Preparing for a Phone Screen: Technical Account Manager (TAM)

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We’re making history, and the good news is that we’ve only just begun.

Thank you for taking the time to speak with us. The tips below are intended to enhance your
candidate experience.

Our Technical Account Managers function as part of the Enterprise Support team to ensure key
enterprise customer success in building applications and services on the AWS platform. TAM’s
support our customers’ creative and transformative spirit of innovation across all technologies,
including Compute, Storage, Database, Big Data, Application-level Services, Networking,
Serverless, Deployment, Security and more.

TAM will provide advocacy and strategic technical guidance to help plan and build solutions
using best practices, proactively keep customer’s AWS environments operationally healthy and
are engaged at the account level to support all phases of the implementation life cycle.

Material to Review:

 Position Description (Refer to Career Site or the Position Description sent by our
scheduling team)

 Amazon’s 14 Leadership Principles

 Video – “Meet Sarah Farrell, Head of Enterprise Support at AWS”

 Video – “Meet our Technical Account Managers at AWS”

 Pod Cast – “So What Does a Technical Account Manager Do?”

 Recommended: Create an AWS Free Tier Account to familiarize yourself with the console

https://aws.amazon.com/free/. Please note, formal AWS experience/certifications are not a

 Set aside 60 minutes for the call

 Ensure you are in a quiet room where you won’t be interrupted

 Familiarize yourself with call/conference details provided to you by our AWS Recruitment
Coordinators & create an account for chime login if you need to.

 Have the contact details of your AWS Recruiter or Recruitment Coordinator handy in-case
you may be running late or experiencing difficulties.

Possible Topics Covered in a Phone Screen:

Technical -

 Traditional Infrastructure components: Security, Storage, Networking, Compute, Web,

 Newer tech: Cloud Architecture, Micro-services, and DevOps-related tooling/methods such

Behavioral -

 You may notice towards the end of the interview, we will move from Technical to
Behavioral style questioning. It is advised that you review Amazon’s 14 leadership principles
as these will be the basis of all behavioral questions.

 Follow the STAR methodology (Situation, Task, Action, Result) when structuring your
responses and provide singular in-depth examples per question rather than listing multiple
examples.

Phone Screen Tips:

 Prepare to answer motivational questions. (Why AWS? Why are you interested in a TAM
role?)

 Do not expect narrow focused technical questions – we will ask you about technical
questions in the context of customers, people, and the business

 We are looking for an ability to have a well-structured and comprehensive technical

 It’s important to know, TAM’s may be a specialist in 1-2 technical areas though have
strong generalist knowledge. That being said, we don’t expect you to know everything. We
would rather you say you don’t know than have you provide a wrong answer. Our TAM’s
would conduct themselves this way when dealing with our customers and leverage the
knowledge of relevant Engineering or Product teams in our business to help them find
solutions.

 We recommend that you provide examples from past roles where responsibilities are
similar to what a TAM does.

Next Steps:

If successful after the first phone screen, you will have a second phone interview with the hiring
manager. This would include behavioral questions exploring your non-technical skills in more
depth (e.g. customer engagement).

The final stage would be an onsite interview with several members of the team. The whole
process generally takes 3 – 5 weeks depending on scheduling.

Technical Account Manager (TAM) Role FAQ’s

How many customers do AWS TAM’s typically manage?

TAM’s at AWS usually work with a small number of customers at a time, that largely depends
on the size of the customer. For enterprise customers operating at a sizeable scale, a different
approach is taken in the best interest of the customer & business to introduce multiple TAM’s.

How often do AWS TAM’s make onsite customer visits?

Our TAM’s normally visit their local customers 2+ times per month, which is often dependent on
the customer and how they operate. TAM’s aligned to customers in other parts of the region or
country may have less frequent onsite customer visits (monthly, quarterly, etc.).

Who are the most common points of direct contact that AWS TAM’s have within their
customers?

At AWS the TAM’s have three primary areas of interaction with their customers — providing
proactive guidance, coordinating their AWS service needs, and providing oversight of their
reactive support and cases. As such, TAM’s are able to regularly meet and interact with
customer personnel ranging from Engineers and Architects, to Directors, VP’s and CxO-level
staff. This can be dependent on the customers’ company size, its use of AWS, and other
variables, but many TAM’s have regular cadence meetings with most levels of their customers’
organizations.
Are AWS TAM’s involved in any direct or indirect sales activities?

