I applied online on May 5th. I Upload my resume, finished an assignment which consists of several parts that I needed to complete in less than 14 hours. I used 10 hours to complete all the assignments: “an audio recorder made in Inglish to explain what are the three skills that help you the most to this role”; “a test with several questions where you need to choose a responses from several choices”; and a “writing test where you need to respond to several real situations” – in my case the questions were based on best practices to write L2 specs documents.
In the next week, I received an email saying "congratulations you passed the assignment and you will be placed on the Marketplace for a potential interview". A place where you must wait until someone liked your profile and give you the opportunity to be hired for that role. Fortunately, one week later I received an email to participate in a remote interview (one a one). They asked me to choose the best available day and hour from the interviewer agenda. But, in my case, I get no such luck because the Interviewer was placed in the US and I'm living in a timezone with a 6 hours difference. So, I chose the best available that can fit for me. I chose one where I can apply for the interview but only after my daily work. There was no possibility to take the interview in the morning when I’m still fresh. With a 6 hours timezone difference it will be most improbable.
The Interview:
The interviewer presents himself and gives a brief presentation about the company and role. I was expecting a “traditional” interview, with questions like those ones:
- "talking about yourself";
- "Tell me about a time you failed and what have you done to surpass it";
- "Tell me about one of the greatest success stories in your professional work";
- "Tell me about a time your team developed a feature that was perfect but couldn't be implemented that way and a compromise had to be made"
- "Etc"
The Interviewer used a different approach and asked me to simply "describe a real situation where I was in-charge of the development of a product”, “identifying the challenges I passed during the process development from the business and technology perspective", and “identifying the core problem, the product was able to really resolve”.
This is, now, my interpretation of the exercise interview, that I can remember after revisiting the interview in my head. Because during the interview I didn´t see this question like that.
Believe me, when someone is looking for a person to hire with a Skill description like this one: “You should be a clear and organized thinker, able to find the important patterns in work and focus on the “big picture” without being lost in the details”, you cannot do the opposite… but, unfortunately, I made exactly the opposite!
It’s my entire fault! It’s simple, I was not prepared for this interview…
I didn’t choose the best Use Case for the interview. I chose one use case without thinking about it. I don’t know why I used this particular Use Case!!! The interviewer asks me for a Use Case and I chose the first one that appears in my mind… The reason? Maybe it was one that maybe makes me feel happy in the past. Who knows… Now, it's too late to think about that.
So during the interview, I was simply limited by myself. Not prepared, trying to remember under “interview pressure” for the product details and the reasons behind the product needs. It was a real nightmare! I was pleased when the interview stopped the interview!!! I don’t remember any particular case where the interviewer had the need to stop an interview with me. This was the first time in my life and I supposed I’m a Super Senior and a professional man with more than 20 years experience in participating in “pressure meetings” with CxO persons…
Looking from a different perspective and putting myself in the place of the interviewer: if I was the interviewer and the candidate was doing what I have done (disorganized of ideas and clarity of thoughts) I believe I made what the interviewer made with me. He simply stops the interview, always polite, and said me that I don’t have the required skills for the role!
Unfortunately, in this case, I was my worst adversary.
So, to close my point… if you want to be an SVP of Technical Product Management, you must be prepared for this type of exercises. You should analyze at least two good Use Case (you don’t have time for more than one, so be smart and try one simple with real challenges), decomposed the Use Case in its fundamental parts, and try to write a clear and concise resume about it. Analyse the different phases and challenges you got with the business interaction, the reasons behind the technology you chose and most important: “what was the problem that this particular product really wants to resolve”. Think about that, and try to be “fresh” for the interview. I believe you will be hired.
I wish you the best luck.
