What circumstances prompted us to be here today? Or for you to start looking for another job?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Main reason was personal stuff leading to burnout, but component for me around unclear expectations for the role and what it meant to be successful. Not getting feedback. Joining a team that was notoriously not super organized. Felt murmurings of my performance that weren’t communicated to me. But hurt my confidence in leadership communicating what success means, hurt my own confidence. When a company scales from 50 people, deep connection, so intrinsic motivation but at this point feel the growing pains. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Realizing that customer success wasn’t a good fit for what I was interested in my career long term. Adam Parsho (EA) - Realized I wasn’t feeling challenged on a daily basis. I felt like I should push myself and started to learn more on the side. Under what circumstances, if any, would you consider returning to the company? OR What could have been done for you to remain here?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - To return it’d have to be the right role fit. If something available in the future, would return. Clear expectations, regular feedback, what it means to be successful. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - An opportunity in professional services or a leadership role would have presented the right new challenge. Adam Parsho (EA) - If there was a chance to join the engineering team after I’ve finished my CS education. I don’t want to work in operations anymore and want to be more technical. Do you think management adequately recognized employee contributions? If not, how do you think recognition could be improved?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Yeah I think so. We nailed positive feedback, but needs to be balanced, especially when the person knows need to get constructive. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - I do, yeah. But always room for more in that area. Not specific to the company. Adam Parsho (EA) - Yes, I always felt positive feedback. People were very supportive. Did you receive constructive feedback to improve your performance as well? What can we improve about the process of delivering feedback?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - The biggest thing for improving feedback is laying out role expectations or being explicit they are vague. But if there are things that are expected, that’s the biggest thing for me. Makes it easier to give constructive feedback if have expectations. Not sure Ankur knew what he was holding me against, what expectations. Also being told I was the only junior person in the role, so couldn’t look to the others as peers. Being told I’m taking up a senior seat. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - I did receive feedback about my performance. Where i would have liked more feedback was on growth opportunities - because I was asking for it would have liked to know how I could have gotten to a better spot. Adam Parsho (EA) - My manager helped me a ton with my writing, communication, and organization. Did you have clear goals and objectives?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Yeah, the way that we plan I set out projects. I was deciding what they were. Towards the end I fell back to things that would help me set better boundaries. Did a lot of team operations - help route requests, build docs to support the team. Fell back to things that I felt like could be wins b/c didn’t feel like I was having wins in my role. But felt bad volunteering for clerical piece b/c didn’t feel like I was getting wins, but then seeing others to be successful. Wish I was redirected from this so I could have tried to have more wins. What’s tough w/ the performance piece, even w/ 5 weeks off, hit most of OKRs except ones put on w/ exploration. Set OKRs but felt like another set of expectations that weren’t communicated. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - No. Not very. I do recognize because team is growing and emerging. Didn’t feel like that was a major issue though. Knew it was changing and being defined. Do you feel your job description changed since you were hired, and if so, in what ways?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Since I joined, each of roles in I was laying the tracks while driving the train. Then in new space to decide what roles to bring on team. I think I performed well for first couple years. I then joined data team w/ expectations that weren’t clearly communicated. Have to manage stakeholder relationships, which I kind of did on support, but w/ data, navigating diff types of agreements and had to do that part well. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - No. It didn’t. It was my impression of the job changed. And not necessarily any thing about the job. Adam Parsho (EA) - No, it was very consistent and had a nice blend of work. Did you feel that the work you were doing aligned with your personal goals and interests?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Yeah, a lot of it was. I really really enjoyed a lot of the data work and analyses. The only part that was really hard for me was the stakeholder relationships. In a customer support role say yes to customers. W/ internal stakeholders have to say no and set boundaries. That was a lot harder to feel engaged w/ it. Confidence kept getting hit. Not able to be successful. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Sort of. Parts did and parts didn’t. Certain aspects of what I enjoyed others didn’t. Adam Parsho (EA) - Initially yes, but I realized I have a different passion. Did you feel you had the tools, resources and working conditions to be successful in your role? If not, which areas could be improved and how?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Team was supportive, had a lot of tools and resources. Some of it chaotic w/ tools and resources. Didn’t know where to go or send people or set boundaries. Ankur was good at walking through tools and through challenges at me to help me learn. But didn’t feel supported on how to set up relationships and partnerships - Megaphone was chaotic and I was switching projects every quarter. I was constantly switching to something new. Demand marketing, then all megaphone, then SEO. Got whiplash kind of. Acknowledging that part of the role is to be able to navigate the ambiguity. Trying to switch so many times. