Multiphase and simultaneous development speeds development. How would you handle that.
Prototyping the project is important. How long before you could provide a prototype. Give examples. Answer better be three months.
Manhour cost drive projects, how do you apply manhours and show results. Answer, Milestones, or basic MBO stuff Costs tracking is inherent in MS Project. Can you use it.
Saving Changes...
Michael WoodProject Manager / Business Analyst / Business Process Improvement Guru| Independent ContractorGig Harbor, Wa, United States
Some of the questions I typcially ask are designed to reveal the candidate's ability to apply themselves to the abstract. Questions like "How would you go about organizing a project that had enterprise wide implications?" or "What is your approach to managing projects and how does it vary based on the size and complexity or the project?" or "Who should lead projects? Who should be accountable for the project's outcome?"
The goal here is to observe how they apply themselves, what qualifying questions they ask and to measure their cognitive process. Saving Changes...
I have a couple unusual questions that I like to throw at interviewees. 1) Describe a time when you had to give bad news on a project to a customer. There are a lot more approaches to this than you would think, and answers can be insightful.
2) What did you learn from your first job (like flipping burgers at McD's)? The idea here is to see if they can glean useful information out of simple situations, can they reflect and learn from any situation. I think this form of countinuous learning is key for PMs.
3) How good are you at MS Project (or whatever tool you use)? This is almost a trick question from my perspective. I believe that most of a PM's job is people, so if someone knows a piece of software forwards-and-backwards, they probably don't have the people skills required to do the job.
4) Describe how you motivate and manage a matrixed team--where the people on your team do not work for you. Since this is often the mode, they must be able to do it.
These are a few of my favorites--they keep people off-balance, which is where PMs will often find themselves. Best of luck, Gordon Saving Changes...
A standard question I like to ask: Give me an example of how you "break the rules?" (I use the answer to gauge how flexible and able to change a candidate might be and also use it to give me an indication of their willingness to save $$$ or bypass traditional, mandated processes that often slow things down!
Also, all the "hard skills" questions are great, but the biggest problems PMs have are with people - ask the candidate for "soft skills" examples and how they have applied those skills on projects. Saving Changes...
First prize, the PM has a PMP designation - you have to answer some tough theoretical, practical and 'case study' type questions to pass (so you don't have to ask them - and you have to show experience to qualify to write).
Second prize, get the candidate to write the Project Management exam on Brainbench (http://www.brainbench.com) - it is free, and I can assure you that the standard is very good.
So much for the stock standard questions on theory, and practice. My view is that a Project Manager should have one focus - Getting the work done (OBOBOT if possible of course) in such a way that the organisational change is managed and the organisation gets the value that was promised in the first place. This is the toughest problem to crack, and If you have used the above approach you can focus on these questions.
My questions would include:
1. How stakeholder expectation is managed, 2. How internal and external project risk is managed (quantatively if possible), 3. How organisational change is managed (involving the stakeholders that will experience change in their lives as a result of the project), 4. How 'scope management' is done, when the project has not been scoped properly - this is not scope creep I am talking about, merely the fact that the user, client and management learns what they realy want as the project progresses nine times out of ten - incedentally, glib answers like 'We use RAD, spiral models, prototypes only indicate that the candidate nows of such things, and not that they know how to use them, 5. What needs to be reported to stakeholders, when and how the data is collected - I normally focus on financial management techniques here - does the PM know how to use the GL, does the PM understand signing powers, how is overtime managed and used, etc. 6. How does delegation work - you don't want a PM that does technical work(domain specific work) - the PM should manage the project (not always practical, but it sounds nice anyway), 7. How does the inteface between line management and the Project work - Can the PM negotiate with Middle and Senior resource managers when interests conflict, 8. How is project progress measured - Anyone that tells me that the %complete calculation function in MS Project works is ignorant!! - I can prove to anyone who is interested that the algorithm is faulty, and 9. How project team communications, stress and conflict is managed.
And so on - I have more questions if you are interested.
Please note that you may not need the PM to know all the answers to these questions - it depends on the application.
Stuart Saving Changes...
Anonymous
Besides the standard run-of-the mill questions on planning, scheduling, cost and resource management, here are some of the questions we ask:
1. How do you manage risk ? Probability matrix and consequences.
2. Requirements management and requirements traceability. Familiarity with RTM and the applications to different methodologies.
3. Estimation methods and frequency - FP etc. As an organisation we re-estimate at the end of every phase to manage cost and manpower overruns, this may differ for your organisation.
4. Processes improvement and implementations. Important if you're SEI CMM Level 5 or heading that way.
5. Technology change management. Also a Level 5 KPA.
Also a good source of information is the PMI's Body of Knowledge. Downloadable at www.pmi.org