The TAM is part of the AWS Enterprise Support service, and works on the same side of the table
as their customers. Customer satisfaction is the primary measure of success, and TAM’s are
neither involved in direct sales activities nor incented to develop new sales opportunities. Rather,
our TAM’s support the customers with their usage of AWS, often providing solutions which
encompass AWS services to solve a problem they’re having, or designing an architecture to meet
their needs. As a result of our TAM’s working closely with their customers on desired outcomes,
new service needs are often surfaced, leading to increased investment on AWS services by their
customers.

What is the typical travel requirement for the AWS TAM role?

While it may vary depending on customer assignment and other specific factors, travel beyond
the local AWS office and/or local customer office locations (where applicable) for TAM’s is
limited. After an initial 3-week training period, out-of-town travel is usually less than 15% for
most, though it may be higher at times in some unique cases. Some regional customers have
business units in other parts of the country, so quarterly-to-annual visits to those sites may be
required for their respective TAM’s. Other occasional short-term travel may include internal
AWS conferences, annual kick-off meetings, trainings, and other off-site team events.

How often are AWS TAM’s able to work remotely/from home?

There is much flexibility in this area -- at AWS we encourage our TAM’s to spend as much time
as they can with their customers while also benefiting from time spent in their local AWS office
(where applicable), spending time with fellow TAM’s to chat about their customers and
challenges, and for team-building and learning purposes. As such, most TAM’s work at their
local AWS office (where applicable) 2-3 days per week when not visiting customers, while also
being provided the additional opportunity to work from home.

Is there an on-call requirement for AWS TAM’s? Do they carry pagers?

As part of the role, our customer-obsessed TAM’s are expected to ensure that highly critical
cases are handled by our technical support teams within SLA whenever they occur, thus TAM’s
are on-call with their partners for their customers’ critical issues. Accordingly, TAM’s do set up
paging either via a paging app on their phone or a physical pager, and receive a text message on
their phones when their customers open critical and urgent cases. However, we do rely on the
expertise of our global tech support centers to handle most cases. Historical data has shown
that most customers have critical issues that are outside of business hours only 1-2 times per
month on average.
What types of formal training do AWS TAM’s receive?

Our goal is to have each new TAM ready to successfully support their customers within two
months of beginning their role. All new TAM’s attend two weeks of training offered to
familiarize them with the tools used across the AWS Support organization, followed by a week-
long TAM training which expands on the tools of the TAM trade. New TAM’s also participate in a
check ride process which provides them with a safe audience for coaching, and to prepare for
our standard customer meetings such as on-boarding, management business reviews and
cadence calls. Our TAM’s are also afforded time to study and prepare for AWS Certification
exams, and access to on-line instructor-based training and hands-on labs is provided to all
TAM’s for certification and ongoing skill development purposes. Best of all, every TAM is
assigned a seasoned TAM mentor to support them throughout the entire readiness process!

Are there optional training & development opportunities that are available to AWS TAM’s?

Yes, the sky is the limit! TAM’s will create AWS accounts to use for their own learning, both self-
paced and workshops. Within the TAM team, as well as externally, AWS has multiple day-long
workshops in areas such as IoT, Big Data, Serverless Computing, Gaming and many others
which are typically hands-on and allow for use of services. Other training materials include self-
paced labs and similar self-learning activities. AWS also provides growth paths that allow our
TAM’s to participate in training provided by product teams in the form of week-long boot
camps, as well as the opportunity to pursue a challenging public speaking certification.

Is the cost of AWS certification exams reimbursed for AWS TAM’s?

As our certifications provide us added credibility with our customers, we do reimburse for AWS
certification exams for TAM’s!

CONGRATULATIONS ON GETTING TO THIS STAGE AND WISHING YOU THE

Questions? Feel free to contact Adrian Holtham, Technical Sourcer for Enterprise Support,
[email protected] / +61 385 823 567 / +61 431 920 414

Important note: This document is for general reference purposes only, and is not a legally
binding document. The information herein is subject to change, and actual individual situations
may vary.