MICROSOFT

PROGRAM / PRODUCT MANAGER

JOB INTERVIEW PROCESS,
QUESTIONS AND INSIGHTS

Hello,

I have interviewed with Microsoft for a Program Manager role very recently and
outlined my experience step by step in this document.

I have also added the following information in this document:

- Questions I’ve been asked during the interviews and my suggested answers.
- Steps for applying & getting an interview with Microsoft.
- Guide to answering famous behavioral questions asked in Microsoft interviews.
- Case questions me and my friends’ have been asked during interviews for
various roles at Microsoft.
- A worksheet that has all the answers to those questions, answered using the
STAR methodology. Answers are provided by me and my colleagues who got
offers from Microsoft. We used those answers to get job offers!


Please note that this document is licensed for a single person. Please do not copy
it or distribute it.


Hope you find it useful!

Ryan L.

How to get an interview at Microsoft?

Microsoft, once only an operating system developer, is now a global tech giant
with many products such as Microsoft Office Cloud and consumer electronics
(XBox, Microsoft Surface Tablet). It now has offices in many countries and it is
one of the hottest companies to work for.


There are basically 3 ways to get an interview Microsoft:

1. Employee referral: If you can find a friend/person who can refer you
through the internal ATS (applicant tracking system) that is the fastest
way to get an interview with Microsoft. (That is how I got an
interview).
2. Apply through the company website.
3. Watch out for “Hiring Events / HR Road Trips” that will happen in
your city. You can find out those by following some Microsoft HR folks
on LinkedIn.



Referrals are obviously the quicker way of getting an interview. In my case, I did
it via a person from a similar / close team to the role I’ve interviewed for. If you
can try to find a person who knows about that role and have a friendly chat
about the role and its responsibilities, that would be even better.


The interview steps I had was like this:

1. Initial phone (video chat) screening with a recruiter
2. Phone/video chat interview with a hiring manager
3. Phone/video interview with another member of the team
4. Onsite interviews

1. Initial phone(video chat) screening with a recruiter

This is the initial phone call where the recruiter actually tries to understand your
motivation, your willingness to join Microsoft and your general culture-fit. At
this stage you do not need to have detailed product information. You will also
most probably not be asked case questions at this stage.

Tips for this screening round: Know why you are looking to apply to Microsoft,
why the PM role and what skills are transferrable to Microsoft. Very important to
communicate that you are data driven, customer focused and can take
ownership. Projects / experiences to highlight: analytical projects, experience
working with cross-functional teams, experience using customer insight /
customer data to make decisions.





2. Phone/video chat interview with a hiring manager

You will normally get an email from your recruiter about this next stage. The
email I got from the recruiter was this:

This phone interview will cover your experience and how it relates to the team and
position. You will be speaking directly with a manager or member of the team that
is currently working in this space. Our goal during the call is to introduce you to
our team and gauge your fit for Microsoft.



For this interview, make sure to prepare 3-4 unique stories that are examples of
key program/product management principles. Some of the key principles of
Program Managers that Microsoft looks for are:

1. Customer Obsession.
The questions I got about this principle:
- Tell me about a time when you used customer data to develop
a product / feature? What was the process? How did you act on
this data? (For this question, it is important to share a story
where you persisted and recommended a feature / idea / product
based on customer need. Bonus points if you had to convince
someone / got pushback on your recommendation.)

2. Being Data Driven / Deep Diver
The questions I got about this principle:
- Tell me about a time when you had to uncover multiple layers
of data to get to the solution? How did you go about it? Can you
walk me through the process? (For this question, it is important
to highlight the complexity of the situation. Why was the problem
challenging? What made the solution non-obvious? What was
your thought process in solving this problem? What were the
alternatives you considered? What was the result? What was the
key learning from this experience?)


3. Bias for Action
The questions I got about this principle:
- How did you make a decision in the absence of data / analysis?
What guided your decision-making? What were the trade-offs
you had to make? (Here, Talk about a situation where you were
not able to analyze either due to time or information
constraints.)


