questions, the key is to implicitly exhibit the well sought-after product manager traits I outlined above. Broadly, there are three instant tips you can apply:

• Prepare stories, not questions: Many candidates make the mistake of preparing on a per-question basis, i.e listing out the possible questions and the corresponding answers/stories. A much better approach would be to prepare 3-4 detailed, all-round, refined stories exhibiting all the required attributes, then fine-tune the stories according to the interviewer’s questions.
• Implicitly show your product manager traits: To prepare your stories, compare your past experiences with common product manager traits, along with personal values you’re most proud of. Then, select the stories best reflecting those traits and values. You want to show that your values and experiences perfectly match what recruiters look for.
• Use the STAR method: STAR stands for Situation, Task, Action, Result. By structuring your answer based on these four criteria, your answers will sound more structured, logical, and easy for listeners to follow.

Five Product Manager interview instant tips

Below are the five tips you can apply to instantly improve performance in Product Manager interviews. These are the tips drawn from the “how to tackle” section for each question type above, and can be applied to any problem-solving questions you’ll encounter. Let’s dive in!

Tip 1: Ask for time-out to outline your answers 

Whenever you’re asked a product design question or a guesstimate question, avoid answering right away. Instead, ask for a timeout to think through and/or draft your approach to the question. After that, walk the interviewer through the details of your approach. In candidate-led consulting case interviews, we call this “case-opening”. Learn the formula to perfectly open any case here.

Throughout the interview, interviewers might also ask questions to which good answers require careful thinking. In these situations, it’s always a good idea to ask for time-out to ensure your answers are always structured and logical, which signals good communication skills.

Tip 2: Number your items and keep them MECE

When tackling problem-solving questions, you’ll likely encounter two steps (as detailed above): problem listing and solution-listing. For list answers like these, two useful tips you can apply right away is to (1) number each item and (2) keep all items MECE .

First, numbering each item not only makes your answers sound instantly structured, but also makes the items easier to keep track of. Second, keeping all items MECE means ensuring that none of your listed items overlaps, and all of them combined creates a whole. By keeping your items MECE , you avoid repetition and missing items.

MECE is one of those defining concepts of the consulting world , and has applications everywhere. If you’re not familiar with this concept, I highly recommend checking out this comprehensive article , or this video for better visualizations.  

Tip 3: Ask clarification questions

For all problem-solving question types, always make sure to thoroughly understand the problem you’re about to solve. Do so by asking clarification questions before moving on. Often, the best practice is to ask three questions:

1. What’s the objective? 2. What’s the timeline required? 3. Any quantified or well-described goals?

You can scroll back to the “how-to-tackle” section of question type 1 and type 2 for clarification question examples for each type. But to demonstrate my point, let’s suppose we are presented with a problem: “Dave lost his car key”. In tackling this problem, be sure you’re crystal clear about the following points:

1. Objective: Dave in fact just needs to be able to use the car. 2. Timeline: this is an urgent need. Dave is happy only if we can help him within the next hour. 3. Specificity: help the client put his car into normal operation like before he lost the key.

Tip 4: Pause frequently to summarize

Another useful tip is to pause frequently, summarize what you’ve done, where you are, and how you’re going to proceed in solving the given problem.

Problem-solving during interviews can often be stressful, especially in cases where you must process large amounts of information. It’s not uncommon for even the brightest candidate to derail from the objective or forget what they’ve just calculated.

Pausing frequently to summarize gives you a sense of direction and authority while making it easier for the interviewer to follow your case progress. It also makes you sound organized and systematic – a definitive trait of good communicators– and interviewers will love it!

Tip 5: Prepare a script in advance

Finally, it is best to prepare a personal script in advance, especially the part right after the interviewer gave you a problem-solving question. This is the time to deliver a perfect 3-minute case opening that leaves a good impression throughout the interview.

Here’s an example of a good personal script for the product design problem. Use the script after you’ve received the question:

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Product Marketing Manager Interview Guide

Detailed, specific guidance on the Product Marketing Manager interview process - with a breakdown of different stages and interview questions asked at each stage,

The role of Product Marketing Manager

Product Marketing Managers (PMMs) are the linchpin between the product and the market, responsible for a spectrum of functions that are pivotal to a product's lifecycle. They are the architects of product messaging, positioning, and go-to-market strategies, all with the ultimate goal of effectively communicating a product's value.

PMMs essentially act as the bridge between a product and its audience. They bring in invaluable market insights that directly influence how a product is designed and developed.

