Automated sales for product management

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[Music] hey hello everyone welcome to the another episode of product management interview experience i am sugar and today we have priya who has recently joined sugi as a product manager welcome priya thanks thanks a lot for having me uh i'm really happy to be here share some you know good insights into the retirement field uh you know which i hope someone would have when i was starting off so thank you for having me awesome uh we are very glad to have you priya for today's episode so folks uh keep watching the video till end because we're gonna be talking a lot of insights about how does it takes what does it takes to be a product manager at swigi understanding the entire interview process and also some tips and tricks that helped priya to crack those interviews so before starting i would request everyone to please like share and subscribe this channel so that it reaches out to so many other folks and it motivates me to create some awesome contents so without any further ado let's get started uh priya why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself sure thanks again so um i'm a password from lsr i did my beacon honest in 2017 started my career from there um i worked for citibank for almost two years in bombay where i was in the foreign exchange sales market division so i was looking at their digital products that they had to offer to all the uh clients in india and abroad that they have um so i think that's when that somehow uh sparked some some sense into me that hey you know what i want to know how a product is actually built like i was just doing the sales part of it but like i wanted to know like okay who decided what's going to be built so i think that's when i decided that hey i want to be a part of like some kickstarter journey uh see the entire process the business uh also behind it and uh i joined as an apm at a small uh fintech firm called fashion uh these guys were into personal lending uh they're just me like three years old so i joined in their product team which was also pretty small then uh but i got the opportunity to lead one of their products which they which was a baby when i joined um i think that experience essentially helped me to know uh all the faces of product as well as business um because i think it's something where a product manager also needs to be a business product uh owner um so yeah i looked at like you know i looked at sales marketing i looked at product design operations uh setting up a team um you know so the technical aspects as well uh post that i joined as a product manager at moby quick which is basically a digital wallet company uh there also i joined in the lending vertical but i was looking at a separate product so i was looking at their paylater uh product which is also a very interesting place to be in uh providing the pay later business actually moving across india and the world um so the reason for shift was that you know i had been part of lending but i wanted to uh you know even we just excel in that niche as well so decided that okay let's try some new product let's try it in a new ecosystem so i think uh uh moby quick being the payments company uh has a very deep integration across you know a lot of verticals a lot of complications great problems to solve um and yeah so i was there for a year and when i came across the opportunity at swiggy um i think i was more than happy to jump on it uh because i had been in the fintech and the finance industry for almost four years now um and i really wanted to make sure that i am as a product manager i'm very diverse and i am industry agnostic so that's where uh you know that's where i started the next challenge was uh so yeah so that's what motivated me to uh join i'll talk about like in detail what all exactly excited me about uh these particular opportunities hey thanks priya i think that was a really interesting journey right uh you mentioned that hey you started your journey from a sales then perverted to a product management into fintech and now finally as i'm working as a pm at a foot tech company so can you uh give some uh insight like what actually helped you to transition your journey from a sales to a like was it an easy transition difficult transition because a lot of aspirants are in similar space where they want to transfer from sales to uh apm pm role so would love to hear some insights around that so uh i think uh initial uh one or two positions especially the apm position was definitely not easy because i didn't know the domain i had into the industry all that well and definitely i didn't know anything about product so i think uh that was uh that was a little difficult not only to get the opportunity but also to survive there uh but that was a very very steep learning curve you know i think people who are looking to break into uh product management irrespective of which whichever background they come from it resales marketing operations i think the uh a great starting point is a product management internship um apprenticeship or an apm program simply you know because i think the company is having especially smaller companies uh having their apm programs they are extremely flexible about uh getting all sorts of people uh because they want more hands-on deck deck they want to they also want young folks and you know people who are very very eager to learn uh because they know that you know it's if they are the ones who want to do the hustle so i think that's something that's a very good starting point uh you'll have to do a lot of dirty work uh but i think that dirty work actually makes you learn like okay this is what product management is this is what i like doing this is what i don't like doing now let me just make my skin in it right um so i think yeah so i think that starting point is very good and the other piece is i think we sort of underestimate the um you know power of networking uh just a fun fact that uh after the city uh the three of the jobs that i've got i actually got it