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Cracking the PM interview
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CRACKING THE
PM INTERVIEW
How to Land a Product Manager
Job in Technology
Also by Gayle Laakmann McDowell
Cracking the Coding Interview
150 Programming Questions and Solutions
The Google Resume
How to Prepare for a Career and Land a Job at
Apple, Microsoft, Google, or any Top Tech Company
CRACKING THE
PM INTERVIEW
How to Land a Product Manager
Job in Technology
GAYLE LAAKMANN MCDOWELL
Founder and CEO, CareerCup.com
JACKIE BAVARO
Product Manager, Asana
CareerCup, LLC
Palo Alto, CA
CRACKING THE PM INTERVIEW
Copyright © 2014 by CareerCup, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any
manner without written permission except in the case of brief quotations in
critical articles or reviews.
Published by CareerCup, LLC, Palo Alto, CA. Version 1.01391280371759.
For more information, contact [email protected].
978-0984782819 (ISBN 13)
To my little buddy, Davis.
~ Gayle
To Tim, who supports me in all my adventures.
~ Jackie
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
Why does this matter?
Who are we?
What now?
2. The Product Manager Role
What is a PM?
Functions of a PM
Top Myths about Product Management
Project Managers and Program Managers
3. Companies
How the PM Role Varies
Microsoft
Apple
Amazon
Yahoo
Startups
4. Getting the Right Experience
New Grads
Making the Most of Career Fairs
Do you need an MBA?
Why Technical Experience Matters
Transitioning from Engineer to Product Manager
Transitioning from Designer to Product Manager
Transitioning from Other Roles
What Makes a Good Side Project?
5. Career Advancement
Tips and Tricks for Career Advancement
Q & A: Fernando Delgado, Sr. Director, Product Management at Yahoo
Q & A: Ashley Carroll, Senior Director of Product Management, DocuSign
Q & A: Brandon Bray, Principal Group Program Manager, Microsoft
Q & A: Thomas Arend, International Product Lead, Airbnb
Q & A: Johanna Wright, VP at Google
Q & A: Lisa Kostova Ogata, VP of Product at Bright.com
6. Behind the Interview Scenes
Microsoft
Apple
Amazon
Yahoo
Dropbox
7. Resumes
The 15 Second Rule
The Rules
Attributes of a Good PM Resume
What to Include
8. Real Resumes: Before & After
Richard Wang (Anonymized)
Paul Unterberg
Amit Agarwal (Anonymized)
Adam Kazwell
9. Cover Letters
Elements of a Good PM Cover Letter
The Cover Letter Template
A Great Cover Letter
10. Company Research
The Product
The Strategy
The Culture
The Role
The Questions
11. Define Yourself
“Tell Me About Yourself” (The Pitch)
“Why do you want to work here?”
“Why should we hire you?”
“Why are you leaving your current job?”
“What do you like to do in your spare time?”
“Where do you see yourself in five years?”
“What are your strengths and weaknesses?”
Sample Strengths
Sample Weaknesses
12. Behavioral Questions
Why These Questions Are Asked
Preparation
Follow-Up Questions
Types of Behavioral Questions
13. Estimation Questions
Approach
Numbers Cheat Sheet
Tips and Tricks
Example Interview
Sample Questions
14. Product Questions
About the Product Question
Type 1: Designing a Product
Type 2: Improving a Product
Type 3: Favorite Product
Preparation
Tips and Tricks
Sample Questions
15. Case Questions
The Case Question: Consultants vs. PMs
What Interviewers Look For
Useful Frameworks
Product Metrics
Interview Questions
16. Coding Questions
Who Needs To Code
What You Need To Know
How You Are Evaluated
How To Approach
Developing an Algorithm
Additional Questions
Solutions
17. Appendix
Ian McAllister: Top 1% PMs vs. Top 10% PMs
Adam Nash: Be a Great Product Leader
Sachin Rekhi: The Inputs to a Great Product Roadmap
Ken Norton: How to Hire a Product Manager
Amazon Leadership Principles
18. Acknowledgements
Gayle Laakmann McDowell
Jackie Bavaro
Please join us at CrackingThePMInterview.com for additional resources and
information, or to discuss questions with fellow PMs.
Introduction
Chapter 1
Product management is a strange role.
For many roles, getting from point A to point B is pretty obvious. If you want to
get a programming job, you learn how to program. So you go to college for
computer science or you learn to write code on your own. Ditto for being an
accountant, lawyer, doctor, etc.
If you want to be a product manager, what do you do? There are no schools for
product management. There’s no formal training. It’s also not a role you
typically get promoted into, exactly.
How, then, does one land a product manager job? That’s what this book is here
to teach you.
Jackie and I have worked with countless current and aspiring product managers
to help them learn how to get the right experience, how to position themselves
appropriately, how to prepare for interviews, and how to ace them.
This book translates these many hours of coaching sessions and conversations
into written form.
Why does this matter?
Product management shouldn’t be this elusive role, accessible only to those who
are lucky (and connected) enough to have someone explain what PMing is all
about. Greater accessibility is a good thing for candidates and employers alike.
You, the candidate, are better able to position yourself for a job when you know
what to expect. It’s not about faking anything; you can actually acquire the
experience you need once you know you need it.