Key responsibilities of a Product Marketing Manager encompass tasks like conducting thorough market research, creating persuasive product messaging and collateral, planning and orchestrating product launches and marketing campaigns, strategizing product pricing, and continuously providing market feedback to steer the product's evolution.

In terms of remuneration, the base salary for Product Marketing Managers varies, but it typically falls within the range of $124,373 to $157,993.

Interview Process

There are three main rounds to the Meta PMM Interview process:

• Screening with the Recruiter
• Phone Call with a Hiring Manager
• Case Interview/Take-Home Assignment
• Onsite Interview (PMM Competency & Behavioural Rounds)

What are interviewers looking for in PMMs?

• Clear Communication; is vital for conveying product value to teams and customers.
• Empathy; understanding customer issues and creating emotional responses.
• Collaboration; working with various teams and individuals is essential.
• Process and Project Management; handling multiple campaigns efficiently.
• Prioritization; focusing on impactful tasks and campaigns.

Let's discuss the interview process in detail:

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Product marketing manager - recruiter screen.

The recruiter screen is typically the first step in the interview process, lasting around 30 to 45 minutes. Its main purpose is to gauge your potential fit for the PMM role. During this round, you should be prepared for standard behavioral and resume-based questions, such as "Tell me about yourself" or "Why this company?" It's your chance to showcase your qualifications and alignment with the company, so provide a concise yet comprehensive overview of your background, professional experiences, educational qualifications, and relevant achievements.

Product Marketing Manager - Phone/Video call with Hiring Manager

The phone or video call with the hiring manager lasts about 30 minutes. At this stage, they're simply looking for standout applicants who meet their company values and mission. 

So, be prepared for some behavioral questions and others related to product marketing, such as inbound/outbound marketing, product strategy, execution, and so on.

Nail this, and you're on your way to an onsite interview.

Read these articles

Product marketing manager - take-home assignment/case interview.

Case assignments during PMM interviews are quite common at many companies, and they serve a couple of important purposes.

• First, they allow the company to gauge the quality of your work in a real-world scenario. While initial interviews can give them a sense of your skills, these assignments provide a more tangible example of your capabilities.
• Secondly, these assignments help the company understand your thought process and how you approach your work holistically. This can be a valuable insight that doesn't always come through in a standard Q&A interview.

It can be a bit nerve-wracking, but it's a valuable part of the interview process that helps both you and the company understand if you're the right fit for the role.

Typically, a recruiter will send you the assignment, and you'll have a reasonable amount of time to complete it. The goal is to assess your ability to perform tasks relevant to the role you're applying for—these assignments culminate in a final presentation.

As an example, they might task you with analyzing a complex dataset and presenting actionable insights. Or, you could be asked to troubleshoot and provide a solution for a specific technical problem. The time given to complete these assignments typically ranges from a few days to a week, and your final deliverable could be in the form of a written report or a code repository. 

Following this, you'll have the chance to present your findings and discuss your approach with a group of evaluators who will provide feedback.

Product Marketing Manager - Onsite Round

The onsite round comprises a mix of questions—from role-specific questions to behavioral and those analyzing your approach to product marketing, execution, and so on. At some companies, you might also face a portfolio review round.

Let's look at these in detail:

PMM Role-Specific Interview

This round is meant to test your product marketing skills, general marketing knowledge, and as well as your own methods and approaches to creativity and problem-solving. This is done through case-style questions or hypothetical or situational questions where you provide not just an answer but an approach for how you arrived at your answer.

So, questions go something like "Your team is releasing X feature in a product. How would you go about advertising it? Which channels would you use?" OR "How would you finalize the messaging and positioning of a product?'

Your interviewers may probe with further questions, or drill into specific areas of your answer. They want to understand how you might act as a PMM or make decisions as a PMM which will give them a sense of if you would be a fit for the specific role.

The goal here is not to provide one single perfect answer but to have a well-structured one that demonstrates a clear line of thinking and your approach. Throughout the process, show them how you arrive at decisions, how you make sense of vague or limited amounts of information, and how you approach problem-solving.

Interview Questions

Interview Questions:

• Can you outline your approach to transitioning marketing leads into sales opportunities and the key information you provide to the sales team to facilitate the process?
• How do you characterize a successful onboarding process for a product?
• Given your understanding of our products, what strategic priority would you recommend to enhance sales: leading paid campaigns, enhancing user experience, or developing new features?
• Identify a well-designed product with ineffective marketing, and propose alternative marketing strategies to enhance its visibility and appeal.
• Share your strategy for communicating with customers about a new feature launch that involves a price increase and how you would navigate potential concerns.
• Given a two-week delay in a product launch after preparing advertising activities, how would you adjust your marketing strategy to mitigate any potential impact on the campaign?
• How do you measure the success of a product launch event?
• What CRM software do you use and what metrics do you track?
• How do you ensure that the sales team presents the product in the best way to engage customers?
• How do you create messaging and positioning for a product?