4. Thinking Big
The questions I got about this principle:
- Give me an example of a radical approach to a problem you
proposed. What was the problem and why did you feel it
required a completely different way of thinking about it? Was
your approach successful?
- How do you drive adoption for your vision/ideas? How do you
know how well your idea or vision has been adopted by other
teams or partners? Give a specific example highlighting one of
your ideas.
- Tell me about time you were working on an initiative or goal
and saw an opportunity to do something much bigger than the
initial focus.
- Tell me about a time you looked at a key process that was
working well and questioned whether it was still the right one?
What assumptions were you questioning and why? Did you end
up making a change to the process?
(For questions about this principle, talk about a situation where
you saw an opportunity to do something big that the team had
completely missed. (e.g. scenarios: where you fundamentally
rethink how things are done.) Microsoft likes product managers,

who conceive solutions that challenge the status quo with

initiatives such as Microsoft Office Cloud moving the Office Suite
to cloud altogether). Highlight what are some of the assumptions
/ processes you questioned and then thought about how they can
be changed?)



Do you have any questions for me?
Have 3-4 thoughtful questions to the interviewer - this can be about principles
that resonate with them, what are some of the things they like / dislike about the
role and Microsoft? What are the current problems the team is working on?
Make sure to communicate that you have the skills to do well on the job - eg.
being data driven, being tech-savvy.







3. Phone / video interview with another member of the team

This interview will be a similar one to the previous interview. Remember that
both interviewers are also trying to gauge your cultural fit to the team as well. So
don’t forget to be nice and friendly while also showing your motivation and
program / product management principles!

For this round, also prepare 2-4 different stories that focus on these principles
not covered during the previous round. Have 3-4 questions for interviewer.
Show passion for working at Microsoft. Here are some other principles &
questions that I was asked:

1. Invent and Simplify
The questions I got about this principle:
- Tell me about a time when you defined a metric / analysis /
product? What was the situation and how did you go about
defining the feature? (Talk about a complicated analysis /
metric you had to measure e.g. ROI on promotion or Customer
lifetime value or computing churn)

2. Ownership

The questions I got about this principle:

- Tell me about a time when you sacrificed short-term gains for
long-term outcome? What was the situation? What was your
role? What did you do? (Talk about a situation where you had to
think long term. There was an easier solution that would yield
results in the short-term, but might lead to problems later on.
What was the situation? How did you approach the situation?
How did you get buy-in to your approach?)

3. Have Good instincts and Judgment
The questions I got about this principle:
- Tell me about a time when you had to make a decision based
on your judgment because you didn’t have enough time / data
needed to guide your decision-making. What was the situation?
What was the decision you made? How did you make the
decision? What was your thought process?



3. Onsite Interviews

During onsite interviews, you will meet with 4-6 people from the team and
possibly one person from another team (I had one person from another team
which my team was working closely). All of them ask questions based on the same
principle, so please be prepared to have 3-4 stories at least for each principle as
covered under previous round. The person from the visiting team can ask further
details about your stories so be prepared to share specific details.


During my onsite interviews, I was asked the following questions: (please find
my suggested answer / way of approach below each question)


Question: Microsoft is thinking of launching a premium color version of the
Surface Pro tablet. How would you quantify the benefits of this service?

Suggested approach:

When Microsoft (or any other company) is considering launching a new service
or feature, the first thing that product managers should evaluate is whether the
product / feature benefits the customers and if there is a market for it. Some
questions to bring up to demonstrate customer orientation are:

- Tablet sales accounts for what proportion of total hardware sales

globally?
- Within Microsoft, tablet sales accounts for what proportion of total
hardware sales?
- If there is a significant difference in what competitors’ offer and what
Microsoft currently offers?
- Some of the ways we can check whether a feature is important to
customers is through consumer surveys, analyzing historical data on
past product launches and the impact on customer behavior.







Question: An engineer comes and tells you that he has launched a premium
Windows OS version for Surface Pro tablets, but for some reason some
customers are being charged more than normal for this feature. What will
you do? How will you resolve the situation?

Suggested approach:

- Identify why the customers were incorrectly charged (e.g. bug in the
feature)
- After understanding the root cause for the incorrect charges, evaluate if
there might be many other customers who might have been incorrectly
charged.
- Analyze the total number of customers impacted (i.e. who have been
incorrectly charged for this feature).
- Communicate to all customers impacted that they have been incorrectly
charged for this and that their account will be shortly credited the incorrect
payment.
- To compensate for the incorrect charge, compensate the customers with
some Microsoft credit

Question: What are the steps in product development? If you are a PM,
what are some of the steps / ways in which you would go about building
new features?

