What the Product Sense Interview is Evaluating: Evidence from Meta

I found Meta’s 5 criteria for the product sense interview. They’re surprising.

Let’s break them down:

Source: Meta Careers

Reminder… this is the interview where they ask questions like:

• Improve ChatGPT.
• How would you differentiate Reels from TikTok?
• What’s your fave product? How would you improve it?

And why should you care about Meta related to this?

Meta originated product sense interviews back in ’08. Their criteria have propagated to the rest of the industry. I saw similar one’s when I worked at Affirm and Apollo.

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Here’s the details:

Criteria 1 — Understanding the product landscape and motivation

A great product sense interview response actually goes through:

• What problem is are we solving?
• What business goal is this achieving?
• What are the competitive alternatives?

So, your interview framework should give you the opportunity to answer all 3 of these questions.

Criteria 2 — Determining the audience or people using the product

Product case interviews worship at the altar of the user.

It’s important to not just identify who the user is, but who are the people who matter in the ecosystem?

EG, a common ‘gotcha’ in marketplace questions is when the interviewee only focuses on one side of the equation. (Think creators and consumers.)

Criteria 3 — Identifying and prioritizing the problem

The biggest mistake people who haven’t practiced much make is jumping straight into solutions.

The biggest mistake people who have practiced make is not exploring a variety of problems.

It’s critical to brainstorm several problems, and then prioritize one. And provide a good reason why.

Criteria 4 — Developing creative and impactful solutions

Once you’ve narrowed into one problem, you can’t just get excited about one awesome solution.

You need to brainstorm several creative one’s — that the interviewer hasn’t heard before.

Going back to the user and business problem can help you think outside the box.

Criteria 5 — Making intentional design choices

It’s counter-intuitive, because the product sense interview and product design interview are often different…

But you should actually get into some design choices in your product sense interview.

In fact, a key component of real-world product sense IS design. So don’t cut short your framework or answer.

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I know several people who have aced all their interviews except product sense.

And they didn’t get the offer.

Don’t neglect this round. Learn more in my deep dive.