Portfolio Review

It's common for companies to request a portfolio of your work. This could be anything from presentations, ebooks, blog posts, etc that you have created, case studies that show your strategic thinking, market research reports, social media campaigns you've managed, and so on.

Some recruiters may provide specific guidelines, but if not, carefully select and send 2-3 high-quality samples of your work. Remember, the goal is to offer a glimpse into your skills and expertise while ensuring the materials reflect the quality of your work. It's a plus if the chosen work aligns with the role's responsibilities. For instance, if the position involves content creation, sharing a well-crafted blog post can demonstrate your capabilities effectively. 

Behavioral/Leadership Interview

Here, they delve deep into your past experiences to gauge how your skills align with the current role. 

The questions in this round are designed to assess your past behaviors and accomplishments and determine how they might impact your future performance. Plus, they use these questions to get a sense of your personality – after all, they want to ensure you're a good fit for the team dynamics. 

During this round, it's important to provide specific examples of your experiences to demonstrate your skills and experience, rather than just listing your qualifications and responsibilities.

Highlight the challenges you faced and how you overcame them to showcase your problem-solving and leadership abilities. You need to show how you have and will contribute to the team's success and collaborate effectively. Or how you can handle multiple priorities, tight deadlines, etc.

• Share an example of how your marketing strategies positively impacted conversion rates in your previous roles.
• Discuss a product you were involved in launching. What target audience did you focus on, and what strategies did you employ for marketing?
• Can you recount a challenging moment in a product marketing campaign? What obstacles did you face, and how did you navigate them to achieve success?
• Describe your approach to collaborating with cross-functional teams for successful product launches. Can you share a specific instance where this collaboration was crucial?
• How do you stay informed about industry trends? Are there specific resources, like conferences or blogs, that you find particularly valuable?
• As a PMM, how do you manage priorities, especially in tight-deadline situations? Can you provide an example of a time when you had to make tough decisions about task prioritization?
• Recall a situation where you had to handle a challenging stakeholder. What was your approach, and what was the ultimate outcome of the interaction?
• How do you integrate industry trends into your marketing strategies? Can you share an example of a successful implementation based on current trends?

Interview with an Executive

If you're lucky, you might land an interview with a big shot like the VP of Product Marketing. Having an executive interview in the PMM process is quite common. When you get to this stage, it's usually a positive sign – these interviews usually happen later in the process when they're seriously considering you for the role.

You can expect questions about your vision for the product, market trends, and how you'd contribute to overall business objectives. 

Just be ready to share your detailed insights, your last experiences, your role-related knowledge, etc— and demonstrate how you align with their goals. This is a chance to showcase your value and make a lasting impression.

Product Marketing Manager Roles and Responsibilities

Following are the roles and responsibilities of PMMs:

• PMMs skillfully leverage market research insights to shape product development, influencing features, user experience, naming, and packaging.
• They lead the charge in developing a meticulous launch strategy for the product, creating accurate and compelling messaging. Additionally, they oversee the production of various content forms, including videos and blog posts.
• Post-product release, they diligently monitor customer feedback and promptly implement necessary adjustments. Furthermore, they devise growth campaigns and provide recommendations for enhancing subsequent product iterations.
• They hold the responsibility of effectively communicating the product's value to potential buyers, clients, and external investors, transcending organizational boundaries.
• PMMs serve as the essential link connecting the product team with the target audience, ensuring alignment with customer expectations.

Skills and Qualifications Required for a PMM

Here are the skills and qualifications required of a PMM:

• Effective written and oral communication abilities
• Substantial experience in both product marketing and development
• In-depth knowledge of market trends and the life cycles of products
• Proven expertise in devising strategic product marketing campaigns
• Demonstrated ability to understand and empathize with diverse perspectives and situations
• Demonstrated adeptness in negotiation strategies. Plus, leadership skills are a must.
• Instinctive grasp of effective delegation of responsibilities
• Extensive track record in crafting customer promotions
• Proficient in web development languages and technologies, including HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
• Skillful in product design techniques, backed by hands-on experience

Frequently Asked Questions

What happens after a successful interview for a UX Designer role?

What can I do to stand out as a candidate during the UX Designer interview process?

How long does the entire interview process for a UX Designer role typically take?

What should I know about the company's design philosophy and user-centered design approach during the interview process?

Are there behavioral or situational interview questions in the process?

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