Suggested approach:

- The first step in product development is to understand what is the
customer need / pain point that the product / feature is trying to solve? Is
the problem / pain point big enough / pressing enough to be solved?
- Once the customer impact has been established, define what is the list of
things that the product needs to address - jobs to be done. What benefits
should the product offer to the user?
- After defining the product / solution requirements, prioritize the features
to be built. You can prioritize features based on number of customers
impacted, degree of impact, engineering resources required, and time taken
to build. One way would be to prioritize features that impact a large
number of customers significantly but require few engineering resources
and can be implemented in a short span of time.


Question: Microsoft is revamping it’s online store and rethinking the
delivery options available to the customer. There are many different
options in delivery experience - same day delivery, 2 hour delivery and 2
day delivery and no-rush delivery. How would you decide which delivery
option to show to which customer?

Suggested approach:

Some of the methods / data used to decide which delivery experience to
recommend to customers are:

- Based on products ordered, some product categories such as Surface Pro
tablet might be better suited for same day delivery options.
- Location of the customer - do they live close to a shipment center? If yes,
then it might make sense to promote same day delivery?
- Time of the day: orders placed before 12 pm might be suggested same day
delivery.
- Look at past customer order data to determine what product categories the
customer has ordered and to evaluate if there are certain patterns in
products / delivery experience chosen? (e.g. does the customer order small
gadgets through same day delivery?)

Where would you show this information? At search or checkout? How do you
decide this?

- Decision on where to show the delivery options can be made based on user
behavior and customer impact. It makes sense to show different delivery
options if it will influence choice of products. For example, if there are 5
products shown in results page, do all products have the same delivery
option? If yes, then it doesn’t make sense to show delivery options as it
wont influence consumer decision on products chosen. On the other hand,
if 2 products have delivery option, it is important to highlight the delivery
options for these 2 products because it may be material in consumers’
choice of products.
- It may also make sense to highlight delivery options in search for certain
product categories such as cables etc. where customer values delivery
soon.
- If the products all have same delivery option, then it can be shown during
checkout as it wont change their products chosen.

What happens if the user is not signed in?

- If the user is not signed-in, use typical customer behavior to guide delivery
options either during search / checkout based on the product being
ordered. (E.g. recommend prime now and same day delivery for cables.)




Other questions I’ve been asked during the onsite interviews:

1 - If you had to go and pitch Microsoft Cloud solution to partners, how would
you do it?
(Here it is important to layout the high level approach you would take, what data
would you use to convince them? How will you influence them and get their buy-
in?)

2 - How would you develop the go-to-market strategy for ____(specific Microsoft
B2B product?
(Outline the key elements of the go-to-market strategy: Product, value proposition
/ positioning, what channels will you use, what partnerships will you explore?
Distribution channels? How will you communicate this?)

3 - How do you manage territory planning / account management?
(Here you will walk them through the process of territory planning, criteria used,
how would you measure success?)

4 - What is the value proposition for _______( Microsoft product/program that you
are interviewing for)?

5 - Tell me about the competitive landscape for _____( Microsoft
product/program you are interviewing for)












Case Questions asked during Microsoft Interviews
and the STAR Approach to Answer Them


As an additional material, I have created a practice guide for preparing for and
answering Case Questions that are asked during the interviews.

At the end of this section, I have also added a collection of questions asked to me
and the questions I’ve collected from my friends who went through interviews at
Microsoft recently.

*NEW* : I have now also added an excel worksheet with answers to all these
questions as an additional excel file bundled with your purchase. The answers in
the worksheet are given by me and my colleagues who got offers from Microsoft.

This practice uses the STAR method to answer case/behavioral questions and
practicing this way was critical in my success in the interviews. Please
practice answering case questions by following the steps below.




STAR METHOD:

ST: Describe the situation & task.

- When & where did this occur?
- Why is it important?
A: What actions did you take?
- How did you solve it?
- Who else was involved?
- How did you personally own it?
R: How did you measure success for this project?
- What results did you achieve?
- What are the cost savings & generated revenues?
- Other quantifiable results.



Practice Guide:

1. First, study the list of Behavioral/Case Question Categories listed below.
2. Pick one of the categories and take a look at the questions related with
that category (sample questions are found after the list). Answer it with
the STAR method as if it was asked you during your interview.
3. After you answer the question, pretend to be the interviewer and try to
challenge yourself by asking more details about your answer.



BEHAVIORAL QUESTIONS


CUSTOMER OBSESSION

- Leaders start with the customer and work backwards.
- They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust.
- Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over
customers.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Know your customer’s needs and wants.
- Anticipate your customer’s needs.
- Honestly pursue customer feedback, not just solicit for compliments.
- “WOW” your customers.
- Know what would be better than what your customer is even imagining.