through linkedin i knew more like i had some connections just by like you know connecting with people making a network uh being very active um you know making it very clear what i'm interested in what kind of person i am what have i done uh so i think that kind of works all work always pays off so i think that's something uh we probably underestimate but uh networking done right can really really uh help you okay very true i think i have heard and even experienced the same how networking plays a key role in the transition of any individuals right awesome so uh that was some great insightful right about your journey of transitioning into uh apm from a sales uh for the viewers who are from a non-product experience right can you also help them understand how does your normal day looks like as a product manager uh you know the most uh interesting thing that i actually it's very difficult because usual days are very also very different you know uh but if you simply put uh i would just play just say that you know a product manager essentially a mini ceo uh so just the way you can't define what like a ceo does to his days right uh you can't really find what product manager does it's true that we are not the you know we're not the expert so we don't actually make the design on using the fancy designs we don't actually do the engineering part but we are the glue that makes everything uh stick together so um my if you say my how does my day look like is i think 70 to 80 of it is actually stakeholder management and to bring everyone on the same page uh and to just make sure that the wheels are moving in the right direction uh then obviously it is in stakeholder management you have like you know a lot of things you need to interact with and you know uh you know it will be your technical team there will be like designers there'll be your sales people uh there'll be growth teams and obviously there will be like say senior folks like senior management the ceos and cfos that you need to uh manage and like you know set the expectations for so one key part of my day it can it's different every day but is doing that the other part part is to actually do some deep work uh to know what's the shorter what's the long term of the product that i'm looking at what can i do different and what's what can move numbers right so i think uh to be able to envision that and put it in a very structured form is something that is constantly going on so we have to do it for the smallest of decision that he i just have like you know one guy and i have ten things to do how do i plan it from saying that hey this is these are the 10 things that we need to build and that's going to move the needle to the ceo so i think decision making and structured thought process they're like everywhere smallest biggest decision so i think that's how i would define my day uh that that's how it goes i am very correct i think uh 70 to 80 time does get spent in stakeholder management and meetings and all and rest part is when you actually work and get a few things done yeah awesome uh thanks priya i think this were a couple of insightful things which we learned about your day-to-day activities now let's move to the part where most of the videos are waiting for about your entire interview experience at swiggy uh we would love to hear as detailed as possible starting from how you got that call to you know what were the different process grounds and what were the different few type of questions yeah uh so i think how i got the opportunity was again as i mentioned it was purely through networking you know i um i was in connect with my the person who's my current manager just in general because you know product folks who are like good and probably a little senior in their area uh write a lot of content which is very insightful so i like doing that on linkedin follow the required people and you never know what opportunity comes by uh so i tend to stay connected so i reach out to them to say say you know i thought you were hiring for your team i'm interested would you like to have a chat um and uh you say cool let's let's see let's catch up you can just like write an email to me and then you know i'll probably organize a call so i think my first round was essentially an exploration call with my the person who's currently my manager so he's a senior um in the one of the swiggy vertigons so uh yeah so i think first was an exploration call which is like a 30 minutes call where essentially it was not a very deep call but it was to understand my fit for the role the company the culture everything that he should we go ahead or not so it was basically just scrapping the surface that uh okay are you good uh and like you know should we go ahead and do a detail so i think first was uh that basically just understanding my job profile what do i do uh what kind of things have i done before um because i had zero footwork experience uh but i did have good production experience so i think that was just a fitment uh call as you call it uh that hey the checkboxes and now we can go ahead in the process round one was that um a very interesting thing that i really liked about silly actually was they were like super super super organized uh you know they had a portal where they used to tell me what the interview was going to be about who's it going to be with frenemy reminders automatically that hey your interviews are 15 minutes and you know uh exactly and you have the option to reschedule it i think it was it was smooth it was the experience was extremely uh smooth so i think round one was that after i passed the fitment round basically every round had a theme around it so you were tested only on those particular skills that fit those themes right the composition of each interview was a combination of uh you know resume related questions uh very round specific questions uh basically general what do you know about that particular theme and then it was obviously a problem solving right that okay how would you solve this problem and like that problem and then then it would then be last