Project Management Interview Questions
“TELL ME ABOUT YOURSELF...” (Have something short and sweet here. There
is a large group of interviewers that like to challenge (ahem, torture)
you by starting with this open-ended question.)
“WHAT
HAVE YOU BEEN DOING since your last job?” (If you’ve been out of work
more than a month, be ready for this question. Hint: “Watching the
History Channel” is a bad answer.)
"WHAT
ARE YOU LOOKING FOR in a new job?” (This should work with your answer
to the similar question, "What interests you about this company?” Both
answers can be used to express your goals and show the homework you’ve
done on the job.)
“I
see you worked at Acme, Inc. for 5 years. WHAT TYPES OF PROJECTS did
you manage?” (Prepare example projects from your past that you can speak
to in moderate detail for this question. Your projects are your
portfolio.)
“WHY
DID YOU LEAVE Acme, Inc.?” (Just the facts and move on. Shoot no
arrows, raise no eyebrows. They are figuring out if they want to work
with you and/or if you are a criminal.)
“WHAT
WAS YOUR GREATEST PROJECT ACHIEVEMENT?” (This would be a good place to
focus on something that helped the company bottom line. Leave off your
cool “Glee Club” accomplishments.)
“Tell
me about a PROJECT THAT FAILED.” (If they asked the “achievement”
question above, you can be sure that this one is coming next.)
“WHAT
WAS THE TYPICAL SIZE AND BUDGET of your projects? How did you manage
budgets?” (Make sure you have high, low and average examples. Estimate
based on resource and other costs if you don’t have exact numbers.)
“WHAT
IS THE FIRST THING YOU WOULD DO when assigned a new project?” (I’ve
gotten this question, to my surprise, many times. While it may depend on
the project, it’s best to cite something specific from your methodology
of choice.)
“What
SPECIFIC STEPS AND TECHNOLOGIES did you use on a typical project?”
(This is a drill-down question customized to the job requirement
details. If ITIL was mentioned in the reqs, for example, be ready to
speak some ITIL detail here!)
“TELL
ME WHY YOU'D BE A GREAT FIT for this position.” (This can be asked a
number of ways, but the gist of it is this... why are you a match for
not only the job, but with the company and clients with whom you'll be
working.)
“WHAT
QUESTIONS DO YOU HAVE for us?” (I usually have a LOT of questions.
However, I’m learning to trim what I ask to the time left and how
glassed-over interviewer’s eyes may be. If you earn a second interview,
you can ask questions later.)
Surprisingly,
some common questions I expected like “What is your greatest weakness?”
have not been asked. Also, I have rarely been asked about any jobs
prior my last two. I may be yearning to talk about my Peace Corps
experience... but they don’t have time, or don’t care!
How would you manage conflict or a tough sponsor is a common one I have been asked.
Often
conflict on a project is posed as an example... either a "tough
sponsor" as you noted, or a problematic team member or project that is
behind schedule and/or over budget. An applicant should definitely be
prepared to answer how he/she would deal with any of these issues.
• Tell me about the main milestones of a project you have done.
what are the most important things you have to take care about in a project and why
Tell me about a lesson learned from a failed project
Describe to me ,in depth, a Project that failed and how so?
If
you were given the project of building a house from scratch, what would
be your thought process and how you would define its life-cycle?
yes,
the "failed project" one has come up, and it can be tough. Best to have
at least 2 examples (one big, one small) ready to go for that one.
Seems to often be followed by, "What did you learn from that
experience?" or "What would you have changed to save the project?"
I
haven't been given the "build a house" or "build a car" analogy type
question, yet. I did once work with a developer who complained about
people wanting to buy shiny wheels for the car before building the
frame, though. Usually, with some colorful expletives thrown in!
what
were the challenges (failures, bad team member or delivery slippages )
during the project pahse and what did you do to mitigate them? also,
sometimes I am asked - what you could have done differently ? --- both
of these hint towards some talking about Risk and Stakeholder
management.
•
Personally I find using "case interviews" as a very effective tool for
evaluating project managers. I usually use a specific problem for
specific business with specific objective. Then I ask the candidates to
try to structure the solution / make a plan and describe what
resources/expertese they need to get the project done -- It allows me to
judge how they think about a problem, how would they structure a
solution, do they know when they have to rely on someone elses help -
kind of simulates the real world that they will be thrown in... (Hint:
to use Chris's example buying the shiny wheels before you build the
frame is what ocassionally happens in a case... ) You can also see what
priorities people have in their mind (e.g. Had someone building a
airport in New York whose primary concern was land regulation.. before
need, before cost, before possibility to do it from an engineering
perspective, before location availability.. guess what? He was working
for the government! I did not even need to look at his resume... ) I
also ask very specific question such as "How would you go about X...
e.g. picking the location for that airport...?" It allows me to judge
whether the person can switch between big picture and the details..
which is important for a project manager who deals with all levels of
stakeholders.
•
Personally, I like your way of giving an case example to solve, as
opposed to asking the candidate to cite one from their past. A couple
weeks ago I was asked to "provide an example of specific information I
had on a project, that I chose to hold back from the team or management,
and how that affected the project outcome." Now, I'm prepared with many
examples and projects, but in a multi-person interview, to try and come
up with an actual real example for something as specific as that
stumped me for (more than) a few seconds, and my answer was less than
exceptional.