- Ask, “Is what I’m working on helping my customer?”

- Remove non‐value steps.
- Listen for what your customer wants, before/instead of telling them what
they need.




OWNERSHIP

- Leaders are owners.
- They think long term and don’t sacrifice long‐term value for short‐
term results.
- They act on behalf of the entire company, beyond just their own team.
- They never say “that’s not my job”.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Create a vision for your team that aligns with the customer experience.
- Foster an environment of autonomy where an employee prioritize and
make decisions.
- Think about the impact of your decisions on other teams, sites and the
customer over time.
- Coach and mentor your team to understand the big picture, how their role
supports the overall objectives of Microsoft, and how it ties to others.
- Ask questions.
- Consider future outcomes (scalable, long‐term value, etc.)
- Give feedback – coach and develop others (peers, associates, manager).
- Speak up in meetings – question, challenge respectfully.
- Understand your role and relationship with other roles.
- Understand the impact of your work on others.
- Partner with peers across the network.

INVENT AND SIMPLIFY

- Leaders expect and require innovation and invention from their teams
and always find ways to simplify.
- They are externally aware, look for new ideas from everywhere, and are
not limited by “not invented here”.
- As we do new things, we accept that we may be misunderstood for long
periods of time.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Simplify and always encourage others to innovate and change inefficient
or unnecessarily complex processes.
- Use new ideas and methods to do your job better and enhance the
customer experience.
- Create an environment that encourages breakthrough thinking that is
simple.
- Encourage innovation and invention for the right reasons, helping others
not to unnecessarily reinvent the wheel.
- Think up and implement great ideas and simple solutions.





GOOD INTUITION & JUDGEMENT

- Leaders are right a lot.
- They have strong business judgment and good instincts.

So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Use sound business judgment to make the right decisions quickly and
achieve results, even in the absence of complete data. Question whether
decisions are being made in the Companies’ and customers’ best interest
and change course when they are not.
- Actively seek out the best solutions, recognizing that great ideas often
come from others.
- Recognize that your idea may not be as good as someone else’s and get on
board with the best idea.

HIRE AND DEVELOP THE BEST

- Leaders raise the performance bar with every hire and promotion.
- They recognize exceptional talent, and willingly move them throughout
the organization.
- Leaders develop leaders and take seriously their role in coaching others.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Take the interviewing process seriously by understanding the job and
focusing on hiring people whom we can learn from and who will raise the
high performance bar.
- Identify the right job description and candidate profile to attract the best
candidates and to raise the performance bar.
- Do whatever it takes by being relentless and creative to hire the best
candidates.
- Make it a priority to coach and teach employees; provide regular
feedback.
- Recognize and act upon poor performance and hiring mistakes quickly.
- Help employees drive their own development and learning by regularly
discussing career goals, strengths and areas for development; identifying
development activities and moves for all employees.
- Drive your own development and learning by actively discussing career
goals, strengths and areas for development and pursuing activities that
support your growth.
- Invest in the growth of others by taking ownership to mentor and guide
them when you have expertise in a particular area.




HAVE HIGH STANDARDS


- Leaders have relentlessly high standards ‐ many people may think these
standards are unreasonably high.
- Leaders are continually raising the bar and drive their teams to deliver
high quality products, services and processes.
- Leaders ensure that defects do not get sent down the line and that
problems are fixed so they stay fixed.

So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Raise the quality bar by demanding that your team delivers high quality
products, services and solutions.
- Teach and coach employees about setting their own high standards and
exceeding customer expectations.
- Provide feedback to employees when work is of high quality and coach to
continually improve work.
- Ensure the quality bar remains high by delivering high quality work, and
demanding it of others’ work.
- Continually self‐critique your work to make sure the quality is the best it
can be.
- Accept and seek out coaching and feedback from your manager and
others about improving the quality of your work.






THINKING BIG

- Thinking small is a self‐fulfilling prophecy.
- Leaders create and communicate a bold direction that inspires results.
- They think differently and look around corners for ways to serve
customers.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Take a radical approach and risks when necessary, always questioning
traditional assumptions in pursuit of the biggest and best idea.
- Create an ambitious mission that employees can be inspired by and get
behind.
- Provide direction for how to get there and explain how everything fits
into the long-term plan.
- Continually communicate the big picture and mission to the team in a
manner that gets employees excited (as a result, employees want to get
out of bed and come to work each day).
- Actively explore new ideas from team members, encouraging risk taking
when appropriate.
- Translate broader mission into big, hairy ideas and tactics in your own
work.

