Breaking Down Our Top Product Interview Videos

Key moments that made these mock interviews stand out

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With jam-packed lifestyles, we can all appreciate ways to squeeze in some PM interview preparation (that are enjoyable, too!). In fact, in my preparation for full-time PM interviews, I started to listen to mock PM interviews while I was on walks, long drives, cooking dinner, or in more focused sessions as I took notes of how the interviewee broke down the problem.

To kick off your prep, Claudia, Aveneel, and I have collected and broke down some of our favorite videos from Exponent, who have a wide range of interviews on their YouTube channel. On a high level, some of the things to pay attention to in these videos include:

• Is it easy to follow the interviewee’s train of thought? How well do they outline their process and signpost along the way? Are their frameworks and answers interesting and creative? If I can whip up some tofu pudding while following every step of the interview then that’s a sign the interviewee is engaging and communicating clearly.
• How does the interviewee interact with the interviewer? This one is a bit more subtle, but it is common to check-in with the interviewer as you move through your framework to make sure you are on the same page.
• How much time does the interviewee take to brainstorm thoughts? See what feels natural and relaxed, and contrast that with what seems rushed or drawn-out.

We recommend you watch each video before diving into the analysis!

Product Design Interview Question

How Would You Design a Product Around Movies For Facebook?

Things That Stood Out In This Interview:

• Celena asked two clarifying questions right away: 1) Is this something that would exist within the Facebook App? 2) Am I constrained to just software products or is hardware also an option? Right off the bat, this showed an awareness of Facebook’s products and allowed her to better understand the constraints she was working under.
• She clearly outlined her plan of attack before diving into the problem. 1) Facebook’s Mission → how does a movie product fit into that mission? 2) Customer segmentation → prioritize a segment 3) Customer pain points and needs → prioritize a need 4) Brainstorm possible solutions → evaluate on impact. (2:00)
• Taking into consideration the current state of the market. Celena mentions that many content creators probably feel lonely trapped at home all day. Keep in mind that businesses have had to shift to adapt to the COVID-19 pandemic, so what you say in a PM interview should show empathy for how customers have been impacted by current events or trends. (9:50)
• Evaluating potential options by tracing back to Facebook’s mission and competitive advantage. She picks a feature that allows creators a more social, video-creating experience because it aligns with FB’s mission to build community and their social graph advantage. (11:30, 16:00)

Product Sense Mock Interview Question

What is Your Favorite Product?

The ‘Favorite Product’ interview question tends to have three parts, and you’ll want to nail all 3.

• What is your favorite product?
• Why is it your favorite product?
• How could it be improved? You can generally follow this structure: 1) Who are the users? 2)What are their pain points? 3) What are possible solutions to one of the pain points? 4) Which solution should be prioritized, and how would it work?

Things That Stood Out In This Interview:

• The choice of product. Google Nest is unique, but not unheard of. We recommend choosing something that’s unique, but still fairly mainstream, so you don’t need to explain it as much to the interviewer. Even if your product of choice is a bit more mainstream, try to provide a refreshing perspective on it.
• Use Cases: He gave examples of the many use cases of the product: it can write emails, display pictures, play music, etc.
• Improvements for Google Nest. He mentioned valuable features of other products (Facebook Portal) that could be added. He also mentioned privacy concerns that could be addressed.

A few improvements we suggest:

• Signposting more clearly. Signposting for reasons he likes the product could have been better: i.e, “There are 3 main reasons why this product is great: 1.) it’s simple to use, 2.) etc.” It was a bit hard to tell where he was going with his answer, so a clear framework in the beginning could have helped the interviewer follow along.
• Start with pain points. This answer could have been improved by starting with current pain points of the product first (i.e “users worry about privacy concerns, such as Nest hearing them”), then prioritizing one to focus on. He also could have picked a specific user of the product to focus on. This adds more structure to the answer and is a methodical approach.
• Don’t wait to be asked about competitors. The interviewer pushed him to talk about competitors, but we recommend proactively incorporating this into your framework — discuss similar products and why your product is superior. This demonstrates that you understand the user’s need for the product and can evaluate products in depth.

Generally, during interviews feel free to ask for a few seconds to organize your thoughts. Many of the answers in the first half of the interview could have benefited from having a more clear structure in the beginning. Even a few seconds can give you time to come up with an answer you may not have thought of on the spot.

Overall, this was a great interview from an experienced PM and it is insightful to see his perspective on Google Nest!

Product Execution Interview Question

How Would You Set Goals and Deal With Declining Metrics For YouTube?

Things That Stood Out In This Interview:

• Clear exposition of the company’s goals. Celena started out the interview by clarifying the use cases of YouTube (entertainment and educational), the company’s goals, and then she stated that they should currently focus on engagement rather than monetization at this point in time. This showed the interviewer that the interviewee was aware of YouTube’s audience and platform as a whole as she also laid out her thought process regarding what metrics would be useful to look at.
• Organizing metrics. The interviewee laid out a large list of user actions and metrics that they could look at and then she further organized these metrics into three categories: Tracking metrics, North Star metric (watch time), and Counter metrics (a metric that can be measured to ensure you don’t lose sight of the main goal while optimizing for your North Star metric), and then proceeded to elaborate on all three categories.
• Great follow-up questions. Stephen asked a question regarding a 3–4% decline in the North Star metric, and the interviewee immediately followed up with clarifying questions such as “How long has this decline been happening? Is it a gradual decline or a sudden one? Where (geographically) has the decline been happening? Is the decline focused on a particular segment? Is there a particular device type this has been focused on?” You can divide your follow up questions into possible external (holidays, weather) and internal factors (the product itself or changes in the team or company) that could have had an impact on the product to determine the issue, as Celena did.

We liked that the interview started to feel more like a two-sided conversation as they discussed where the decline could have come from!

The reason for the decline turned out to be the launch of YouTube Shorts, a feature that resembles Instagram Reels and TikTok. The interviewee reached the right answer due to the fact that she asked the interviewer several questions regarding internal factors and eventually hit gold when she inquired about the release of a new feature inside the company, and she instantly recognized YouTube Shorts as the new feature.

The interview was a great example of how important it is for an interviewee to have a conversation with the interviewer to eventually get to the bottom of the issue and to diagnose it. Celena did a fantastic job of breaking down her ideas regarding the issue into categories and organizing her thoughts that led to the solution!

Wrapping Up

Every interview is different, but hopefully what stood out to us from the above videos can give you some insight into what makes a great interview. Best of luck — you’ve got this!