Product Sense/Design Interviews: Common Mistakes

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Ace your product management design/ product sense/ product strategy interview for Google, Facebook/Meta and other top tech/FAANG companies by avoiding the common mistakes people fall into that lead to weak responses. As an interviewer, I've noticed 90% of candidates interviewing for product manager roles make the same few mistakes. Check out the list, so you don't fall into the same traps and learn how we can answer more impressively
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[@diannayau]

🤩Comment below: ✍which mistakes do you make when answering product design questions? 🥴Struggling with product interviews? 🚀Book 1:1 COACHING @ superpeer.com/dyau

[@gregjamesbrown]

This is hands down the BEST product management video/channel for your Meta interview. If you are interviewing at Meta, this channel is a MUST.

[@diannayau]

Thanks Greg! So happy to hear you’re enjoying the content! Planning on covering interviews for some other companies too, so stand by!

[@housingjack]

Thank you Dianna, I never knew i was making the Pain Points vs needs problem. From now on I will point out the needs and then address pain points within those needs to be exhaustive.

[@sharathreddy9003]

Thank you Dianna! I think I made these mistakes at some point during the process. Really helpful content!

[@vishal.shetty]

Wow! your thought process is clear. Glad I subscribed your channel.

[@swetasamaddar7038]

Thank you @diannayau for your videos. These videos help me clear a lot of conceptual errors that are not called out elsewhere.

[@swetasamaddar7038]

on the plus side, I also like the lip shade you are wearing. Can you let me in on that secret as well?

[@ananthnarayanan9296]

you are the best. I actually wait for your videos! I watched your videos and got an offer from a good startup. thank you so much!

[@diannayau]

Ananth, that's so great to hear you got an offer from a great startup! Thank you so much for sharing and making my day! I love to hear stories of people in the community who've used the tips to help them get jobs! If you have learnings from your journey, feel free to share with the community!

[@erictoulain7903]

I guess candidates ask about constraints like mobile VS web because of the examples given by Lewis C Lin on his CIRCLES framework (per Microsoft famous question: design a new airport from 0)

[@bubblelanlan]

Very sincere and great advices.

[@krnboison]

Hey @diannayau - these videos are amazing! Thank you for doing this. One quick clarification: For the user segmentation question - how do you prioritize between selecting between the Businesses Providing Services vs Travelers (aka users in this case)? Do you perhaps say you want to focus on the traveler because the total addressable market is more (due to more users)?

[@amylovescoffee4759]

Awesome video Diana. I want to give this video 1000 thumbs up. Thank you for sharing.

[@amylovescoffee4759]

A year later, I'm back to watch this video again and again. You're a gem Diana😊

[@mohamedshommo4455]

You are the best and I enjoyed your videos

[@ashwinkumar8245]

Great video. Thanks, Dianna. It would be great if you can create video for product improvement. Once again, thanks for the amazing videos you have uploaded to your channel.

[@diannayau]

So glad it’s helpful!! Yesss I’ve got a video on the question, how would you improve the product. Check it out in the product sense playlist on the channel

[@Righteoso]

Dianna, your videos truly stand on top of all others I've seen. Thank you so much! I used your videos to prep for my Facebook PM interview (2nd attempt) and although I didn't make it again, I did much better than the first time. I really hope the 3rd time will be the charm :))) I have a question on time management vs going deep. I've struggled to balance the two. On one hand, in order to do a good job, for example, segmenting users (going deep and branching out), you need at least a few minutes just for that. Last time I did this (when asked to design a travel product for Facebook), I took some time to go into a few types of travelers but then I felt I was taking too much time with this so I moved on to picking a couple of segments to focus on. This might have been a mistake. So I'd like to ask how you guys, the interviewers, balance this? Do you wait to quickly validate if the candidate gets it and then ask them to fast forward to the next step or you wait for each step to be completed as detailed as possible? It does feel like a very well detailed product sense analysis would never fit into 45 minutes, so knowing how you guys go about it would help me immensely next time. Thank you so much!

[@diannayau]

A great question (and i'm planning to launch a video addressing this!) there is an art to covering each section deeply but also concisely...with user segments, it's not necessarily thinking too exhaustively of a list but rather thinking of 3-5 subsegments and doing a good job of rationalizing WHY you'd pick the one you'd pick (with an objective criteria)

[@TheBigCheezeIt]

Great video about depth

[@Bcerto]

Dianna, you should literally create a product management school and not just coach. This video was so helpful and so much more insightful than the vast majority of interview prep videos I’ve seen thus far. I just recently discovered the product management world/realised that I’ve been doing it in my current role the entire time. So now I’m going to take a General Assembly certification course in PM to reaffirm/perfect what I’ve already been doing. I will certainly be reaching out to you once my program is complete to get coaching! Thanks again for your help and sharing this crucial information 🙏❤️.