- Ask questions to get a sense of direction and confirm how work fits into
the short and long-term picture.
- Hungrily accept the challenge to create the best idea/solution and take
risks.




BIAS FOR ACTION

- Speed matters in business.
- Many decisions and actions are reversible and do not need extensive
study.
- We value calculated risk taking.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Make sound, timely decisions and remove barriers for direct reports.
- Quickly identify how work should be done and communicated to team.
- Make timely, sound decisions for the business even when all info you
want to have isn’t available.
- Empower your employees or become a bottleneck.
- Remove barriers to help your team act on new ideas immediately.
- Quickly identify if you need more info before taking action request that
info and move forward.
- Be ready, willing and able to roll up sleeves and assist with customer
facing tasks when needed.
- Ask for help when needed in a timely manner.
- Respond promptly to requests for information.
- Follow up and deliver as promised.
- Make sure you create an “action item list” (identify owner and target
dates).




BEING FRUGAL

- We try not to spend money on things that don’t matter to customers.
- Frugality breeds resourcefulness, self‐sufficiency and invention.
- There are no extra points for headcount, budget size or fixed expense.

So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Ask, “Does this spend make a positive impact for the customer.
- Be a role model for the team by not exhibiting “hierarchical” behavior like
taking a larger office, expensing lunches, being extravagant.
- Being transparent with team about costs by creating a general awareness
that things cost money.
- Understand the difference between frugal and cheap.
- Creatively spend money and share your resources.
- Seek out “no-cost” alternatives prior to spending.



EARN TRUST OF OTHERS

- Leaders are sincerely open-minded,
- They genuinely listen.
- They are willing to examine their strongest convictions with humility.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Earn the trust and respect of the team and build positive working
relationships by:
o Consistently making good decisions,
o Keeping commitments,
o Treating others and their ideas with respect, and
o Adhering to high ethical standards.
- Provide an environment where team members have room to take smart
risks and learn from mistakes while not losing sight of their
accountability for results.
- Listen, communicate and delegate to help employees get the right things
done.
- Do what you say you will do or appropriately reset expectations.
- Honor commitments made to other teams even if your own goals are in
jeopardy.

DIVE DEEP

- Leaders operate at all levels, stay connected to the details and audit
frequently.
- No task is beneath them.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Not pass the buck on unwanted tasks, demonstrate hustle and a “do what
it takes” attitude to get things done, even if that means being hands‐on.
- Stay closely connected to the details of projects/business, knowing when
to get involved without micromanaging.
- Frequently “audit” by drilling down into projects/business, questioning
and providing feedback, quickly assessing progress and risk, and hold
employees accountable for results.
- Drill down on fuzzy information, refusing to accept generalizations or
lightweight responses.
- Have a firm grasp of the details of your work in order to deeply discuss it.
- Frequently “audit” your work by checking accuracy, facts and
assumptions.




DELIVER RESULTS

- Leaders focus on the key inputs for their business and deliver them with
the right quality and in a timely fashion.
- Despite setbacks, they rise to the occasion and never settle.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Continually reinforce to yourself and the team who the customer is in
order to execute and deliver the right results.
- Set and communicate smart team goals, expectations and priorities;
- Help employees stay focused, yet nimble and adaptable to moving targets
or when projects aren’t progressing in order to get things done.
- Help others remove barriers/roadblocks towards meeting team goals.
- Recognize and celebrate successes, while keeping the team focused on
delivering the right results.

- Focus on the most important tasks, while adapting as needed to achieve

results.
- Persevere through setbacks and overcome obstacles to deliver
outstanding results.




HAVE BACKBONE: DISAGREE AND COMMIT

- Leaders are obligated to respectfully challenge decisions when they
disagree, even when doing so is uncomfortable or exhausting.
- Leaders have conviction and are tenacious.
- They do not compromise for the sake of social cohesion.
- Once a decision is determined, they commit wholly.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Question rigorously,
- Challenge assumptions and escalate issues up and across the “food chain”
when you’re not satisfied, even if unpopular.
- Stand up for what you believe is in the best interest of the company and
our customers.
- Openly demonstrate your support and commitment to decisions that have
been made, even though you may not have originally agreed.
- Refrain from being transparent with these types of decisions in the best
interests of your employees.
- Get on board with decisions that have been made, even though you may
not have originally agreed.




