Product Manager Interviews Module 5 – Execution, prioritisation and technical rounds
Working with engineering, design and data
Answer questions on working with engineering, design and data: settle disagreements with shared goals and evidence, set decision rights and say no well.
What you will learn
- Resolve a disagreement with engineering or design through shared goals and evidence
- Define decision rights with a RACI and write decisions down
- Respond to an unworkable request and say no without losing trust
Before you start
What you’ll learn · Before you start
What you will learn
- Resolve a disagreement with engineering or design through shared goals and evidence
- Define decision rights with a RACI and write decisions down
- Respond to an unworkable request and say no without losing trust
Before you start
On this page
A product manager may lead a designer, an analyst and six engineers, and not one of the eight reports to the product manager. Questions about working with engineering, design and data test how you get such a team to one decision: how you settle a disagreement, who decides what, and how you say no to a request without losing the person who made it.
Below, you follow one disagreement about an invented bus-ticket app’s checkout from proposal to decision, write the decision rights as a RACI, and turn a flat refusal into a no that keeps trust.
Each partner owns a different question
The checkout of the bus-ticket app loses 38 % of the riders who start it, and each partner sees a different problem. Working with engineering means agreeing what to build with the people who know what it costs and what could break. Working with design means agreeing how it should work for the people who use it. Working with data means agreeing what the numbers say before anyone argues about what to do. The product manager owns why and what first:
| Partner | Owns the question | Needs from you |
|---|---|---|
| Engineering lead | How to build it, and how long it takes | The goal and the constraints, early |
| Designer | How it works for riders | The problem, not a finished solution |
| Analyst | What the data shows | The question and the decision it informs |
| Product manager | Why, and what first | Their evidence and their dissent |
Atlassian’s handbook for product candidates calls the difference “unity of command and unity of effort”: in the military, orders are given and followed, but “a product manager has to be great at unity of effort”. Google’s interview tips ask candidates to think about how they would address a conflict with someone they work with.
Not affiliated
Based on public information about Atlassian, Google and Amazon. MySmartCoPilot is not affiliated with Atlassian, Google and Amazon, and Atlassian, Google and Amazon’s real interview process may differ from what this lesson describes.
Checkpoint
Check: What each partner owns
Disagreements end with evidence agreed before anyone looks
A disagreement between design and engineering is two goods in tension, not a fight to win. MySmartCoPilot’s method has five moves: restate each view until its owner calls it fair, name the shared goal, agree what evidence would decide and by when, decide, then commit, dissent included. Step through it on the checkout:
The drawing shows the whole scene; its 8 steps are listed below.
Every step as text
- The proposal. The designer proposes replacing the bus-ticket app's four checkout steps with one page. Today 38 % of the riders who start checkout do not finish it.
- The objection. The engineering lead objects. The payment provider's library needs a page of its own, so one page means building the payment form, about six weeks of work and new security checks.
- Restate both views. The product manager restates each view until its owner agrees that it is fair: fewer steps for riders, and the cost and risk of rebuilding payments. Nobody has to win yet.
- The shared goal. Both want the same thing: more of the riders who start checkout to finish it, from 62 % to 70 % this quarter. The question becomes which change moves that number most for its cost.
- Agree the evidence first. Before anyone looks, they agree what would decide it: where riders drop out today, from the app's analytics, and a test of both ideas as prototypes with eight riders, within a week.
- The evidence. The analytics show that 60 % of the riders who leave checkout do so at the seat step, not at payment. In the prototype test, six of the eight riders struggled to pick a seat in both designs.
- The decision. The product manager, who decides which design ships, chooses the seat step first: two weeks of work inside the existing payment page. The one-page checkout waits until the seat fix is measured.
- Disagree, then commit. The designer still prefers one page and says so, then commits to the seat step. The decision, the evidence and the result that would reopen it go into the team's decision log.
The evidence was agreed before anyone saw it, so neither side could reject it afterwards. Amazon’s leadership principles describe the last move: leaders “respectfully challenge decisions when they disagree”, and “once a decision is determined, they commit wholly”.
Key idea
Restate both views, name the goal they share, agree the evidence before anyone looks, then decide and commit.
Checkpoint
Check: Settling a disagreement with evidence
A RACI says who decides before anyone has to ask
Two people who both believe they decide will reopen every decision. A RACI: A chart that names, for each decision or task, who is responsible for the work, the one person accountable for deciding, who is consulted before and who is informed after. names four roles for each decision: responsible people do the work, one accountable person decides, consulted people are asked before, and informed people are told after. Atlassian’s guide to RACI charts asks for “one accountable individual per task”. For two of the checkout’s decisions:
| Role | Which checkout design ships | How payment is built |
|---|---|---|
| Responsible | Designer | Engineers |
| Accountable | Product manager | Engineering lead |
| Consulted | Engineering lead, analyst | Product manager, security lead |
| Informed | Support, marketing | Support, designer |
Write each decision down in one line of a decision log: what was decided, why, who decided, and the result that would reopen it.
