ACT 1: Start with the Whiteboard
Explore techniques to respond rapidly in product management interviews by structuring answers clearly under pressure. Learn user-focused prioritization, metric diagnosis, and trade-off design with frameworks like Lean CIRCLES. This lesson prepares you to handle classic PM interview scenarios with confidence and clarity.
We'll cover the following...
Why ACT 1 exists
In real interviews, you are expected to respond immediately.
You may be asked, “Design X,” or “User retention is down. How would you approach it?” You are expected to think through the problem without additional context or supporting material. ACT 1 prepares you for that scenario.
It focuses on core PM interview skills, covering product design, metric diagnosis, experimentation, prioritization, and structured responses under pressure.
The material is structured, not just a set of practice questions. Each section begins with a scenario-based warmup that highlights the evaluation criteria: clarity, structure, reasoning, and judgment. You’ll learn practical frameworks, sample thought processes, and step-by-step drills before responding independently.
The goal is to help you structure clear, defensible responses in high-pressure interview settings.
What you’ll learn to do
Structure your response to an open-ended product question in under a minute.
Think from the user’s point of view, even when you don’t know who the user is.
Prioritize needs, not features.
Identify root causes in messy metric shifts.
Design thoughtful trade-offs between product, tech, and business.
Tie short-term ideas to long-term strategy.
Key tools and frameworks introduced
Lean CIRCLES: A streamlined approach to product design thinking
Funnel-based diagnosis: For analyzing metric drops
Guardrail vs. North Star Metrics (NSM): For experiment design
User-first prioritization: For roadmap chaos
Each tool will be revisited throughout the course, but Section 1 is where you first apply them in realistic interview scenarios.
Upcoming missions: What to expect
Each of the next five missions in ACT 1 will drop you into a classic interview moment:
Mission 1: A fuzzy product design question
Mission 2: A metric gone sideways
Mission 3: A promising experiment with surprising trade-offs
Mission 4: A design critique that becomes a conversation
Mission 5: A roadmap planning session with too many voices and too little time
You will get guidance, structured challenge, and repeated practice. By the end of ACT 1, you will be able to respond with the structure and confidence expected in real interviews.