Interview Frameworks

Connect frameworks to feedback

• STAR - Situation, Task, Action, Result

  • The STAR framework is a widely used method for answering behavioral-based interview questions. It helps you to provide a structured response that showcases your experience and behavior in past situations.

  • Example question: “Tell me about a time when you had to make a difficult decision.”

• CIRCLES - Comprehend situation, Identify customer, Report problem, Cut through prioritization, List solutions, Evaluate trade-offs, Summarize

  • The CIRCLES framework is particularly useful for product design questions. It provides a structured approach to understanding and solving problems.

  • Example question: “How would you improve the user experience of our mobile app?”

• AARM - Acquire, Activate, Retain, Monetize

  • The AARM and DAVE frameworks are particularly relevant for product strategy and growth questions. They demonstrate your understanding of a product’s lifecycle and how to optimize its performance over time.

  • AARM focuses on the key stages of a product’s growth

  • Example question: “How would you grow our user base and increase revenue?”

• SWOT - Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats

  • The SWOT framework is a classic tool for analyzing a product’s position within its market. It helps you demonstrate your strategic thinking and ability to assess both internal and external factors that impact a product’s success.

  • Example question: “How would you assess our product’s competitive position in the market?”

• RICE - Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort

  • The RICE framework is a valuable tool for prioritizing tasks or initiatives. It helps you evaluate each option based on four key criteria:

  • By assigning scores to each criterion and calculating a total RICE score, you can objectively compare and prioritize different options.

  • Example question: “How would you prioritize the items on our product roadmap?”

• GAME - Goals, Actions, Metrics, Experiments

  • The GAME framework is useful for developing and tracking product initiatives. It helps ensure that your efforts are aligned with your goals and that you have a clear way to measure success.

  • Example question: “How would you improve the engagement of our mobile app?”

• MECE - Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive

  • The MECE framework is a problem-solving approach that helps you break down complex problems into smaller, more manageable components. The key is to ensure that each component is mutually exclusive (no overlap) and collectively exhaustive (covers all aspects of the problem).

  • Example question: “How would you analyze the decline in our e-commerce sales?”

  • You could break this down into mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive categories such as:

• Hook Model - Trigger, Action, Variable Reward, Investment

  • The Hook Model, popularized by Nir Eyal, is a framework for building habit-forming products. It outlines four key steps to engage users and keep them coming back:

  • Example question: “How would you increase user retention for our subscription service?”

• JTBD - Jobs to Be Done

  • The Jobs to Be Done framework focuses on understanding the underlying motivations behind why customers “hire” a product to do a specific “job.” By framing customer needs in terms of the jobs they are trying to accomplish, you can develop solutions that better meet those needs.

  • Example question: “How would you improve our customer onboarding process?”

  • A JTBD approach might uncover jobs such as:

    • “I want to get up and running quickly so I can start using the product right away.”

    • “I want to feel confident that I’m using the product correctly and getting the most value from it.”

    • “I want to customize the product to fit my specific needs and preferences.”

• 5 Whys

  • The 5 Whys framework is a simple but effective technique for getting to the root cause of a problem. It involves asking “why” five times in succession, each time drilling down further into the underlying reasons behind the problem.

  • Example question: “Our user retention rates have been declining. How would you diagnose and address this issue?”

  • By asking “why” five times, you can uncover the fundamental issues contributing to the problem and develop targeted solutions to address them.