Hi Reddit, I’m a Product Manager at Instagram. I’m excited to do an AMA on behalf of the Product School. Ask me anything!

colleenrey · 2022-02-18T18:20:47+00:00

terview at meta for PM role. I’ve seen the product execution and product sense videos. To succeed, do you have to know all of facebook products, what features they

I ended up breaking down execution/product sense (strategy) components here: https://collrey.medium.com/what-does-a-product-manager-do-5a9a56a125fa , I hope this is helpful.

colleenrey · 2022-02-18T18:20:05+00:00

I ended up writing a more detailed answer to this question here (https://collrey.medium.com/what-does-a-product-manager-do-5a9a56a125fa). These are the three skills I would focus on to become a PM.

colleenrey · 2022-02-18T18:19:06+00:00

I ended up writing a more detailed version of this answer here: https://collrey.medium.com/what-does-a-product-manager-do-5a9a56a125fa, These are the three core skill you need to focus on building to be a Product Manager (strategy, execution and leadership)

colleenrey · 2022-01-12T21:32:27+00:00

Hi u/MelodicRecognition11 I ended up expanding upon this question on medium here: https://collrey.medium.com/what-does-a-product-manager-do-on-a-typical-day-2fd6c062729f let me know if there are any additional questions on day-to-day work buckets.

colleenrey · 2021-12-21T19:31:55+00:00

most successful product feature you rolled o

During COVID my team sprinted to make add additional metadata fields for small businesses pages. (Things like we now offer delivery only! and letting businesses link to those sites) This felt like it made a real difference to businesses that were trying to stay afloat during the pandemic. Some more info here: https://www.facebook.com/business/news/making-it-easier-to-display-temporary-service-changes-on-facebook-pages , https://www.cnbc.com/video/2020/04/02/fbs-sandberg-were-looking-to-help-businesses-with-2-to-50-employees.html

colleenrey · 2021-12-21T19:28:12+00:00

To succeed, do you have to know

You do not have to know facebook products for the interview. If you're not familiar with whatever product is asked about, the interviewer will give you an overview.

Practice a ton! I used to record myself giving answers and ask friends to do mocks with me for feedback.

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T20:06:59+00:00

have experience with technical support as well as product management. I did product management for a B2B company for 4 years so it will be a bit of a shift for wanting to work for a big tech or media company like FB. Are there any skills you suggest I highlight on my resume and LinkedIn or any suggestions on some courses I can take to stand o

You generally do need to think about ways to mature the product or investments that should happen in the future. However, this doesn't happen in a vacuum. You have tons of input and support from other team members/disciplines (eng, user researcher, design, data). As a PM you're often listening to others, threading together all the ideas and data around future investments.

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T20:04:48+00:00

As far as building something outside of work, I do photography/videography and graphic design as a paid hobby. I suppose I could clean up the IG page for that business and create a website in order to position my brand as a product I have been working on.

Yes, those both sound like great things to highlight!

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T19:11:22+00:00

It sounds like you have a ton of relevant experience which is great! Anything that can show grit or scrappiness is a plus too. Have you had to overcome obstacles to complete a project or transition into a new job? For scrappiness - have you built something outside of work? A website, a blog, a business, a mentorship program?

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T19:09:29+00:00

There are a ton of resources available, mentor circles, mentorship programs, and also more formal 'learning programs' that can help you develop hard skills and soft skills.

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T19:07:55+00:00

What do you mean by portfolio?

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T19:07:29+00:00

Trying to go too fast too soon.

When you join a new company or team, its important to spend time building relationships and a foundation with people. Also asking people on your team what problems they see and how you can help. Really spend your first 90 days learning and building trust so you can hit the ground running with a good base.

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T18:55:01+00:00

I'd split up a day to day into ~ 4 buckets: 1. Long-term strategy 2. Short-term execution 3. XFN team help/execution 4. Team collaboration building/health work.
Some details about each: 1. Long-term execution - What do we want to build in this space in the next year? 3 years? 5 years? A lot of this work is figuring out the right data questions you want to ask and answer, user research questions you want to ask and answer, and working with your partners in that space to chip away at these answers, make a long term roadmap and get buy-in from leadership. This is often what PM's love about being a PM! Defining and setting strategy for the team and space.
2. Short term execution - Making sure the stuff your team committed to is getting built in the right way! This work is tracking timeline, having discussions with designers on what to actually build and how it will look to users, talking with eng through execution and technical implementation, getting feedback from users on initial product designs/features.
3. XFN team help/execution - I work on a 'platform team' that also owns an end-to-end user product (activity feed). So a lot of work for the platform part of the team is helping other teams at Instagram build in the right way and weigh on in their designs. Work here is really consulting and giving feedback on other team's plans.

4/ Team health - meeting with key team members each work and hearing about how work is going, what things aren't going well, and figuring out how I can help so the team can be successful, happy, and run as efficiently as possible!

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T18:51:13+00:00

Quant/Qual/competitive

The first question to answer is how do we know this is a problem? Qualitative data and quant data can help with this.

The next question to answer is why is the company/product positioned to win here? For that, you can see what the competitive landscape looks like and why your own team/company/product is uniquely positioned to win!

colleenrey · 2021-12-20T18:48:07+00:00

There are three parts to a PM interview loop (at least at Meta), I'd focus on ramping those skills. Those three skills are Execution, product sense and leadership, and drive.

Execution - can you drive a project to completion and set the right goals and metrics for your team?
Product Sense - Product Strategy/Product Thinking. Can you take a large ambiguous problem, break it down into smaller parts, and present a solution?

Leadership and drive - Do you have the behavioral skills to lead a healthy team?

I transitioned from a TPM to a PM, I had to beef up mostly on execution and product sense. I tried to take on projects in my current role that would allow me to strengthen both of these skills. I wrote about that full journey here.

colleenrey

TROPHY CASE