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Yes, I did. I did feel like had enough of all of those. Adam Parsho (EA) - Yes, lots of support. Do you feel you had the necessary training to be successful in your role? If not, how could it have been better?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - That’s a tough one, can’t put on the company. It was taking chance on me. Any role in data, data science is a big field, so as far as anything company could have done better... biggest thing helpful for me, guidelines on how to build relationships, how to establish ownership of different parts of the work. At a big rock level, can be confusing. Eng might be building dashboards, but needed training to navigate those relationships. Maybe if in role long enough, comes easy. But think there’s some nuances here. What part of work do you own. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Yes. There was one aspect that I personally didn’t have experience with - email campaign / sales outreach that didn’t have experience with and could have used support on that early in the role. Adam Parsho (EA) - Lots of hands-on learning, which I liked. How can our company improve training and development programs? (leave very open ended)
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - See above Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Might be something you’ve done or plan to do, but for me, an intentional time where we talk about career, discussed at company level or encourages that to happen. Adam Parsho (EA) - I’d love more support on my public speaking skills. What was the best part of your job here?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - The people. I think the company has a high bar for hiring, and that’s the hardest part to leave. Everyone is super creative, and unique, and passionate. A lot of good people. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - I loved working directly with makers and problem solving a specific request. Adam Parsho (EA) - People - totally amazing. If you could change anything about your job, what would you change?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Clear role expectations, more feedback (manager training). Maybe this is a me thing, but have heard from others too, communication system feels chaotic - slack is hard to stay up to date on. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - I would have preferred more technical doc building and less outreach. Adam Parsho (EA) - Nothing - just wished I enjoyed it more. What are three things you'd change about the company?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Mentioned, but role stages and expectations. Communication strategy - meaning our comms structure generally can be chaotic, and create inclusive spaces for people (not overwhelming new folks too much). Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Meetings- the stats and stories meeting was too into the weeds in stats and the stories was not intentional enough. Both are very important and missed opportunity to make it polished and valuable. Felt like a weekly update rather than intentional high impact sharing of trends and stories. Already been discussed but the way that slack channels, vs emails, vs doc - the way information is shared and collaborated on is going to be hard to scale as the team grows.
Adam Parsho (EA) - Would love to see us invest in more face to face time. Being remote was a bit dry. How would you describe the culture of our company?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - See answer to 11 and There is some encouragement to explore and get curious and live right over familiar. We’re good at breaking molds w/ DEI stuff, evaluating if things aren’t working, etc. The flexibility to be curious to dig into different things can be very motivating. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Very, um, people are highly motivated, competent and creative. In some ways the focus on efficiency and how things are run I appreciated. So much on our product. Allows for intentional discussion. Adam Parsho (EA) - Collaborative, transparent, fast-moving. Do you have any suggestions for improving employee morale or engagement?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - At that point where we’ve tipped into scaling. Used to be small super connected team to now not know everyone. For BizPlat, sort of felt expected to keep same level of expectation, which feels in authentic. Keep smaller and it will be better - larger events feel like forced fun. We’ve leaned away from this a bit like “Dory, Molly, etc” but as we scale that can be exclusive - megaphone does “garden parties” (don’t know what that means). And then clear expectations for success. Continuing to encourage good work life balance- esp when folks are responding to emails at all hours. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - In person events which doing soon! Adam Parsho (EA) - As I said earlier, in-person time. Do you have any concerns about the company or management that you’d like to share?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - No, don’t think so. The thing that was hard was moving from manager to IC, knowing that we were told to make sure to focus on positive feedback, but I know it needs to be balanced w/ constructive. There is a secretive space in a way. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - No Did you share your concerns with anyone at the company prior to leaving?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Yes, I shared a lot of the feedback. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - No, other than the role fit. What skills do you think we should look for in the person we hire to take on a similar role?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - [off the record] - Alex is really tough. In what used to be my favorite meeting he’ll dominate the conversation for 30min. Even John looks dead inside, I can tell he’s just saying “I’m so over this.” Worried he’s going to ruin the culture / experience for a lot of others. Quickly. Sam Barnes (Engineer) - Doing all the right things right now, just making clear the responsibilities. Adam Parsho (EA) - Hyper motivated and organized. Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Jane Smith (Product Manager) - Sam Barnes (Engineer) - I really appreciated time here and loved the product. Adam Parsho (EA) - Really grateful for my time here. 
Interview Questions