Interview with Google for a L4 product manager role ($250k/yr)
How to get an interview and detailed schedules from the initial recruiter call to the final rounds
Have you ever had an interview experience so positive that you want to work for that company even more? Or get a glimpse of the professionalism and culture through the interactions with recruiters and interviewers?
I have through my experience with Google.
How it started
I was connecting with dozens of professionals on LinkedIn every day, increasing my connection count from 400 to over 1500. I was scheduling coffee chats with product managers to get referrals and applying to various companies that ranged from start-ups to big tech companies.
Connecting with recruiters
I knew Google received an enormous number of applications so to stand out from the rest, I made a lot of effort in connecting with recruiters. I searched on LinkedIn for product management recruiters who worked at Google. Check here to learn how I searched for product recruiters. I used a mix of personalized notes and inMails to reach out to about 15 Google recruiters. Out of them, only one person connected with me. This is the inMail I sent.
Title: Mid Product Manager role at Google
Hello! I am a 5 yr professional and currently a product manager. I am almost done with my master’s in CS at Georgia Tech with a specialization in Interactive Intelligence, which is the intersection of AI, ML, and HCI. I spoke with multiple Google PMs and really enjoyed what they had to say about the work, culture, and people. I want to apply for a product manager role at Google. Are you willing to help me navigate? Thanks!
He immediately replied back with this note.
Hi, happy to have a chat. Would you be available at 5pm CST tomorrow for a call?
Initial phone call
My call with the recruiter happened the very next day. Prior to the call, I sent him my resume. He called me on my phone and the call only lasted about 15 minutes. We briefly introduced each other and he asked me to talk about my product experience and why I wanted to work at Google. I had prepared an elevator pitch so this part wasn’t very hard. At the end of the call, he will be scheduling a 45-minute phone interview with a Google product manager who will ask a product sense question. The next day, I got an email from a Google recruiting coordinator to schedule the call.
How I prepared for the interviews
I searched on Blind and Glassdoor to read about other people’s interview experiences. But I always go to Exponent* for mock interviews, interview prep content, and question banks.
*affiliate link that helps support my blog!
First round interview
Google Nest’s product manager called me on my phone. We started off by briefly introducing each other (3 mins) and then jumped straight into a product design + estimation question. I was told to design a physical product and then estimate the market size for that product. Due to the occasional poor phone quality, I had a hard time hearing, which made me panic a little bit but I kept my pace by repeating myself when necessary.
The questions weren’t a big surprise for me as I already reviewed hundreds of interview questions from Exponent. I recommend subscribing to Exponent for a couple of months to get access to the full question list, lessons on frameworks, and how to ace your interviews. The question I got asked was similar to the ones I prepared. I used a framework to give a clear and organized response. I got a sense that the interviewer was taking pretty detailed notes because he was asking me to repeat my steps, user segments, trade-offs, needs, and solutions.
After the product design portion, we were 35 minutes into the interview. The interviewer then asked me to estimate the market size. For this question, I focused on the different types of potential users and scoped them down to the US only. I was able to reach a reasonable number and close the interview.
The whole time, I had no idea how I was doing because I could not see the interviewer’s reaction. So prepare to receive a minimum reaction.
Waiting for the result
I did not have a big expectation but after a few days, my recruiter called me on my phone to say that I made it to the final round! He said that the recruiting coordinator will reach out to me to set up the final date and that he will also schedule a short meeting to go over how to best prepare for the final rounds.
Coordinating the final interview
Since it was during a pandemic, the final onsite interview was replaced with a virtual interview. The recruiter coordinator reached out to me to schedule a day for the final interview. I gave 3–4 available dates and times and after almost 1 week, I was scheduled for the final round.
The recruiter also gave me details on the final round. He said there will be 5 interviews with 5 Googlers on topics laid out below. He also gave me helpful blogs/websites to help me prepare for these interviews.
Interview 1: Product Insight and Design/ Strategic Insights Interview 2: Strategic Insights/Analytical Interview 3: Technical Interview 4: Product Insight and Design/ Googlyness and Leadership Interview 5: Analytical
Final virtual onsite interviews
I took a day off from work so that I could do the final interview. The interviewers came on time and were very courteous. All of them had prompts prepared and after a short introduction, they went straight to the questions. The interviews felt professional, efficient, and smooth. The calls happened via Google Meet and most of them had videos on.
None of the interviewers asked about my previous experience or any other personal questions. They seemed to have a clear purpose of asking the interview questions and taking diligent notes, which felt extremely efficient and professional but also a bit cold and robotic.
Interview 1: The first interview was with a product manager in Maps. He asked me a strategy question related to Google Maps. The way how he framed the question threw me off. He created a scenario where my boss is sick and I had all the power to make product decisions. Don’t panic when you are presented with a scenario like this. In essence, they are asking about strategy.
Interview 2: This interview was with a product manager working in Android systems. Her question was about designing an application for children. I was allowed to use a Google doc so I shared my screen and documented my process. I was having trouble multi tasking! I was writing and speaking at the same time. Just know that it is ok to take a couple minutes to gather your thoughts.
Interview 3: The technical interview was with a Google software engineer. He told me that he wasn’t assessing my product skills. He purely wanted to see if I was technical. He started off by asking about simple CS concepts like sorting and filtering. Then he asked me a system design question for a search engine. I knew I did not perform well here.
Interview 4: Another interview with a product manager. He asked me an analytical question about revenue at a company significantly decreasing. I had a good structure and probing questions but I was not able to identify the correct root cause. He ended the call by asking me how I would root cause if I had more time.
Interview 5: The last interview was with another product manager. She asked me what kind of metrics I would implement to track safety/security. This one was hard because I did not have much exposure to this.
All in all, I felt like the conversation went well but I wasn’t able to provide insightful or stellar responses.
Results
After about 3–5 days, I got an email from the recruiter that I did not get a role and that he wanted to call me at my available time. He called me and gave me general feedback on areas I can improve on and really wanted me to apply again in 6 months. He was really trying to give me actionable feedback by saying interviews are a game and that I needed to learn how to play the game well.
Final thoughts
Although I did not get the role, I felt really good about the whole experience. I knew exactly what the process looked like and I gain confidence in myself. I also knew what I needed to improve so that I can try again.
My other interview experiences:
