Book Description

Interviewing can be challenging, time-consuming, stressful, frustrating, and full of disappointments. My goal is to help make things easier for you so you can get the engineering leadership job you want. The Software Engineering Manager Interview Guide is a comprehensive, no-nonsense book about landing an engineering leadership role at a top-tier tech company. You will learn how to master the different kinds of engineering management interview questions. If you only pick up one or two tips from this book, it could make the difference in getting the dream job you want. This guide contains a collection of 150+ real-life management and behavioral questions I was asked on phone screens and by panels during onsite interviews for engineering management positions at a variety of big-name and top-tier tech companies in the San Francisco Bay Area such as Google, Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, LinkedIn, Uber, Lyft, Airbnb, Pinterest, Salesforce, Intuit, Autodesk, et al. In this book, I discuss my experiences and reflections mainly from the candidate’s perspective. Your experience will vary. The random variables include who will be on your panel, what exactly they will ask, the level of training and mood of the interviewers, their preferences, and biases. While you cannot control any of those variables, you can control how prepared you are, and hopefully, this book will help you in that process. I will share with you everything I’ve learned while keeping this book short enough to read on a plane ride. I will share tips I picked up along the way. If you are interviewing this guide will serve you as a playbook to prepare, or if you are hiring give you ideas as to what you might ask an engineering management candidate yourself. CONTENTS: Introduction Chapter 1: Answering Behavioral Interview Questions Chapter 2: The Job Interviews Phone Screens Prep Call with the Recruiter Onsite Company Values Coding, Algorithms and Data structures System Design and Architecture Interviews Generic Design Of A Popular System A Design Specific To A Domain Design Of A System Your Team Worked On Lunch Interview Managerial and Leadership Bar Raiser Unique One-Off Interviews Chapter 3: Tips To Succeed How To Get The Interviews Scheduling and Timelines Interview Feedback Mock Interviews Panelists First Impressions Thank You Notes Ageism Chapter 4: Example Behavioral and Competency Questions General Questions Feedback and Performance Management Prioritization and Execution Strategy and Vision Hiring Talent and Building a Team Working With Tech Leads, Team Leads and Technology Dealing With Conflicts Diversity and Inclusion