[@diannayau]

So psyched for your journey in product! Haha I do like the idea of teaching PM camp.. would love to hear what types of things would be useful that I can cover in videos! And thanks so so much for the support and kind words!

[@Bcerto]

@@diannayau Absolutely! Thank you 🙏 I would love to see framework planning, much of the same tailored videos you provide on user seg, engagement metrics, and the like. But what I would REALLY LOVE to see or have the opportunity to participate in is an opportunity for simulation-based case study sessions that would allow students to truly experience the full cycle PM experience and feel confident. I think it would be a game changer, as a major pain point for PM students or recent grads is imposter syndrome and premature anxiety over not knowing the day to day interactions with a potential development team/ roadmap for day 1/30/60/90.

[@christopherruizchiu9730]

Two questions: What's an appropriate way of recovering from identifying overlapping segment types or generally choosing "bad" segments? What is the appropriate way to acknowledge that a product (like Zodoc) might already exist, but you're not sure if it does?

[@anvikaanvika9834]

You are amazing.

[@jordanevans55555]

Really appreciate all of your great content! I have my interview this upcoming Monday and your videos have helped me build my confidence.

[@diannayau]

Your very welcome! Cheering you on for your upcoming interviews!

[@inspired784]

@jordan did you get the job? I am interested to go through mocks. I have finished the first two rounds and now have been called for onsite.

[@jordanevans55555]

Unfortunately I did not

[@diannayau]

@@inspired784 Happy to connect you to others for mock interviewing, just reach out to me :)

[@SuperDiwa]

@@diannayau I am interested. Can you please help with mock interview.

[@vasanthanuthakki8872]

Thank you Dianna, for the great content. I always look forward to your videos 🤩I started preparing for Meta interview and your videos are very helpful. One question regarding the mistake you referred to in the solution section. One reason people might repeat an existing solution is because they may not be aware that the solution already exists in the market. I try to keep up with the latest product launches, technology trends, startups etc but still I am pretty sure I don't know all solutions that are out there for a given problem. How do we get past this mistake? Does the interviewer provide feedback that the solution already exists and allow the candidate to gracefully course correct or is that a major blunder and results in a failed interview?

[@diannayau]

Great question! Definitely not a deal breaker if the interviewee doesn’t know of an existing product that might not be well known. The interviewer might tell them about the product and give them an oppty to think of new solutions

[@aquarianTube]

Great content Dianna. One question about prioritization : You prioritized user persona and then pain-points. Are we also supposed to come up with 'multiple' solution ideas and then use a prioritization framework to prioritize them too?

[@diannayau]

Yep! Criteria for solutions is impact vs. effort (Eng resources and complexity)

[@sudarshankhadka9227]

@@diannayau thanks, Diana. quick q: what parameters would you measure impact on?

[@iam_Riri]

insightful video!, under user segment do we have to also define and go through the user journey? , thanks in advance!

[@diannayau]

That comes in the painpoint section after you’ve defined a user segment you want to choose

[@martinluc]

Thanks!

[@diannayau]

Thanks Martin for your Super Thanks!!! It really means a lot and i'm enthralled you're finding value in the content :) let me know what other content could be useful in your journey

[@zoubeirjazi5484]

Interesting insights. Thanks!

[@diannayau]

Glad it’s interesting! Let me know what else you might be interested in!

[@zoubeirjazi5484]

@@diannayau More content / examples about product strategy! Regards.

[@diannayau]

@@zoubeirjazi5484 great! will work on that!

[@mankala]

Great tips! A small question. I learnt that MECE = Mutually Exclusive and Collectively Exhaustive, is it Comprehensively?

[@diannayau]

😂 I just googled it and you’re right, it does stand for collectively…I guess comprehensively and exhaustive both just emphasize the same thing, maybe that’s why I thought it was comprehensively. Good call out! Will make sure I correct it in future videos!! Thank you for calling it out

[@isaaczimberg2815]

How am I supposed to know that Zocdoc already exists? For that matter, how am I supposed to know if the add-on feature I'm proposing also doesn't exist? All I can say is "I assume something like this exists, but I don't know. I'm just guessing." Isn't it?

[@tonyb279]

Would you use the same framework if the question was “Improve product x” For facebook it could be the newsfeed experience, events, messaging etc. Would you still want to use the motivation section to determine why the company should improve the product? It would be great if you outline any examples

[@diannayau]

Here’s a video on your exact question kzbin.info/www/bejne/oWXapYKnh8qVaaM

[@Lima3578user]

7:28 great points

[@Lima3578user]

Dianna , can you post a video pertaining to the role of a investment bznking product manager for eg jp Morgan . How does a product manager strategize in a banking domain.

[@gordonh9655]

splendid 🙂✌️️️!! YT ranking services > P-R-O-M-O-S-M!!