SELF CRITICAL

- Leaders come forward with problems or information, even when doing so
is awkward or embarrassing.
- Leaders benchmark themselves and their teams against the best.


So, as a people manager or an individual contributor, you have to:

- Admit mistakes, issues and areas for development.

- Seek out and accept coaching and feedback to improve.
- Set an example for your team by owning responsibility for problems and
failures and working to resolve them.
- Encourage team members to bring issues to your attention constructively.
- Escalate issues even when doing so might be unpopular.








QUESTIONS RELATED WITH THESE CASE & BEHAVIORAL
QUESTIONS

** These questions and their answers are found in the excel worksheet.


CUSTOMER OBSESSION
- Give me an example of a time you used customer feedback to drive
improvement or innovation. What was the situation and what action did
you take?
- Give me an example of your most difficult customer interaction and how
you worked through it. What was the outcome?
- Tell me about a time a customer wanted one thing, but you felt they
needed something else. How did you approach the situation, what were
your actions and what was the end result?
- Tell me about a time when you went above and beyond the call of duty for
a customer. Why did you take the action you did? What was the outcome?
- Most of us at one time or another have felt frustrated or impatient when
dealing with customers. Can you tell us about a time when you felt this
way and how you dealt with it?
- When do you think it’s appropriate to push back or say no to an
unreasonable customer request? Can you give me an example of when
you’ve been able to see around the corner to meet a customer need or
delight a customer with a solution or product they didn’t yet know they
needed/wanted?
- To try to meet the high expectations of our customers, we sometimes
promise more than we can deliver. Tell me about a time when you
overcommitted yourself or your company. How did you resolve the issue?

- Tell me about a time when you had to balance the needs of the customer
vs. the needs of the business. How did you manage this situation?

OWNERSHIP
- Tell me about a time when you took on something significant outside your
area of responsibility. Why was it important? What was the outcome?
- Give me an example of a time when you didn't think you were going to
meet the commitments you promised. How did you identify the risk and
communicate it to stakeholders? What was the outcome?
- Tell me about a time you made a hard decision to sacrifice short-term
gain for a longer-term goal.
- Give an example of when you saw a peer struggling and decided to step in
and help. What was the situation and what actions did you take? What
was the outcome?
- What steps do you take to ensure projects you complete get transitioned
effectively to new owners? Give an example where you elected to re-
engage on a project that you had already transitioned to someone else.
What was the situation and why did you feel it was important to re‐
engage?
- How do you ensure your team stays connected to the company vision and
the bigger picture? Give an example of when you felt a team or individual
goal was in conflict with the company vision. What did you do? (Manager)
- Tell me about an initiative you undertook because you saw that it could
benefit the whole company or your customers, but wasn’t within any
group’s individual responsibility so nothing was being done. (Manager)


INVENT AND SIMPLIFY
- Know when not to reinvent the wheel? Tell me about the most innovative
thing you’ve done and why you thought it was innovative (can also probe
with: That sounds more evolutionary than revolutionary – tell me about
something you’ve done you feel was truly revolutionary? Ask for one or
two additional examples to see if it’s a one off or pattern.)
- People often say the simplest solution is the best. Tell me about a
particular complex problem you solved with a simple solution.
- Tell me about a time you were able to make something significantly
simpler for customers. What drove you to implement this change?
- Describe a challenging problem or situation in which the usual approach
was not going to work. Why were you unable to take the usual approach?
What alternative approach did you take? Was it successful?
- Give an example of a creative idea you had that proved really difficult to
implement. What was the idea and what made it difficult to implement?
Was it successful?

- Tell me about an out of the box idea you had or decision you made that
had a big impact on your business.
- Give me an example of how you have changed the direction or view of a
specific function/department and helped them embrace a new way of
thinking? Why was a change needed?


