Last night, I provided my game plan to tackle today’s interview for a Project Manager role.

Despite losing hours of sleep to excitement, I interviewed much better than I’d anticipated. My interviewer (the senior project manager) and I were both very pleased with my answers. I answered confidently with minimal hesitation, and my answers were well-formed. Ultimately, I was provided an offer — but not for the position. I’ll get to that later.

Even if I were given the chance, I would not reverse time to change my answers. I answered truthfully and built rapport with my interviewer.

Here are some highlights of today’s interview.

Important Interview Questions

Question: How do you approach engineers to collaborate with your projects?

Answer: I learn from CFTs about the other projects they’re juggling, so I give engineers space to focus on higher priorities. I follow up sparingly, but I help them understand their two or three hours’ worth of effort to offload their workload to my department will rid them of further distractions.

Feedback: That was exactly what my interviewer wanted to hear. How does this work benefit the engineers? Leveraging the manager card to say it’s because you (or your boss/stakeholders) said so are poor motivators. Help them recognize the value they deliver for themselves and their projects.

Question: What have you researched and learned about the Project Manager role?

Answer: I understand it requires people skills, which is one of my strengths. There’s a balance. On one hand, I need to please my stakeholders and their demands. On another, I want to trust engineer feedback about realistic timelines and blockers.

Feedback: My interviewer interrupted me to emphasize the significance of my answer. He said I was right. The balance between pleasing stakeholders and keeping teams on track is the among the most difficult challenges for project managers, and a big contributor to failure. It is important to recognize this reality and bear the weight of pressure from both stakeholders and engineers, who all assume they know better than the project manager.