Facebook: Leadership & Drive Questions

Ravi Mehta does an excellent job of explaining the Facebook interview process here. Below are excerpts from his comments on Leadership & Drive questions.

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Can you lead yourself and your team no matter the challenge?

Facebook sees PMs as facilitators who enable a co-equal, cross-functional team to deliver product results.

The PM’s peers include Engineering, Design, Data Science, and User Research.

An excellent Facebook PM rallies their cross-functional team to collectively

  • understand the problem,

  • identify the right solution, and

  • flawlessly execute that solution.

Leadership at Facebook is more about influence than authority.

Facebook values people who

  • manage themselves,

  • work effectively with their team,

  • collaborate laterally with other teams, and

  • manages upward with leadership.

Your interviewer will be looking for:

  • Do you have the grit to push through challenges? Do you set that example for your team?

  • Are you introspective? Have you grown from past challenges and mistakes?

  • Are you convincing? Can you rally a team around an idea even in the face of obstacles?

  • Are you a supportive leader? Do you adjust your leadership style to coach different people differently?

  • Are you scrappy? Will you make the most out of scarce resources, asking for more only when it is needed?

  • For managers: Can you make the right hiring decisions and the tough firing decisions?

The Product Sense and Execution interviews focus on how you think about Facebook products. In contrast, the Leadership & Drive interview will focus on your past experiences.

Example Leadership & Drive Questions

Tell me about a time when:

  • ...you were aware of an important problem, but you were not able to resolve it.

  • ...your team wasn't working well together.

  • ...you had to change the way you work with others to be successful.

  • …you rallied people behind an idea you were passionate about.

  • …you needed something from another team, or other teams needed something from you.

  • … you didn't have the resources to get something done but got it done anyway