would be culture fit that they would want to understand that you know how would you react in certain kind of situations which is more of like people and uh you know structure oriented so that's broadly how all the rounds were structured which obviously the differentiation in terms of what gave what was even more weightage deferred as for whoever was taking my interview so into it and how many rounds were they appear uh and what the total duration it took so uh i had six rounds um and after like the exploration call uh every round was one hour each uh so yeah i think they were mostly like quite spaced i think one in one week in two weeks into the entire process i think i was through with all the interviews in one and a half months uh that was also probably because uh you know i it was like november december a lot of holidays and also i was working so i had very limited time sorts back then so it's not so yeah so i think one and a half months i was able to cover like all the interviews and i have the offer in my hand so my second time was essentially called product sense uh which was taken by a very senior person who was a product lead essentially in the firm so here uh the the structure was at eighty percent was actually a case study where she gave me like a question that hey you know what tell me how would you design a feature in swedish app which allows you basically to you know couple things from different restaurants and give an order right and place an order which currently doesn't happen right because we have like we have two if i have to order two separate restaurants i have to order it once and then pay and then order it again and then it's a hassle so um it's obviously a very very evident hassle that everyone faces so i think she asked me how would i solve it and uh the expectation essentially of this uh the answer was not only that he you know what i just put this feature in the press it was about a detailed plan and how would i do the consumer journey so one thing about sweden is that they are consumer backwards uh whatever solution starts it's all it always starts from the consumer uh like okay how will they feel about it how what can i do to like please them or like have they have created a delight for them so they wanted to have that consumer background thinking in me where you design and tell me that hey what will the experience look like tell me how do you envision the ui and the ux which is which is a very very important part so i think this was uh majorly what the discussion was about uh you know how i went about it uh essentially was i broke down the problem uh you know and said that you know probably there has to be a plan before that okay where where am i planning to do an initial pilot on buy a pilot who am i targeting uh so i think these are the basis or assumptions basically there are later and then i have jumped on to the solution i think one of the very important parts of actually presenting a solution is also saying that hey you know what i'll make this page i'll make that page i'll make this box it's not that actually they are not looking for the perfect solution they are looking for a structure so i think even though you can take time and actually you should take time and think that okay present the problem statement essentially and then say that hey my solution will cover x y and z it can be anything it doesn't matter but if you're organized in your thought process i think that's what's uh gonna help you so i look at look at this after that okay what why who scale and then i thought of like a skeleton right that what all do i need do i need a section do i need a checkout page and just laid down the structure walked the interviewer through that and also then went like l1 l2 and l3 so i think it just helps you to be organized and not get like confused that you voted as earlier and just write it down make a structure whatever whatever sticks uh so i think yeah that's very very important but that's how i went about it awesome thanks again this was i think interesting uh question which yeah we used to always discuss right when swiggy is launching this feature but uh yeah as you mentioned right nothing right or wrong answer it's all about the structure and the approach you you follow yeah yeah yeah because they are testing how you think about uh you know actually developing the product because this is what you're gonna do in the end so how do you take up this problem is what they are looking for perfect let's let's keep proceed uh proceeding and here to your upcoming surprisingly i don't think many people would know it like okay this is also required as was business sense and data oriented uh decision making so uh essentially this was taken by uh some avp was a category uh basically used to lead a business across all categories and it was to understand my understand how comfortable are you with numbers how well you can uh you know calculate as well as use them to your advantage and uh all the this is the strategy to concept how familiar with them something like do you understand what is top line do you understand what is bottom line which is basically the money someone's gonna make and like how do you make decisions using those numbers or those concepts in general because like i said you know uh in fintech it's obviously very important for you to be very very tightly integrated with business and their strategy because uh you know it's a it's a number game anyway you know um and it business a lot of it drives product um which is also not true that much in sweden but still you need to know the business to be a good product manager so i think that's what uh uh they were testing some of the sample questions since i belonged to fintech and i was leaving a lending product uh they probably asked me that hey uh what how does the pnl of your product the profit and loss basically statement of your product looks like tell me about it um what are your major costs um and you know and you and he used to ask me that what does this cost me what does that cost me uh how long does it last