Random PM Interviews

I will start: 1. Having low hit rate with junior PMs than with leadership level folks (Dir & above) Rant - these PM interviewers with fewer years than me and just 1 org haven't seen enough failures to learn humility or not trained to understand experiences and approach not like theirs. 2. Accidently interviewed with a startup with product leader coming from service IT background - who didn't understand impact, outcome pointers in my resume and was asking if I had PRDs I have made in my personal laptop. Rant - Jesus H Christ. This person thought I didnt understand tech, mocked me for making lofi wireframes in a case submission. Only interview where I told back to the person in their face and in email feedback later - seriously, I have no interest in working in a delivery IT team like theirs. Tata, goodbye and thanks for wasting my day. 3. Product leader being critical that I'm only attracted by shiny projects and keep jumping because of my career break and short stints at startups (macro stuff, startup low hit rate at early stage reasons) - because they worked in a b2b org for 10 years and is in a new place to do the same. Rant - this is after they were poaching me for my prior experience with 2 verticals of products they were trying to build out and me being cleared by their Director, senior PM and HRPB. And have more, but over to you guys to share yours and red flags to lookout for.

What are some intriguing problems/ puzzles you have been subjected to as part of the PM interview process. Format: Role –> Company –> Problem statement –> Outcome

Does anyone else feel like the PM interview process is easily scammable? I feel like 80% of it is a vibe check and 20% is the actual content itself. Am a PM with 3 YoE and have been interviewing around recently. I have 0 preparation for any interview I walk into and have gotten offers from multiple startups. (Not bragging, I'm a good talker) You need to just break down any questions into understandable parts and explain it well enough. Maybe it's imposter syndrome or maybe I'm a little disillusioned with my job. TC : 31 base 4 performance bonus 10 ESOPs

Note - I am a product manager too 4 out of 5 product managers will act all high and mighty of themselves, bragging their way as if they run everything going on in the company, flaunting their business degrees and being utterly disrespectful towards their team( dev design qa name it), Recently started going to office so the attitude I am seeing is very transparent and more visible (more with the higher experience folks) It makes me wanna leave this hyper inflated role, thinking of I will end up like them scares me, and you have to do is speak out jargons in meetings day in day out and have a English accent of Shashi Tharoor. Recently my manager told that this is a role where you have to very representable or very visible and act in floor as if you are the busiest person on earth and I seriously some PMs in company doing that, they walk so fast in floor as if they will fall off or would be better to have 4 legs.

The stupidity and arrogance of some leaders in some companies to use colleges as filter criteria for what is clearly irrelevant for the role. Mostly these idiots end up fucking up company after company creating these neo-casteist groups sucking off and living off each other. This identity based hiring is the start of corporate politics. I still don’t understand how difficult it is for fucking idiots to understand that while hiring for most roles you have to encourage diverse backgrounds at the start of the process to help you hire the right candidate for the long term, specially in a startup. PS I’m not against preferring candidates from certain colleges if it’s relevant. What i do hate is this herd behaviour of trying to hire only from your alumni the moment you are given leadership roles. It must be such shitty experience to work under idiots like these if you are not from their alumni colleges because their biases play into all evaluations they do about their teams.

Lately I have been giving interviews for APM/PM roles, it seems interviewers are looking more on how well you can solve a guesstimate/product design question than what you have done in the past, has anyone gone through a similar phase? Any resources that can be referred for PM interview prep?

Hi PM's I have been a PM for the last 1.5 years before that I had marketing experience after which I took a career change and landed here The work I did in PM till now has been quite focused on execution part but not product/strategy neither I developed any kind of product roadmap or was involved. In job 1 (small company less than 20 workforce) - I spent around 11 months in which I created 3 apps 2 web and one mobile as per business direction and their approach towards customer and market then I changed my job because I was more interested to change my domain since I had spent around 5 years approx in a single domain and also wanting to manage a bit mature product along with to learn product strategy and roadmap and also monetary upgrade I was the only Pm here spearheading everything below me were QA and project co-ordinator and outsourced developers In job 2 (A company with around 400-500 employees) - I have spent around 4 months as a PM here it's a new domain their product is a bit mature has thousands of users but again I feel the same as I felt earlier I have been doing more execution work rather than strategy and roadmap or learn any new skills neither I feel the boss is very helpful and he's is the co-founder of the company. Here also I am the only PM here but tech is inhouse and we have a great bonding in terms of work but everyone feels dissatisfied nor they have learnt anything new since arriving. There are also concerns at company level which I feel are scary that their goal is to optimize costs from everywhere possible and they have not been paying salary on time plus the upper management is also implementing extreme micromanagement on tech and product function as we all feel like we have been just striking list from sheet in terms of development which we are supposed to complete. I am again thinking to switch job but the market is not well as it was few months back I am in a bit of dilemma here on what is right and what is not?

What were some of the trickiest/toughest cases you've been asked in interviews and by which firm? I'm a 22 grad and wanted to get an idea regarding the spectrum of difficulty in interviews since most of mine have been pretty straightforward (guesstimate/ product design / metrics, etc)

Recently gave a PM interview with a b2c saas company. I was asked to do a take home assignment. The interviewer has no intention of conducting the interview. He was late and he looked like he just woke up from sleep. The questions were all over the place. And he didn’t even spent 5 minutes going through the case study I prepared. I don’t know why people take interviews when they are not interested in it. Such a waste of time!!!!

How frequent and important are behavioural questions in PM interviews? I kind of really struggle picking a story at that moment and identify the level of details to be shared. Eventually, I see myself rambling and losing the interviewer. Any experiences or inputs that can help. I’ve gone through resources online for prep but looking for more experiences that worked / didn’t work for people.