How much time do I need to prepare for Product Management interviews?

TL;DR - For Google & Facebook, it will take at least 1 month but typically 3 to 6 months. For Amazon, we suggest 4 to 6 weeks, but he have helped folks with shorter timeframes.

There is no one size fits all timeline. We have worked with people who crammed in a few days and others who worked for 6+ months (no exaggeration). Typically, the successful candidates fall somewhere in the middle. Typically between 2 and 3 months with 4 to 6 weeks of intense work.

If the candidate has previous success with case or behavioral product interviews before, it can be faster. But typically, even the skilled interviewers need to re-learn interview skills.

There is no silver bullet. It takes time, effort and hard work because case and behavioral interviews both require that you (1) learn them (2) be comfortable and (3) make them your own. The competition is stiff, most of the strong candidates are practicing as if they have a second job at night, or actually taking time between jobs to practice.

Do you a schedule I can use?

We have mapped out study plans (spreadsheets) for Facebook. You should allow 6 weeks to master the product sense/design framework. Then it will take another 2 months to polish product sense/design while preparing for execution (Facebook) and estimation/technical for Google. For Facebook, do not underestimate execution questions, they are rigorous and unpredictable. For Google, the technical questions are tough.

For Amazon, the study plan depends on your comfort with storytelling and the time constraints you face. Amazon tends to move quickly.

Can I ask the recruiter for more time to prepare?

TL;DR - Yes, for most big companies. No for smaller ones that hire for specific roles. See below.

If you are an IC (individual contributor) 9 times out of 10, for large companies like Google or Facebook, you can ask for more time to prepare. The recruiters know it is a daunting process and you need time to prepare to make it. They are likely putting you into a pool of candidates and it could take months to get a ‘team match’ and then an offer. Some recruiters may push because they have some quota. Be careful. Protect your future. 

Skill Specific Roles

The exception is when you are being interviewed for a specific role, typically for something highly specific based on your experiences, for example Machine Learning or a particular Growth role. If they have several candidates and you have a chance to compete directly, timing make or break your opportunity.

If you are not ready, it is not worth the risk. Typically (but not always) if you fail an interview at Facebook or Google you have to wait a full calendar year to interview again. So, depending on your situation, you may want to forgo the tempting interview if you are not ready. 

Long Memory

Also keep in mind, they keep your history of interviewing. If you have a great interview, this works to your advantage, you can come back again. BUT if you have a terrible interview, this can hurt you in the future because those past interviews where you didn’t do well will be used when they consider you. For me, my hypothesis is that I got mis-leveled because they used my past experience to assume I wasn’t as experienced or strong a candidate. If you were borderline and historically you did poorly, you might not be looked on fairly. There is a lot of bias in the interview process. 

Cost of Being Unprepared

In summary, don’t go into a FAANG interview unprepared because it could hurt your future prospects. So yes, look at the big picture and plan accordingly.

How do I know if I can prepare in 10 days or 3 months?

TL;DR - Meeting with a coach for specific advice or fill out our questionnaire to get a ballpark estimate.

The most direct route is to work with a coach who can assess your readiness on various different factors. If you don’t work with a coach, you can try assessing the amount and type of feedback you are getting from mock interviews to determine progress. 

Experience in the Role - If you have little or no experience in the role of product manager, you will have a harder time coming up with experiences for behavioral interviews and you will not be able to relate the frameworks for cases to real life experiences and so they will be harder for you.

Previous Failures to get hired - If you tried in the past, you likely have feedback but you definitely have self-reflection, humility and self-awareness that will give you a better read of your own progress.

Understanding Grading System If you know what interviewers are grading you on, it seems easier to prepare. However, remember interviews are conducted and graded by biased human beings. Even those with highly regimented processes leave a lot of room for judgment calls in the interview process.

So, no grading system is perfect. Interviewers are looking to see if you can handle the role and the company culture. Generally speaking, they want people who (1) understand the user (2) can handle ambiguity and (3) fit into the culture. (The companies claim to be politically correct about culture fit but human bias seeps right in.)