you know uh how do you guys make money like you know where is the income coming from so as simple questions as these but obviously uh it was not uh to his domain but actually to my domain uh so i think that was uh very interesting and the one of the case studies that he had asked me was that and very simple was you're a restaurant owner now tell me how will uh your piano statement look like tell me uh what will you count as revenue what will you um you know count as like your earnings and stuff and how would you you know probably estimate uh like the the money you're going to make in a year so i think that was a guesstimate plus a case study where essentially he was not testing me on like oh exact numbers but it was like do you know what's going to go in the book i might have said thousand it might be relaxed but it was like hey you know that there has to be one line item there so that was my round number three which is business understanding and pretty interesting case study as well again right the entire cnl part of it uh i haven't heard much of while talking to other pm's right this kind of rounds but uh again uh you know the pnl part of it from a pm perspective is amazing yeah yeah yeah uh yeah so the next round that i had with the fourth round was essentially uh with the director of product uh which was about product strategy vision and like you know road mapping so uh this round essentially was to test your big picture thinking right um you know your prioritization skills your stakeholder management your road mapping still essentially that are you can you like zoom out and like build a road ahead uh so i think yeah this was mainly focused on one of the key things which which i usually used to take very lightly is uh you know ruthless prioritization to be able to see your head right uh it's like easy for senior folks to do but actually it's not um fun fact like you know you managing your own time is also a part of product management so how you manage your time is actually one of the skills you need to have to be a product manager uh because if you can't manage your own time then how do you manage other people's time right so uh yeah so this round was actually about that uh you know i was tested and asked questions like hey you have to decide you know what to build and what not to build so how do you take that call like you know what is the technique that you use so i think my answer was structured around uh that hey i do an impact passport analysis you know if my i'll know what what the i should know at least the goal is uh because you know goals can be anything and usually they come from top down so it can be cost reduction it can be you know um increasing your numbers it can be about growth it can also be you know just increasing your average order value it will be anything uh first so i said i would align myself to that and then i would probably think of like i don't know solutions have no one but i will obviously assess those solutions in terms of the numerical impact is going to have uh numerical husbands like qualitative as well and uh and then assign their priority so i think that was something that uh you know that they also need because uh as you know like sample foreign couple of things that he you know how would you uh do your 369 approach in terms of a roadmap which means that how do you make uh three months plan how do you make a six-month plan what do you do with nine-month items right uh because essentially 99 has to be a part of just like it's just there in my head it's not too focused but it's not that uh you need to put it out and like you know structure your thoughts even for three six and nine even though you just had three so yeah it was that of one of the very interesting features that he asked me was that he you know if you had the opportunity to design like a feature right swiggy to yourself or anyone like what would that be right uh so actually just be convenient to me honestly uh i don't know if it was creative enough or not i had actually suggested that uh you know probably should come up with a with a calendar you know that i don't i don't want to order every day uh they should just detect my location make the suggestion or i can just like set it like an alarm right every day 10 am just get me coffee from here every day because that's what i was i do when i go to office like order coffee at like 10 10 30 11. so i think that's something that that was pretty interesting um more like a wish than the thought of the yeah and i already know i've been begging for the solution you know i think i don't know about the viewers but i'm really enjoying this interview experience right uh like it's seen so many refreshing content which she was telling about and also um getting to know many new things about swiggy right the way they interview people their entire culture speaks a lot about them yeah so yeah i think i really enjoyed the interview process it never seemed very grilling or daunting or uh you know scary it was a very very healthy conversation you would like i wouldn't realize when an hour passed i'm sure the other people did probably but it was a very very fruitful uh discussion it was i think they've designed the interview process very well uh and you know uh my next round essentially was about execution uh excellence which i never actually thought that someone talked to someone says that like on an interview right because everyone has the only thing that's different for sure in everyone's organization is the way things get done and that was like the tricky part so uh i had this interview with the engineering manager who was who i was going to work with if i got hired and that entire interview was essentially about you know how you can can translate the business rules into uh executionable documents um you know vision for your teams to execute on we design we tech um and like you know what is your way of working uh again like shipment like how will you be able to do that translation where will you be able to understand both the sides well uh so i think that's where we