Kevin Brennan

Managing Product Managers

4 best practices for Product Manager job interviews

The most important parts of a manager’s role are recruiting, developing, and retaining high-performance product team members. Like all specialized roles, successfully hiring Product Managers requires that the recruitment and interview process be optimized for the unique aspects of the role. Here are some key best practices for interviewing Product Managers.

1. Have the interview be a simulation of the actual role

The best measure of a candidate is to evaluate the person operating as close as possible to the actual role. Hiring the candidate as a contractor for a period to work in the role would be an ideal way to assess fit. However, that’s often impractical for both the candidate and the hiring manager. Focus the interview on the key responsibilities of the specific product role and how the candidate fits these criteria. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways:

  • Presentation – Given the importance of communication and influence in most product roles, have the candidate create and present on a topic related to the role. Have the full interview panel attend the presentation and allow time for the panel to ask questions. This is a great way to start the overall interview.
  • Homework – Get the candidate to do an assignment based on a project they will encounter in the role. For example, get the candidate to do a market and competitive analysis for a specific product and to recommend features for the next version.
  • Case study – Leverage a case study that outlines an actual situation the candidate is likely to encounter in the role as part of the evaluation.
  • Behavioral questions – Use behavioral questions to see how the candidate would respond to common product management situations. Behavioral questions examine specific situations the candidate has experienced where they had to use certain skills. For example, “Describe a time where you had to drop a potential new feature from a product project,” or “Tell me about a time where you had to interact with a difficult client.”

2. As the hiring manager, take an active role in organizing the interview

It’s critical that the hiring manager takes an active role in working with the hiring panel in preparation for the interview. It’s not enough to gain commitment from the four to five members of the hiring panel and hope that they will know what to do. Meet with the interviewers before the interview to make sure the role and the ideal candidate criteria are clear and understood. Assign specific areas for each interviewer to evaluate that are critical to the role (see the list below). These assignments will help ensure that all important areas are evaluated and that there is no significant overlap across interviews. Discuss how each area will be evaluated and how notes from the interviews are to be captured and distributed. Common areas to evaluate for product roles include:

  • Teamwork
  • Influence and leadership
  • Strategic thinking
  • Decision-making
  • Problem-solving
  • Analytical skills
  • Communication skills, both verbal and written
  • Product design
  • Market knowledge
  • Technical knowledge
  • Company fit and team fit

3. Build the interview panel with roles the Product Manager will work with daily

Have the people the Product Manager will interact with most participate in the interview panel. If that’s not possible, at the very least, ask representatives from each functional group to participate in the interview. Common groups a Product Manager interacts with may include Engineering, Design, Program or Project Management, Sales, Marketing, Finance, and Legal. 

4. Conduct the interview in person

It’s common to do an initial screening of potential candidates on the telephone or on a video call. However, given that product management roles have a high degree of interpersonal interaction, it is best to conduct the subsequent interview in person where possible.

Read more about interviews and other key product management topics in my book, Mastering Product Management: A Step-By-Step Guide, available now in paperback and eBook.

Clearly define roles and responsibilities to avoid product team conflict

Product teams, like all teams, tend to move through a series of phases from the time the team is assembled to when the team is executing optimally on the product scope. One model of group development identifies four phases: Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing.

In the Forming phase, the team comes together to discuss and understand the product project and resulting goals. Mature teams or teams that have already worked together on past projects often move from the Forming phase directly to the Norming and then Performing phases, where the team is operating cohesively toward the overall product goals. However, the team often passes through a Storming phase where friction and conflict arise.

One common source of conflict is misunderstanding about the roles and responsibilities of the product team members. Spending time when the team is formed, or when there’s a personnel change, to have a discussion on the different roles, who does what, and the expectation that each role has of the other roles will go a long way toward eliminating this source of team conflict.

Common technology product team members often include a Product Manager, a Program or Project Manager, an Engineering Lead, and a UX or Design Lead. Each role should identify what they see as their responsibilities to the team and also their expectations of what the other roles will do and deliver. For example, the Product Manager may include the following as key responsibilities of the Product role:

  • Is an expert on the market, including customers and competitors
  • Has ultimate responsibility for the business success of the product in the market
  • Owns the creation and execution of the product strategy
  • Owns the product roadmap
  • Defines the product requirements
  • Sets pricing
  • Monitors and manages the program P&L and return on investment
  • Is the final decision maker on product scope and schedule

The Product Manager may also identify the following in their list of expected responsibilities and deliverables for the Engineering Lead role:

  • Specifies, develops, tests, and releases the product
  • Defines the technology and architectural strategy for the product
  • Translates product requirements from the Product Manager into technical specifications
  • Creates and owns the engineering plan

The other roles would likewise identify the key responsibilities of their role and their expectations of the other roles. Having an open discussion on each role works to identify areas of alignment and, importantly, misalignment, which can then be resolved.

The final area the team should identify is the responsibilities that exist at the collective level and are no one role’s responsibility. This can include items such as monitoring for where ownership is unclear or identifying capacity deficits and working together to resolve those.

Read more about product teams and other key product management topics in my book, Mastering Product Management: A Step-By-Step Guide, available now in paperback and eBook.