Mock Interviews Completed = Interview Experience To get into a FAANG, I did roughly 8 to 30 mocks a week for the bulk of 5 months, occasionally taking a week to 10 days off between two weeks of intense work. Yes, that means I did roughly 150 mock interviews before getting accepted. I worked with people who worked 10 days straight practicing 5 to 8 mocks a day, but they rarely make it.

Probing Questions will take you out

You need to give yourself time to learn and become comfortable with frameworks, concepts and how you want to sell your story, or you fail in the probing question section.

Framework Mastery Even behavior interviews require leveraging a storytelling framework (like STAR or modifications of STAR that close with learnings).

Dream Company It takes longer to prepare for Google and Facebook than Amazon. It takes less time to prepare for startups than FAANGs. 

Timing of multiple offers - Most offers require a negotiation to get fair pay. Those who don’t negotiate quickly find after their start that they are often making tens of thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands less than their colleagues. It can make the different in level, as well. Remember, most companies only increase your pay by 5 to 18% (typically the high end is closer to 12%) YoY, so if you come in at low salary range, you can’t break the cycle without leaving the company, even if you love it. To get a stronger negotiation position, you need to have competing offers. If you don’t time things properly, you have to take what you get. 

Are there any rules of thumb?

Behavioral Interviews (Amazon is the quintessential example of behavioral interviews in product)

• 2 weeks intense practice minimum for behavioral interviews if you know you are strong. This includes being good at talking about both your wins and losses.

• 4 to 6 weeks is more common. Why? You need to think through all your experiences. You need to have enough stories to get through 5 hrs without repeating one story. You need to speak about failures with the listener feeling good about what they have heard. 

• Product Cases + Technical (think Google) 

  • 2 weeks if you have done this before, you are in a pinch AND you have time to do nothing but study for your interviews. If you are working full time, this is not a viable option. Even strong PMs need to practice for interviews. 

  • Minimum of 4 week. Again, you need to be strong at interviewing and dedicate yourself to 2 to 5 mocks a day for most of the 4 weeks. You need to polish your presentation. Just a few weeks rest from interviewing and you get rusty. These product case interviews require you to think on your feet quickly and solve abstract problems quickly and articulately.

  • Advised 2 to 3 months. Start slow, doing 5 mock interviews a week. Give yourself a few weeks where you can take a break. Focus first on Product Sense, as that is the basis for everything, but don’t forget strategy, estimation and general analytics (metrics and situational). What will take the longest though is the technical interview prep. If you are an ex-engineer, you run the risk of getting pretty aggressive technical questions. You might even get sudo code. If you have no engineering training, you basically have to cram over 4 to 6 weeks to think like an engineer.   

  • Less stressful go for 5 to 6 months. For this route, find some folks to work. It will be a long haul and finding quality candidates at your level will be difficult. The nice thing about going the long route is that by interview day, you are so practiced you are relatively relaxed. You go in knowing, this is the best I could do. That helps you remain conversational and not rehearsed like many who race against the clock. I would advise being ready for a handful of hypothetical or behavioral questions to nail warmups and a some behaviorals that get thrown in. 

• Product Cases + Behavioral (think Facebook) - Facebook interviews are a cross between Google and Amazon. You need to pass the Product Case questions with a heavy focus on metrics and measuring success. All the times mapped out above for Product Case + Technical hold true, you just swap your focus on technical questions for deep behavioral failure questions. 

How do I know if I need 4 or 12 weeks? 

• Option 1: Have a someone with experience in product case interviews assess your case, technical and behavioral answers. They need to look for ‘Comfort with ambiguity’, ‘Logical Approaches’ (read use of frameworks), ‘Creativity’ and most importantly ‘Focus on the User’ with an ability to ‘measure success.’ Everyone is subjective, but so are interviewers. The bias in interviews runs rampant. 

• Option 2: Take this self-assessment. Be honest with yourself, cheating doesn’t help anyone. 

• Option 3: (Coming Soon) Take this quick quiz on product sense and product measurement, see how you do.

faq by company amazon | facebook

also of interest coaching style | prep time | salaries