Lesson 1: Being Authentic

Death by 1,000 Videos

You might be approaching interview preparation all wrong. You may have cheat sheets papering your walls, religiously watching YouTube videos that claim to have “the way” to solve a case, or even receiving advice from people within your target company on what is and isn’t an acceptable way to answer a problem.

These resources may or may not be accurate. The basic frameworks for most case interviews are well known and are well-represented by these sources. While there’s no harm in studying them, you run into trouble when you develop a dependence on them to formulate your responses. To deliver a compelling answer, the interviewer must believe it’s your answer, not someone else’s. Over-reliance on these resources can turn your answers into recitals that lack confidence and clarity. Even a moderately experienced interviewer can tell when someone is giving a “paint-by-numbers” response.

Don’t fall into this trap.

Know Thyself

Remember who you are. You’re a successful PM selected to interview at an amazing company. You have skills critical to your career success, and these are the same skills required for product management interviews. You don’t need to replace these skills with “the right way” you find online, from colleagues, or from Product Simply.

Instead, take the lessons and decide whether the strategy makes sense to you. If it doesn’t, ignore the advice. There is no single right way to answer an interview question—only ones that your interview finds compelling. If you can deliver a great answer that is authentic to you, do it that way.

Here’s a classic piece of advice often given about the Product Design interview format. You might be asked to come up with a product that addresses a market need, for example, “you need to build a product in healthcare, what would you build?” The standard approach involves choosing a target market from various alternatives that you define.

Many argue that to answer this question correctly, a candidate must define these alternatives to be “MECE” (mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive). I won’t weigh in on whether this is the correct approach. Instead, decide whether you want to use this method based on reasons you genuinely believe. It’s not enough to say “this is how it’s done”—you must convince yourself it’s the best way.

Then do that.

Wrap Up

When you approach problems in a way that makes sense to you, you enjoy several benefits. First, you will approach the problem with more confidence, as you are in charge of what you’re saying. Second, it’s easier to remember your approach because it lives in your head, not on a sheet of paper or on YouTube. Lastly, you’re more likely to be perceived as a quality candidate by your interviewer, who knows all the interview templates and memes and is unlikely to be impressed by a colorless walkthrough of them.

Be yourself and play your own game. You’ve gotten this far by doing what you’re best at—keep doing it.