- Analysis and design sessions
- Coding quizzes
- Design pattern questions
- Development process question/answer sessions
Now, as an experienced product manager having recently interviewed at various companies, I'm struck that 95% of product manager interviews yield almost no useful or reliable information for assessing how well the product manager would perform on the job.
Unfortunately, most interviewers concentrate on broad and fluffy questions about previous experience but don't probe into what methods and principles a candidate employs to make key decisions as a product manager. In particular, notably absent from these interviews have been such tools as:
- Requirements elicitation exercises
- Product positioning exercises
- Quizzes on product management principles, methods, and concepts
- Product management process quiz (or Scrum quiz for companies that practice it)
If you're hiring a product manager, try creating a rigorous set of tools for assessing how well a candidate knows product management. You'll not only make better hiring decisions, it will help build a better understanding of why you're hiring a product manager in the first place.