When it comes time for interviews, you’ll able to prepare for their questions
more effectively. You will learn how to describe your unique experiences and
most important accomplishments. You’ll learn how to tackle problem-solving
questions. You’ll understand what it means to think about the user. And, finally,
you’ll solidify your technical skills.
Employers, in turn, get more qualified candidates. More relaxed and better
prepared candidates perform in a way that is more consistent with their skillset.
They know which accomplishments are most interesting and relevant to
employers, and they can drive the conversation toward those things. They can
demonstrate their problem-solving skills when they know that’s what the
question is about. They can learn the bits of knowledge that they need in order to
tackle specific questions. This sort of preparation portrays a candidate’s skillset
closer to how it would be on the job.
Taking the guesswork and randomness out of interviews is a good thing for
everyone.
Who are we?
If you flip to the back of the book, you can read our credentials: Google.
Microsoft. Apple. Startups. Hiring committee. Oodles of interviews and
coaching sessions.
Yadda, yadda, yadda.
That’s all very well and good, but that won’t tell you who we really are and how
we got here, writing a book on landing a product management job.
I (Gayle) come from a deep engineering background, but I’ve also spent a lot of
time working with candidates: interviewing them for dev and PM roles,
conducting mock interviews, coaching them on how to strengthen their answers,
teaching them concepts that they don’t understand, and discovering what their
goals and passions are.
I learned two things through this. First, I learned how much even good
candidates could improve their interview performance, with a bit of help.
Second, I learned how little information there was about getting a product
management role. Lots of people talked about how to be a good product
manager, but few people talked about how to actually break into that field.
Except, of course, for my amazing coauthor, Jackie.
I stumbled across Jackie’s blog on Quora, the question and answer site. After
following her for a bit, I was struck by a few things. First, she had worked for
several of the top companies, so she was good enough to navigate these
interviews herself. Second, her advice was to-the-point, actionable, and good.
Third, she cared. She cared enough to write a blog to help people enter the PM
profession.
Making the product management field more accessible is important to both me
and Jackie. We believe that everyone benefits from this, and that is why we’ve
written this book.
What now?
This book will not help you “fake” your way into a PM job. It will, however,
give you a plan of attack, from the beginning to the end of the process.
We will show you what a product manager is and how the role varies from
company to company. We will also describe how different companies think
about their hiring process.
We will talk to product managers from a variety of backgrounds to understand
how they broke into this field and to get their perspective on what makes a good
product manager.
We will talk about the different backgrounds PMs tend to have and how you
might make the transition given your background and interests.
We will show you how to write a great resume and cover letter. Some of this will
be advice that applies outside of product management, but much of it is advice
specific to product managers.
We will advise you on how to get ready for an interview: what sort of research
you need to do prior to an interview and how to prepare for questions. We will
tackle each of the major interview question types—including behavioral
questions, estimation questions, product questions, case questions, and coding
questions—and explain to you what an interviewer is looking for and how you
master those questions.
We will help you put your best foot forward so you can get in the door.
As you read these pages, reflect on how you can draw out the strong points of
your experience in an interview and how you can deliver more powerful
responses.
We are here to help. Please join us online at crackingthepminterview.com for
additional resources and tips.
And finally, just as software is never “done,” we hope this book will never be
either. If you have suggestions, feedback, questions or just want to say “hi,”
don’t hesitate to drop us a note: [email protected]
Thank you, and good luck!
Gayle L. McDowell
facebook.com/gayle
twitter.com/gayle
technologywoman.com
quora.com/Gayle-Laakmann-McDowell
Jackie Bavaro
facebook.com/jackie.bavaro
twitter.com/jackiebo
pmblog.quora.com
quora.com/Jackie-Bavaro
The Product Manager Role
Chapter 2
What is a PM?
A PM is responsible for making sure that a team ships a great product.
Some people will say that the product manager (sometimes called the program
manager or project manager) is like a mini-CEO of their product. That’s accurate
in some ways, since a PM takes holistic responsibility for the product, from the
little details to the big picture. The PM needs to set vision and strategy. The PM
defines success and makes decisions.
But in one of the most important ways, the description of product manager as
CEO misses the boat: product managers don’t have direct authority over the
people on their team.
As a PM, you’ll need to learn to lead your team without authority, influencing
them with your vision and research. Product managers are highly respected at
most companies, but not more so than engineers. If you show up and start
bossing people around, you’ll probably find it hard to get things done. After all,
engineers are the ones actually building the product. You need them on your
side.
One reason product management is such an appealing career is you get to sit at
the intersection of technology, business, and design. You get to wear many hats
and learn multiple points of view.
As a product manager, you’ll be the advocate for the customer. You’ll learn their
needs and translate those needs into product goals and features. Then you’ll
make sure those features are built in a cohesive, well-designed way that actually
solves the customer’s needs. You’ll focus on everything from the big picture to
the small details. One day you might brainstorm the three-year vision for your
team, while the next day you work through the details of the buttons in a dialog.
Product management is a highly collaborative role. The product manager usually
serves as the main liaison between the engineerings and other roles such as
design, quality assurance, user research, data analysts, marketing, sales,
customer support, business development, legal, content writers, other