Technical Project Manager Interview Questions in United States
"When hiring a technical project manager, an employer will look for candidates with the management skills and industry knowledge to oversee company projects that require members to have large amounts of technical knowledge, usually in the form of programming and software development. Some of the interview questions you may be asked will target your management experience and philosophy while others will focus on your understanding of the technical processes you will be working with in the project."
How would you explain story points to a team who's new to Agile/Scrum?
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Time vs effort.. teams get hung up on time based estimates. And not about the amount of effort it's going to take to accomplish a task/user story. Less
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It’s about demonstrating it to them and comparing the efficacy compare to other frameworks via dissecting a story vertically to the smallest size possible. Less
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I said I would talk to them about t-shirt sizing and try several ways to help them understand that story estimation has little to nothing to do with time, rather effort. I also explained that this was a challenging topic for a new team. Less
Describe a project where you encountered issues with completing the tasks or getting others to complete the tasks. Explain what you did.
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I had a project that was interfered with by outside management that continuously interjected non-related tasks into this project. I reset the expectations of management, documented the deliverables and made sure that management supported my deflection of the outside tasks to other responsible staff. Less
Tell me about more about yourself
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I gave a summary of my extra skills and projects I have completed
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I start with my field. My years of experience and the various industries I have worked, the positions occupied and responsibilities in the various companies . Less
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I start with my field. My years of experience and the various industries I have worked, the positions occupied and responsibilities in the various companies . Less
What are your salary expectations?
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I expect the salary to be competitive.
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I was uncomfortable with the question and had to dodge it twice.
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I told them I did my research and asked for what was on here as starting salaries. I was told he was impressed by the fact that I researched them and was given an offer as expected. Less
"There are many project managers who work long hours and weekends sometimes. Would you be able to accommodate that?"
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Let’s get it together and I’m ready
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As politely as possible, I replied that unless there is a real emergency, I will not work late or weekends. I went on to explain that most people working overtime so much are poor planners and are unable to manage time efficiently. I have always been able to plan, track and work in such a way that I never have had to work late. Less
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Why would anyone so no? My ambitious response for the entertainment industry at Fillmore is a strong big YES! Kindest Regards Less
Have you ever tracked velocity? How would you determine a teams Sprint velocity?
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Team velocity is tracked, using the number of estimated story points, over the actual completed story points. This can be measured on the burndown chart. You can guesstimate your team velocity overtime, from the previous sprints. Less
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Velocity is the total story point the team complete in a sprint. It can be tracked in the burndown chart in Jira for instance. Can be determined for an existing team by adding up velocities of 3 sprints and dividing it by 3 to get teams velocity. Less
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I said that I had a little bit, as we still had a bit of a challenge on my last team comprehending the burndown chart and how to improve estimates. How to determine it would be based on the Sprints. I kind of fumbled through this one as I really hadn't ever had much velocity tracking training, I just winged it at that time. Less
The somewhat tired, four people need to cross a bridge which can only support two people at a time plus the lantern they need to see their footing. How long does it take if Person 1 takes 1 minute to cross, #2 takes 5 minutes to cross, #3 takes five minutes, and #4 takes 10 minutes.
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After asking several qualifying questions and not getting clear/good answers I was able to walk the interviewer through 3 different scenarios. As more details were revealed, the time to cross grew. Less
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a minimum of 11 #2 and # 4 goes, then #3, then #1
Tell me a time when...
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Are you serious? Please, disclose a few details. that is a worst thing could ever happen to a candidate. Less
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I'm not naming names or divisions because that doesn't really help me any. The rejection motivated me to go back and get a Masters in CS at a Top 5 school. Amazon has an incredibly competitive culture and what manager wants to hire someone that might be able to pass them? There's two sides to every story, maybe I misread it but I'm trying to be as honest as I can. Less
What are some of the things you and your supervisor have disagreed on?
2 Answers↳
Project Quality control and promotion of the team numbers
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roles and responsibilities of project team members