GOOD INTUITION & JUDGEMENT
- Tell me about a decision for which data and analysis weren’t sufficient to
provide the right course and you had to rely on your judgment and
instincts. Give me two to three examples. They don’t have to be big
strategic decisions – could be big or small.
- Tell me about a time you made a difficult decision and how you knew it
was the right solution (probe on how they evaluated the options, if they
received input, what data they reviewed, etc.)
- Give me an example of when you have to make an important decision in
the absence of good data because there just wasn’t any. What was the
situation and how did you arrive at your decision? Did the decision turn
out to be the correct one?
- Why or why not?
- Tell me about a time when you made a bad decision and the learning from
the experience enabled you to make a good decision later. What did you
learn that you were able to apply?
- Tell me about a time when you have been faced with a challenge where
the best way forward or strategy to adopt was not “clear cut” (i.e. there
were a number of possible solutions). How did you decide the best way
forward?
- Tell me about an error in judgment you made in the last year or two, what
it was and the impact of it.



HIRE AND DEVELOP THE BEST
- Give me an example of one of the best hires of your career. How did this
person progress through their career? What did you identify during the
hiring process that drove his or her success?
- Tell me how you help your team members develop their careers. Can you
give me two to three examples of specific people in whom invested and
how you helped them develop their careers including one who wasn’t
being successful but you saw potential and chose to invest?
- Give me an example of a time you have provided feedback to develop and
leverage the strengths of someone on your team. Were you able to

positively impact that person’s performance? What were your most

effective methods?


HAVE HIGH STANDARDS
- Tell me about a time when you have been unsatisfied with the status quo.
What did you do to change it? Were you successful?
- Tell me about a time you wouldn’t compromise on achieving a great
outcome when others felt something was good enough. What was the
situation? What measures have you personally put in place to ensure
performance improvement targets and standards are achieved?
- Describe the most significant, continuous improvement project that you
have led. What was the catalyst to this change and how did you go about
it?
- Give me an example of a goal you’ve had where you wish you had done
better. What was the goal and how could you have improved on it?
- Tell me about a time when you have worked to improve the quality of a
product / service / solution that was already getting good customer
feedback? Why did you think it needed continued improvement?
- Give an example where you refused to compromise your standards
around quality/customer service, etc. Why did you feel so strongly about
the situation? What were the consequences? The result?





THINKING BIG
- Give me an example of a radical approach to a problem you proposed.
What was the problem and why did you feel it required a completely
different way of thinking about it? Was your approach successful?
- How do you drive adoption for your vision/ideas? How do you know how
well your idea or vision has been adopted by other teams or partners?
Give a specific example highlighting one of your ideas.
- Tell me about time you were working on an initiative or goal and saw an
opportunity to do something much bigger than the initial focus.
- Tell me about a time you looked at a key process that was working well
and questioned whether it was still the right one? What assumptions
were you questioning and why? Did you end up making a change to the
process?
- Tell me about a time you took a big risk – what was the risk, how did you
decide to do it and what was the outcome?

- Now Tell me about a time you took a big risk and it failed. What did you
learn? What would you do differently?


BIAS FOR ACTION
- Give me an example of a calculated risk that you have taken where speed
was critical. What was the situation and how did you handle it? What
steps did you take to mitigate the risk? What was the outcome?
- Describe a situation where you made an important business decision
without consulting your manager. What was the situation and how did it
turn out?
- Tell me about a time when you had to analyze facts quickly, define key
issues, and respond immediately to a situation. What was the outcome?
- Tell me about a time when you have worked against tight deadlines and
didn't have the time to consider all options before making a decision. How
much time did you have? What approach did you take?
- Give an example of when you had to make an important decision and had
to decide between moving forward or gathering more information. What
did you do? What information is necessary for you to have before acting?
- Tell me about a time where you felt your team was not moving to action
quickly enough. What did you do? (Manager)
- Tell me about a time when you were able to remove a serious
roadblock/barrier preventing your team from making progress? How
were you able to remove the barrier? What was the outcome? (Manager)




BEING FRUGAL
- Give me an example of how you have helped save costs or eliminate waste
within your operation.
- Tell me about a time when you had to make tradeoffs between quality and
cost. How did you weigh the options? What was the result?
- Tell me about a time you had to get something done with half or two
thirds of the resources you thought you’d need for the project or
initiative.
- Tell me about a time when you generated a creative solution to a problem
or project without requiring additional resources. What was the problem?
What was the solution and how did you come up with it?
- Tell me about a time you didn’t have enough resources to do something
you felt was important but found a creative way to get it done anyway.
What drove you to seek out creative solutions?

- Give an example of a time you requested additional funding/budget to

complete a project. Why was it needed? Did you try to figure out another
approach? Did you get the additional resources? Why or why not?


