How to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions (Best advice for S.T.A.R. stories!)

[@e.w.6470]

Thanks for the insights! I can tell it's all about the balance between "I" vs "We", "enough practice" vs "not memorizing word by word", "concise" vs "going deep", etc.

[@DonShone1994]

This is gold actually :) I was at an interview for PM at Microsoft, and I passed on to the on-site interview, but I didn't do enough preparation and I failed. One thing I learned from that interview is that clarity and preparation is absolute top-notch priority. So I am starting to prepare from your channel :)

[@PMDiegoGranados]

I’m sorry to read that! I hope that your next interview goes better!! Keep me posted

[@GloriaGuo-jr6gh]

the MOST useful content of behavioral questions i've watched! thanks for sharing this, Diego!

[@KrishnaNandalal]

I was very frustated looking for answers to unasked questions .. you have answered most of them. You are the best! Subscribed!

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thanks for the sub!

[@barakhazan26]

You were great! I am from Israel and I have the first time Interview in English with the Director of Product in Boston, I have learned a lot and I am going to prepare some success stories using the S.T.A.R method.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thanks for watching and best of luck in your interviews!

[@89Kevinnash]

@barak are you in the US now ? can you tell me how you got an interview call from a company in the US while being in Israel ? Are there not any work permit issues ?

[@surbhigupta2910]

I've been looking for an answer regarding my behavioral interview preparation strategy for the last few days and thank god I stumbled upon your channel. You've answered exactly what I wanted to know & understand. Plus I love how you deliver such great content so calmly. I'm so used to hearing 'passionate' voices on youtube, though that's great too.I like yours better. Thanks a lot again! :)

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you, Surbhi! I’m glad that you like my channel :) if you have any suggestions or feedback, they are always welcome!

[@surbhigupta2910]

@@PMDiegoGranados I'll surely share suggestions/feedback once I view all of your videos :)

[@einsteindonascimentojunior440]

You rock, Diego! The greatest tips of all channels.

[@tigerrx7]

DG, this is solid!! If I don’t get the second interview at Amazon though, you owe me at least one interview at MSFT 😉

[@dolandtramp5555]

thanks diego

[@soumen_das]

The best part of your videos are the break downs. All other videos in youtube related to this field only provide superficial answers.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you, Soumen! I’m glad you like my content!!

[@aravindreddy4507]

I wish your audio is bit more loud, it is also low in many other videos of yours. My volume is max, but couldn't help much. Content is great, Thanks, pls make them a bit louder. Kudos!!

[@adambaker8689]

ANOTHER really good video. Perfect explanation and presentation Diego - keep up the good work, i.e. great videos :)

[@namrathanagaraj5919]

Thank you so much for this, Diego! :) It really helped me plan out communicating my stories better.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

That’s awesome @Namratha! I’m glad that it helped!!! Keep me posted on your interviews!

[@alexxaguigi7865]

I’ve been studying for my Interview for a little while man and genuinely feel like one video I watched with you was better then the Conclusion I would draw from other videos gracias for la ayuda hermano

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Glad I could help!

[@VijaykumarChinnamuthu]

Very nice and interesting way of explanation

[@MrAbhimanyuk]

Thanks, Diego! Love your videos! Really very helpful, even if one is looking at a job in Amazon for a role other than product specifically.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Glad it was helpful!

[@MrAbhimanyuk]

@@PMDiegoGranados, wanted to thank you once again! Starting at Amazon shortly thanks to your content!

[@bestofalltime-boat5992]

Thanks Diego. This is really helpful.In my last interview I got the feedback that I have very lengthy answers. Learning I got to take a pause for 7-12 seconds will help to gather your thoughts and structure it.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

I'm glad you found this video useful! Best of luck with your upcoming interviews and reach out if you have any questions :)

[@bestofalltime-boat5992]

@@PMDiegoGranados Hi Diego, Trust you are doing great!!! In the prioritisation questions how do you estimate the value and effort for a feature or story?

[@PMDiegoGranados]

For an interview you can use different frameworks. For example RICE is a popular one and state your assumptions. Let’s say that in your case question your “company” develops software... if one of your solutions is to implement hardware like VR headset, then effort will be high because you don’t have the expertise. You don’t have to always use a framework (like RICE), but you can fall back to the goal, the impact and your best estimate of time to implement. What I mean by that is that you can think of: if we want to maximize user satisfaction, then feature A will have the most impact and while it can be complex to implement, it will help us maximize our objective (user satisfaction). Real life is a different story! But in a case question, it’s about assumptions and giving a good reason to WHY you are prioritizing that way

[@PMDiegoGranados]

If you are curious about how it works in real life let me know and I can help with that too :)

[@bestofalltime-boat5992]

@@PMDiegoGranados My thought: please correct me, RICE framework works well for the products already in the use because you will get a lot of data related to interaction between customer and the product. In which stage the product is also matter a lot e.g. recently launched, very less customer currently, introduction, growth, maturity and decline etc

[@krnchicki]

Thanks Diego! Can you do videos on different type of product questions and how to answer them?

