How I Got an Offer from the First Product Design Interview I Ever Had
To be honest I was never expecting to get an interview, let alone an offer.
I had never worked a day in UX or Product Design. The only thing I had was a degree, a pretty lackluster portfolio, and some confidence.
A couple hours after I applied to a job posting the companies VP of Product shot me an email. “Could you do an interview say around 9 am Wednesday.” My first thought was — no way that was a fast response. Plus, there's an interview! Great! My second thought was — Wait, tomorrow is Wednesday… the interview was in 12 hours.
Not wanting to ruin the opportunity I politely accepted, and the interview was on. To be completely honest I had never done an interview at a company where I did not already have connections, and to be even more honest I’ve never been asked to do an interview for UX or Product design. I have never even done a mock interview!
What was even more intimidating is that the VP of Product had replied all to an email from another potential prospect. Me being nosey, I googled the prospects name and found their resume. Someone who held a master’s degree in human computer interaction, with past internships and freelance work related to product design. This brought me down, but I knew I had a chance if they had still asked me for an interview. I needed to show that I knew what I was talking about, and that I have a personality and potential no other candidate would. I needed to ace the interview.
I mean, there are whole classes and lectures on interviewing, and here I am with no interview experience trying to beat out more qualified candidates.
I kept my cool mentally and took to the internet.
Here are the 3 things I did to prepare:
- Google common UX/Product Design interview questions.
- Do research on the position and company.
- Get good sleep, and don’t get anxious or stressed about it.
Common interview questions
Going into a UX interview there was a lot of questions I was expecting. Here's a few common questions I prepared for, which in one form or another appeared in my interview.
- Tell me about yourself. Super, super common. Don’t ask “What do you want to know?” Sell yourself here. I talked about my background, freelance work, school, being self-employed, then told them I can walk them through my portfolio pieces.
- Walk me through your process (Point out strengths and challenges you face during projects!) Assumably they’ll ask you to pick a portfolio piece you liked. Feel free to dramatize the process and importance, but don’t lie. This is where a good portfolio comes in handy. Don’t read what is already on the screen out loud, pick key details, one challenge you faced, how you overcame it, what the process was, and what your role was (your strength.)
- How would you describe yourself (User Research, UX or Visual Designer?) Because I was new to the industry, I had difficulty with this question. You could go with research fanatic, prototyping wizard, visual design expert. I went pretty broad, but this is where you make sure you read the job description and what they’re looking for. Be honest with your skills, you don’t want a job in something you’re not interested in.
- What challenges have you encountered? You can usually answer this while walking through the portfolio piece where it occurred, but if not, you can bring it up, or go broader with struggles you face in general as long as you can be detailed and explain it.
- Tell Me About How you work with Design Team’s? What Did You Do when you disagreed with a teammate? This is a question which requires experience and luckily, I had done work with a team before. Here I was able to tell the interviewer that I acted as project lead and how I had to help carry my team to conduct user research and settle small disagreements which arose. This question is important to show you can be a leader, work with teams, compromise, and help others.
It is important to remember that these questions can be worded different or they might throw in some curveballs. Do not script answers. Scripting answers is one of the worst things to do, this makes you inauthentic and probably will drop your chances of getting hired. I personally jotted down keywords to jog my memory if needed, because sometimes I have difficulty thinking on the spot. Have ideas, not scripted sentences.
Throw in personal details.
The VP of Product explained to me the concept of the app they were working on, it was sports & entertainment related. While he was explaining the problem the company was trying to solve, I agreed with his talking points, and told him I had encountered the same problem when I was at a sporting venue watching MLS soccer.
Later on, I noticed near the end of the interview he said “Imagine me and you at a Chicago Fire MLS game and…” I got him. My interjection of soccer and encountering the problem stuck in his mind. He was picturing me in the solution, instead of just a generic scenario.
Try to make it a goal to have the interviewer picture you in their company.
He also asked me about design work I did for a live concert series. I asked if he had heard of the company. To my surprise he said, “Yes, I’ve actually been to some of the shows, they also do great videos and so on…” I pounced on this opportunity, I told him the Head of Design reached out to me for design, and how creative everyone on the team was. I told him about work I’ve done for them and my own experiences going to shows. (Side note — This also shows that you should be taking any opportunity you get. The design I did for the shows was actually unpaid — compensated by free tickets — but didn’t require too many hours or much work).
Literally be yourself. I like to write down ideas, so I had a notebook and pen during my interview. I was writing down ideas well we were talking. Some people might think this is weird, but I explained that it's just who I am. The interviewer told me they think that’s good and they like writing down stuff as well. No shame in that.
I had him picture me in the company, spoke on common experiences, and increased my likability. In some ways he could relate to me, and I wasn’t too modest or too cocky. There were never any awkward moments, we were actually talking over the time allotted and I made him late for a meeting (Where his team probably asked how the interview went!)
Ask questions
This shows engagement. When he was explaining the product solution, I kept asking him questions about how it worked, showing my interest, and desire to learn — Of course I didn’t do this too often, that can become annoying. Also , you can even write down some common end of interview questions. Interviewers always ask — So do you have any questions? You want to ask questions and not just say “No” or “I don’t think so.” I asked him. “What traits do you see in employees that you think helps themselves or the company grow?” He responded, “Great question actually.”
Be Polite, Keep Selling Yourself
The interviewer doesn’t want this to be boring or awkward, match their energy or bring your own, tell them stories that lead to some sort of insight about you. Try not to go too off topic though. My interview was scheduled 30 minutes and I took it to 40 because we were both having back and forth discussion as well as questions. All of which were related to the company, the products, my work, and of course myself. Stories. Stories. Stories.
Subtly throwing in industry terms is one of the best ways to get an interviewer to recognize you actually have experience and knowledge of what you’re talking about, “your team works with agile development, correct?” or “Yeah, I noticed the call to action on your website directing customers…” and “The use of Fitts Law with the button placement.” Don’t be too cheesy with this, if it applies use the correct term, don’t just randomly throw industry terms.
Don’t Stress About It
If you don’t get an offer, it’s not going to be the end of the world.
This is a mantra for self-positivity:
You are not going to give up on yourself and think you are useless. You are going to keep learning and trying. Failing as many times as you need, and you are going to love yourself for trying.
Think about it, for many companies and people, this could be the only time you’ll ever talk to the interviewer. So, if you flop, it’s no big deal. If you did good, maybe you’ll get a networking connection anyway. I cannot stress this enough that even if you didn’t have a good interview, you tried. No great success was ever achieved without failure. That’s a fact.
The important thing is that you tried.
