PM Interviewing

Before You Read

The below article would be great if:

You already understand what product management is, if not read this
You are looking for a PM position in the startup ecosystem

Introduction

Product managers come in all forms and flavors. Product management, as a subject, is too vast and generic to fit a single description. Not only this; different types of product managers can also be divided into different groups based on their skills and specializations – the type of product they work on (B2B vs B2C, early, mature), or even at a higher level (whether they are builders, tuners, and innovators).

This below image details out how you can identify your opportunity

The below artifacts talk more about what are the different type of product managers

Do you know different Types of Product Managers? | upGrad blog

The many paths of a product manager

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XCMknoQeNM

Understanding the Competition

Product management exists at the intersection of software engineering, design, and business. If you’re coming from one of those fields, you’re in luck because you have a deep understanding of at least one of those domains, and you’ve probably worked closely with a product manager and had a chance to get a close look at their day-to-day.

Numbers from 17 online businesses all over the world with 600k+ employees

Product people and the educational background they come from. People apart from software engineering, design and business find it harder to break into product management, but its not impossible

Interview Stages

Below are the broad set of stages for the product manager interview, these stages may differ from company to company based on the scale and industry they are at:

Shortlisting

The phase of your job application is to shortlist the companies you are looking at applying to, your ideal next company should be a perfect marriage between your background, the type of PM you want to become and the industry opportunities that are available