I
think that same question could have been presented as an example like,
"Imagine your QA lead just told you about her concern regarding one of
the developers... what would you do with this information?" Asked that
way, which is the way you present it as a "case interview" I believe
would have been just as effective as requesting a specific example from
my past.
a. Do you have any experience of recovering a troubled project. What did you do, why that particular approach, etc.
b. As a people manager, which one you think is challenging and why - managing a top performer or poor performer.
c.
Do you have experience in managing reward and penalty, tough SLA based
project. How did you ensure SLA adherence and sustenance.
d. How do you manage attrition and knowledge retention.
e. How do you expedite delivery date and what are pitfalls in ensuring the success.
f. Your experience in managing multi-cultural team environment.
g.
Your experience in adopting latest project management methodology like
Lean, Agile and how does it relate to conventional project management
methodologies.
h. Your experience in quality management, quality audits, metrics collection and analysis.
•
I'm new to to the PM field and I am excited to say I have a phone
interview coming up for a project coordinator position. Because this is a
new career path I am choosing, can anyone offer any advice or
suggestions for my upcoming phone interview as well as any questions
employers have asked in the past when you were entering as an entry
level...
- How would you establish relationship/trust and manage the resources that are based in multiple offshore locations.
-
Describe examples of significant scope change / cost overrun / vendor
slippage. What actions did you take? What would you have done
differently?
•
Tell me/us about a time that you have had to manage situation with a
difficult/non-preforming resource/person and what did you do to resolve
the issue.
What do yo do when faced with unreasonable requests from senior management.
How do you manage/negotiate with stakeholders who want to introduce a change but will not listen to an increase to time/budget.
-
Do you have any experience of RECOVERING A TROUBLED PROJECT? What did
you do, why that particular approach, etc. (I've had some version of the
"troubled" project question, usually given in the form of an example,
in every interview.)
-
As a people manager, which one you think is challenging and why -
MANAGING A POOR PERFORMER or a top performer. (I've not had this
question, but I have been often asked about a "problem" team member
situation. How to deal with a "top performer" is actually an interesting
question!)
-
Your experience in managing (and establishing relationships) in
MULTI-CULTURAL TEAM ENVIRONMENT. (I've only been asked this, obviously,
on those projects with offshore or remote teams for which I've applied.
If there are people on the team in other places, speaking various
languages, you can be sure to get this one. I hope to be able to work
with multi-cultural teams, actually. Ciao!)
-
Your experience in ADOPTING LATEST PM METHODOLOGY like Lean, Agile and
how does it relate to conventional project management methodologies. (If
this is listed in the job description, it will be asked. If you see
"CSM", "Agile", or "Scrum" in the description, there is likely to be a
very specific question that will test your knowledge of those methods.
Same goes for Lean, Six Sigma, etc.)
-
Your experience in QUALITY MANAGEMENT, QUALITY AUDITS, METRICS
collection and analysis (If you are applying for a job that manages SDLC
and interacts with developers and QA teams, this can be expected. I do
not know if it is asked often in other industries like construction,
defense, or pharma. Perhaps someone else can comment on other
industries.)
-
I have been asked about the "SCOPE CHANGE" and "UNREASONABLE REQUESTS
from management" situations mentioned by @Tu-Ly and @Ruth but they've
been posed in the form of a specific example like, "Tell us about a time
when a stakeholder asked for additional functionality on a project
(software) that was not part of the original scope. How did you handle
that?" (Definitely prepare, as I mentioned in the initial post, a few
project examples that you can cite for this type of question.)
I've
not been asked the questions about SLA's, managing attrition,
expediting delivery (amazingly) very often. My most recent interview
included SLA discussion and metrics, but in this string I'm trying to
apply 80/20 and concentrate on the questions most often asked (in my own
experience.)
While
I think making up a scenario a good idea, it's probably not as good
(IMO) as citing an actual experience you have. Perhaps you can think of
an experience from your past (from school or previous non-PM position)
that contains some of the same structural elements of the question being
asked of you. You don't have to be a PM to have dealt with a
troublesome team member or unrealistic stakeholder requests (like when
the customer asks you to make the latte non-fat, but with whole-fat
cream... what is wrong with those people?) If you can think of something
(anything) from your past that relates, your answer will be more
authentic.
In
any case, if the interviewer is asking you a "have you ever dealt
with..." case example kind of question, they are not only to see if you
have that specific experience in your past, but also how you would deal
with it in the future. If you don't have a specific PM example and you
can't come up with a analogous example as above, your last resort would
be just to say, "I have not had exactly that type of situation, but if
presented with that situation I would do (INSERT what you would do
here!)"
In
this final scenario, where you don't have any story to tell, if the job
requires PMP certification I'd suggest your response follows PMBOK
guidelines, same for Lean, Agile, etc... how you respond to issues goes a
long way towards telling the hiring manager what kind of PM you are,
and what methods you follow. If it's an Agile job and you say, "I'd
pause development and have the product manager fill out a new
requirements document" then you just struck out. :-)