EARN TRUST OF OTHERS
- Describe a time when you significantly contributed to improving morale
and productivity on your team. What were the underlying problems and
their causes? How did you prevent them from negatively impacting the
team in the future?
- Give an example of a time where you were not able to meet a commitment
to a team member. What was the commitment and what prevented you
from meeting it? What was the outcome and what did you learn from it?
Building trust can be difficult to achieve at times.
- Tell me about how you have effectively built trusting working
relationships with others on your team. Describe a time when you needed
the cooperation of a peer or peers who were resistant to what you were
trying to do. What did you do?
- What was the outcome?
- Tell me about a piece of direct feedback you recently gave to a colleague.
How did he or she respond? How do you like to receive feedback from
coworkers or managers?
- Tell me about a time you had to communicate a big change in direction for
which you anticipated people would have a lot of concerns. How did you
handle questions and/or resistance? Were you able to get people
comfortable with the change?



DIVE DEEP
- Tell me about a time you were trying to understand a problem on your
team and you had to go down several layers to figure it out. Who did you
talk with and what information proved most valuable? How did you use
that information to help solve the problem?
- Tell me about a problem you had to solve that required in‐depth thought
and analysis? How did you know you were focusing on the right things?
- Tell me about a time when you linked two or more problems together and
identified an underlying issue? Were you able to find a solution?
- Walk me through a big problem or issue in your organization that you
helped to solve. How did you become aware of it? What information did
you gather, what information was missing and how did you fill the gaps?
Did you do a post mortem analysis and if you did what did you learn?

- Can you tell me about a specific metric you have used to identify a need
for a change in your department? Did you create the metric or was it
already available? How did this and other information influence the
change?
- Give me a situation in which it took you asking why five times to get to the
root cause.
- As a manager, how do you stay connected to the details while focusing on
the strategic, bigger picture issues? Tell me about a time when you were
too far removed from a project one of your employees was working on
and you ended up missing a goal (Manager)
- When your direct reports are presenting a plan or issue to you, how do
you know if the underlying assumptions are the correct ones? What
actions do you take to validate assumptions or data? (Manager)


DELIVER RESULTS
- Tell me about a time you (and your team if Manager) were driving toward
a goal and were more than half way to the objective when you realized it
may not be the best or right goal or may have unintended consequences.
What was the situation and what did you do?
- Tell me about a goal that you set that took a long time to achieve or that
you are still working towards. How do you keep focused on the goal given
the other priorities you have?
- Tell me about a time where you not only met a goal but considerably
exceeded expectations. How were you able to do it? What challenges did
you have to overcome?
- Give me an example of a time when you were able to deliver an important
project under a tight deadline. What sacrifices did you have to make to
meet the deadline? How did they impact the final deliverables?
- Tell me about a time you had significant, unanticipated obstacles to
overcome in achieving a key goal. Were you eventually successful?


HAVE BACKBONE: DISAGREE AND COMMIT
- Tell me about a time that you strongly disagreed with your manager on
something you deemed to be very important to the business. What was it
about and how did you handle it?
- Give me an example of when you took an unpopular stance in a meeting
with peers and your leader and you were the outlier. What was it, why did
you feel strongly about it, and what did you do?
- When do you decide to go along with the group decision even if you
disagree? Give me an example of a time you chose to acquiesce to the
group even when you disagreed. Would you make the same decision now?

- Describe a time where you felt really strongly about something but
ultimately lost the argument. How hard did you press the issue? What was
your approach after you lost the argument? Give an example when you
submitted a good idea to your manager and he/she did not take action on
it? How did you handle it? What was the end outcome?
- Tell me about a time the business gained something because you
persisted for a length of time. Why were you so determined? How did it
turn out?
- Provide an example of a time when you have had to make a difficult
decision under pressure and then defend and justify it. Was it the right
decision?


SELF CRITICAL
- Give me an example of an idea you had that was strongly opposed. Why
was there so much resistance? How did you handle the negative
feedback?
- Give me an example of a significant professional failure. What did you
learn from this situation?
- Tell me about a time where someone has openly challenged you. How did
you handle this feedback?
- Tell me about a time you made a significant mistake. What led you to
making the wrong decision? What would you have done differently in
retrospect?
- Give an example of a tough or critical piece of feedback you received.
What was it and what did you do about it?
- Tell me about a time you received feedback with which you didn’t agree.
How did you react?
- Tell me about time you had to learn something outside your comfort zone
in order to drive results for your organization or to adapt to a change in
the market, organization or other catalyst.




-----Thank You!-----