Checkpoint
Check: Decision rights in a RACI
A no that explains the trade keeps the person who asked
A sales lead asks for a custom spreadsheet export for one large client within two weeks. It would take four, and the quarter’s spare time is already given to the seat step. Atlassian’s handbook counts saying “‘no’ when needed” among a product manager’s strengths; how you say it decides whether the sales lead comes back:
| A no that loses trust | A no that keeps it |
|---|---|
| “We can’t do that.” | “I want the client to stay too. The export takes four weeks, and it would replace the seat fix that every rider needs.” |
| “It’s not on the roadmap.” | “If the client’s renewal depends on it, bring me its date and size, and we weigh it at planning.” |
| An answer that never comes | “Today, the standard export with a filter covers most of it; support can set it up this week.” |
The right-hand column has four parts: the goal you share, the trade, what would change the answer, and the smallest yes you can give now.
Practise: the strongest next sentence
Pick the strongest next sentence in two tense conversations:
Checkpoint
Two tense conversations: the strongest next sentence
Then the self-check below asks about partners, decision rights and refusals, starting where your answers are weakest.
Practice that adapts to you
Practise this lesson
12 questions about 6 ideas of this lesson. Each answer is explained at once, and what you get right is kept in this browser.
Three execution scenarios answered by level Pro: opens with a Pro, Premium or Ultimate pass
Three situations of the kind execution questions describe, each answered twice: the way a mid-level candidate answers it and the way a senior one does. The senior answer is not longer; it changes what gets decided.
In this part:
- Engineering estimates three times what sales promised a client
- The designer wants a round of research before the launch
- The analyst’s dashboard and the finance report disagree on revenue
1 diagram · about 6 minutes
Opening this part with your pass…
This part opens with any MySmartCoPilot pass.
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One payment; a pass never renews. The price shown is the total you pay: no fees or charges are added at checkout.
Passes can’t be bought right now, so this part can’t be opened at the moment. The free part above stands on its own. If you have a pass, enter your licence key.
It also opens every other in-depth part in Learn and every Pro tool. Sales are final, except where the law gives you a right to withdraw, for example in the EU and the UK (refund policy).
The follow-ups that test your judgement Pro: opens with a Pro, Premium or Ultimate pass
After the first answer, interviewers change one condition and watch whether the reasoning holds. Here are three such changes to a working-with-others answer, with the moves that keep it standing.
In this part:
- “Your manager disagrees with the decision the team reached”
- “The evidence comes back split”
- “The deadline cannot move”
- When agreement fails: escalate together, in writing
- What each level adds to a working-with-others answer
about 5 minutes
Opening this part with your pass…
This part opens with any MySmartCoPilot pass.
- Pro pass · 1 week₹79$2.99
- 30 days₹179$5.99
- 1 year₹1,699$45
One payment; a pass never renews. The price shown is the total you pay: no fees or charges are added at checkout.
Passes can’t be bought right now, so this part can’t be opened at the moment. The free part above stands on its own. If you have a pass, enter your licence key.
It also opens every other in-depth part in Learn and every Pro tool. Sales are final, except where the law gives you a right to withdraw, for example in the EU and the UK (refund policy).
Interview questions
For each, say whose call it is, which evidence would decide it and what you would say first, before you open the first step and the follow-ups:
-
Mid to staff
Your tech lead wants to rewrite a fragile service before your launch, which would delay it by six weeks. How do you decide together?
-
Fresher to senior
The designer believes a new layout is better; the analyst says the test shows no change. How do you resolve it?
-
Mid to senior
A senior stakeholder keeps asking engineers directly for features, bypassing your roadmap. What do you do?
Flashcards · 6 cards
Recall it, then check
Say the answer to yourself before you look: recalling it is what makes it stick.
-
Which question does each partner own: engineering, design, data and the product manager?
The engineering lead owns how to build it and how long it takes; the designer, how it works for users; the analyst, what the data shows; and the product manager, why and what comes first. None of them reports to the product manager.
-
What is 'unity of effort', as opposed to 'unity of command'?
Bringing people who do not report to you towards one goal, instead of giving orders that are followed. It is how a product manager leads a designer, an analyst and engineers.
-
What five moves settle a disagreement between design and engineering?
Restate each view until its owner calls it fair, name the shared goal, agree which evidence would decide and by when, decide, then commit, those who disagreed included. Agreeing the evidence before anyone looks stops either side rejecting it later.
-
What do the four RACI roles mean?
Responsible people do the work, one accountable person decides, consulted people are asked before the decision, and informed people are told after it. Every decision has exactly one accountable person.
-
What goes into one line of a decision log?
What was decided, why, who decided, and the result that would reopen the decision.
-
What four parts make a no that keeps the trust of the person who asked?
The goal you share with them, the trade (what their request would push out), what would change the answer, and the smallest yes you can give right now.
Key takeaways
- Engineering, design, data and the product manager each own a different question, and none reports to the others.
- A disagreement ends with both views restated, a shared goal, evidence agreed before anyone looks, a decision and a commitment.
- A RACI names one accountable person for each decision, and a decision log keeps the result that would reopen it.
- A no that keeps trust names the shared goal, the trade, what would change the answer and the smallest yes.
Terms in this lesson
- RACI
- A chart that names, for each decision or task, who is responsible for the work, the one person accountable for deciding, who is consulted before and who is informed after.
References
- Atlassian product interview handbook (Atlassian)
- RACI Chart: What is it and how to use it (Atlassian)
- Leadership Principles (Amazon Jobs)
- Interviewing at Google: best practices, advice and tips (Google Careers)
Related tools
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