did a deep dive into like how do i interact with my engineers how do um how do i make sure that i am able to match my style to the to the people i'm working for because i think one of the most important skills that the product page needs to have is to be able to uh express themselves very very clearly um and you know keep in mind the audience right uh what i write for a ceo would probably not be the same what i would write for my engineer or like the input my designer would want to you know have a vision of what he needs to build so i think uh documentation the way you express yourself structure yourself and uh that understanding of the audience is very important so i think yeah so that this was mainly about execution how do you manage people who are actually not reporting to you so you need to guide like and you know tell people uh what to do even though like they are not reporting to you because usually all the folks we need to get work done from no one reports to us so uh that's that's uh that was something that was being tested here i think um yeah yeah just to call out i think uh generally what the notion is with the viewers is that hey it's engineering round so maybe might be technical questions while it is true for some companies like google where they really test on systems design concepts and all but in most of the other companies i have spoken engineering ground is more about how well you can work with the engineers it's like conflict resolutions how you write prds user stories so those kind of things are being only tested and not deep dive technical knowledge and ask you to quote sort of thing okay let's move to the final round i think here would love to see you know how the entire discussion was around that and then i probably assume you got the offer yeah i think my last round was uh actually like now in hindsight i was quite good because uh the vertical that have been assigned now in swiggy it was actually with the avp of avp of the business um horizontal was looking all at that vertical as well who had spoken to me uh and this last round which was more like business and product it was it was not actually testing you know i'm on any skills but just to have a good conversation and know that hey do we have that chemistry to actually work together as simply put like that so um yeah so i think this was basically my first intro to okay what kind of problems will i be solving uh because you know when we think of swinging we just we just know what's what's in front of us like hey are you part of instrument like oh i'm like this handy genie or like oh how do i order and you'll come you know you'll work with the restaurant so that's not it uh swedish actually got into like so many verticals is actually uh one of like my jobs which has been actually documented okay how are people organized i know i'm confused there's so many people so many verticals uh so yeah so i think uh that was my interface on like say what am i going to do left who am i going to work with what are the problems that i'm expecting to solve in the coming three six months so uh more than it being in interview it was very said okay i want to know like okay what will i do right why should i join you also obviously uh understanding that okay why should you know i take you it was it was a very balanced conversation um you know and uh this was basically to understand that okay how do we fit in each other's requirements uh do we fit as people we should as culture do we need a person like you do you want a person like you and like do i want like someone like you to mentor me because he's also one of like my mentors because i work very closely with him apart from obviously my managers and other people but uh on he's basically the business counterpart of the product that i'm handling so i think yeah it was more it was very conversational uh i could ask as many questions as i wanted i and i asked a lot of them to be very honest i said okay how do you do this how do you do that what am i supposed to do earlier i was asking but now i was asking myself okay i want to know what i'll be working on uh you know what who will be with me do i have this team you have that team you want me to uh you know study something you need something specific and stuff like that you know and even questions like uh uh hey what are you gonna do for like my growth i know it just sounds very upfront but uh it's definitely a transaction where the company is also gaining if you join them right so i think it's very important to ask these questions as well and be very clear about it that hey what are you going to do for my growth how are you going to make sure that uh you know as the team grows as the company grows i also grow and probably i don't want what everyone else wants if you support me in that you know so i think these are very important questions to ask if you are very specific or anything to uh you know make sure that okay for me fulfillment is defined by x so to clarify that hey will you give me x i think it should be point blank very clearly and uh good companies like sweetie they're more than happy to answer it because they pride themselves in their culture or the way they treat people and they consider people their uh you know biggest asset so they they are more than happy when you ask these questions they're interested in answering you so i think the last round was essentially uh this thanks a lot priya i think this has some awesome insights again uh i think folks would really enjoy watching this entire episode and to get so many new things from out of this right so uh thank you again for being a part of this channel and sharing your experience and contributing to the community and we wish you all the very best for all the opportunities and challenges at circle thank you thank you sugar for having me it's great chatting with you hope i can help some folks get through absolutely and do let me know if you hear any linkedin messages saying that this video helped you help them you know to get to their dream jobs yeah perfect thank you bye thank you you