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you for your suggestion, Agnes! I definitely will! I’m currently working on figuring out what’s the best way to explain it in a video, so there will definitely be videos about answering product questions.

[@krnchicki]

@@PMDiegoGranados thanks Diego!

[@sameenahmedashraf5736]

Thank you for this insightful breakdown Diego! I'm definitely more prepared for my interviews now!

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you, Sameen! I’m glad you feel much more prepared. Best of luck in your interviews!

[@aishwaryapathak5]

Loved the breakdown and your way of storytelling. This is extremely helpful! Thank you Diego!

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you Aishwarya! I’m glad you found it useful :) it’s all about how you tell your story and make sure you transmit the message in a great way!

[@ranjithkundapur8410]

Awesome learning, Diego

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you 🤗! I'm glad that you liked the video!

[@madhukv1883]

Although STAR framework is not new, the way you communicate it is excellent. You make it look easy :) Do you think ending with a summary helps ? may be "STARS" - the last "S" for "Summary ?

[@PMDiegoGranados]

I don’t see a problem with that, but I’ll tell you where I’m concerned… if you give the full STAR story AND then a summary, you might be taking way too much time for it 🤔 I guess if you can bring it down to 1 min summary should be fine? I’m not sure, I’ve always ended with “Lesson” and interviewers like it

[@ross2289]

Great video Diego! Do you have any tips for interviewees coming from entrepreneurship background? My most prominent projects involved hiring developers myself and giving them specifications of what to build, so it's hard to speak about "motivating" them, as their main motivation was the salary I paid them :) I have good stories that demonstrate traits like ownership, customer obsession, conflicts with business parties, and hard decisions, but due to my background I don't have substantial stories about "teams", such as "influencing without authority". I did had two smaller projects that involved a team, but those project were shorter and did not succeed, so I didn't even mention them in my resume. I can speak about them as failures that I learned from, but as a team we didn't continue working together (as it was a joint venture with a single objective), so I can't say it later led for "better" team work. For the same reasons, it's hard for me to find any good example of getting a "negative" feedback and demonstrate what I did in order to become "better" next time, as there wasn't a next time. I'm not sure how I will be looked upon in these circumstances compared to candidates who have more substantial "team" stories since they worked in a more "traditional" setting like a company.

[@pepemarin2859]

Hi, Diego. I love your videos. They are pure gold. I have a question for you: what is the interviewer trying to learn when she asks "tell me about a decision you made with very limited information"? How should we approach the answer? Do you have any example? Many thanks. Saludos desde Españña.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Buena pregunta! When they ask “tell me about a decision made with limited information” they are trying to assess how good are you at understanding: 1. In an imperfect world, what other resources did you use when you didn’t have data? But check? Check with the team? Experiment? (How resourceful are you?) 2. Did you try to get more data? Why couldn’t you get it? (How diligent are you?) Use the same STAR format! I don’t have an example yet

[@ToluMakinde]

Thank you Diego. Very helpful video.

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Glad it was helpful!

[@ross2289]

Hi Diego, I think earlier you had a link to about 50 different Behavioral questions, do I Remember correctly? I think it was on your website, but I can't find the link :/

[@robertohardessen2590]

Consice, resourceful and straight to the points everyone must be prepared, thank you so much Diego, awesome way to be well prepared and crushed it on behavioural questions!

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Thank you, Roberto!! I’m glad that you enjoyed the video!

[@thungaestherrani4787]

Hi, Mr. Diego how should I break down the interview at Microsoft for individual contributor role

[@PMDiegoGranados]

Here you go 😉 What is the Microsoft Interview process like? (With sample questions!) kzbin.info/www/bejne/fYOXdGipo5aHeJo

[@thungaestherrani4787]

Is this process is same for freshers

[@PMDiegoGranados]

@@thungaestherrani4787 yes! Same one 😊

[@thungaestherrani4787]

Thank you

[@PMDiegoGranados]

@@thungaestherrani4787 yes! :)

[@vinitmahale]

I am so disappointed that I am paying for a PM course. But I'm so happy that I landed on your channel and I'm obsessed about it now. Fun fact: I shared your channel within the Cohort 😛 more power to you D! 😘

[@PMDiegoGranados]

You are very kind, @Vinit! Hahaha thank you! Hey, I’d love to chat with you about your experience in that course if you are up for it 😊 If you’d like to, please send me a message on linkedin!