Essential Product Owner Interview Questions to Master

Role of a Product Owner

Before discussing the product owner interview questions, it is important to understand about the role of a product owner. The product owner, also known as the agile or Scrum product owner, acts as the bridge between the Scum team and stakeholders such as business managers, customers and the development team. They define the product requirement to the development team based on their stakeholder interaction. Conveying their values, they exhibit the product effectively, indicating its worthiness. 

The product owner is also responsible for managing the product backlog and participating in scrum events. Their role encompasses evaluating feedback and incorporating suggestions, recommendations, opinions, and criticisms to enhance the product as much as possible. 

60 Must-Know Product Owner Interview Questions and Answers

Here are product owner interview questions to practice to ensure your selection in an upcoming interview to take up the mentioned role. 

Q1. Tell us about when you exhibited the soft skills required for the role. 

To answer the question, the candidate must know the critical soft skills for the position. It includes leadership, communication, problem-solving, conflict resolution and time management. Candidates can state the scenario when they exhibit any combination of these skills. If they haven't been in the situation, a hypothetical case indicating their possible course of action can also be used to answer. 

Q2. What do you know about Sprint's goals? 

The question aims to evaluate a candidate's awareness of their responsibilities regarding setting the sprint goals. Their information, approach towards setting the sprint goal, or previous experience with the situation is helpful to answer. Its importance in the duties of the product owner can also be indicated during the interview. 

Q3. Why do you want to apply for this role? 

For the candidates with prior experience in the scrum team or above hierarchy, the question can be answered by shedding light on their expertise in the processing and functioning of the responsibility. They may also mention their will to seek new challenges. The inexperienced candidates can approach the question by presenting their skills, domain knowledge and other key characteristics that make them suitable for this role. They must also include how the role aligns with their long-term career goals.

Q4. What is product increment? 

The question should be answered by providing the definition. It refers to all the new features or functionalities added to the product and includes values of the increments performed in previous sprints. 

Q5. Can we have the same individual as the product owner and scrum master? 

The question seeks to identify candidates' understanding of the different roles in the scrum team. The candidate must be familiar with each role's responsibilities and any problems that may arise while practicing the situation in question. If the answer is no, the explanation will be based on the abovementioned facts. 

Q6. Which other frameworks are you familiar with? 

Since there are multiple frameworks for product development and delivery, knowledge about the role and importance of each in different situations is essential. Hence, the question will be answered accordingly. The candidate can share their experience working on any of the frameworks or state the scenarios where they should be implemented. 

Q7. How would you deny the request of a stakeholder? 

The candidate can approach this question by stating the importance of denial in the matter along with appropriate reasons to do so. They must also exhibit their communication skills by describing the different approaches to dealing with the situation. 

Q8. Where would you mention or store the customer's requirement? 

It is also a core role-based question that requires a working knowledge of the product owner. The requirements are stored in the product backlog, which needs to be prioritized as necessary. The candidate can also include different methods and tools for storing the requirements to enhance the answer. 

Q9. When is the appropriate time for backlog grooming? 

Apart from the direct answer, you can also include what happens and critical points to be discussed in the proceedings of the backlog grooming meetings. Candidates must also discuss expectations and outcomes from the meeting. 

Q10.  How many Product Owners are possible for a single scrum team? 

The answer to this question is one. To address this question, the best method is to state the possible challenges one may encounter in the presence of multiple product owners. One can also give a hypothetical example of any incident or situation where issues can occur. 

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Q11. What is an ideal amount of time for performing research during product discovery? 

The answer will vary among the companies and products. However, a generalized percentage-based figure can be a good approach. Ensure that the time satisfies the research goals and should consume only a little time or include too little time to compromise the quality. A 50% time is an appropriate amount of time. Further, different time-consuming factors should be included. 

Q12. Could you walk us through redesigning the product? 

This question must be answered, indicating your ability to handle the complexities of the role. Your priority must be strategic planning for redesigning the product. You must include all the factors that must be focussed on while restarting. This includes effective communication to understand the demands and seek information on specific improvements and other aspects. 

Q13. According to you, which behavioral pattern is essential to enhance the scrum projects?

Since the interviewer wants to know the values or strengths you believe are critical to performing well in the position, it is better to state the ones you possess. The question can make you a potential employee if you have the skills or know how to develop them. Your focus must be on behavioral characteristics like being unbiased, having a broad overview and other such qualities. 

Q14. State your understanding of velocity in Agile. 

It is a conceptual question asked to assess your core knowledge. Here, it would help if you defined what velocity means in Agile and the approach or methods used to improve it in the best possible way. 

Q15. Explain Scrum in layperson's terms. 

The question evaluates the candidate's basic understanding. One must have clear concepts to offer the solution. We recommend that your answer should include all the keywords and essential terms. To ensure easy understanding, state when, how and where regarding the Scrum. 

Q16. State the important features of the user story. 

The best way to answer this product owner interview question is by describing the key characteristics, such as that it should be short and simple, that the user must be included in the requirements, and that acceptance criteria and qualifying value must be included. This can be coupled with an actual user story to enhance the answer. 

Q17. What would you do if the Scrum team fails to meet the sprint commitments? 

The answer must contain points that help you calmly walk past the inability to meet the sprint commitments as soon as possible. Denial of such a situation should not be the approach. Instead, discuss future actions like acknowledging the situation's occurrence, noting mistakes and incapabilities, making a new plan, adding the failures in backlogs and thoroughly analyzing and inspecting the overall situation. 

Q18. How do you handle backlog prioritization? 

You must use this question to show your ability to adapt to changes and plans. You should also show your knowledge and application skills. For instance, talking about applying the Moscow method or Stack Ranking in this situation will likely offer a good impression of your knowledge and application abilities. 

Q19. What are your weaknesses? 

The interviewer understands and accepts that the presence of weakness is possible. However, lack of recognition and planning to improve can take a toll on the project that companies can't compromise with. Hence, it is best to indicate the weakness that doesn't hinder the success of the project (in case you have loads of experience and don't hold any such weakness). Alternatively, you can also state the weakness but couple it with the entire plan or priority steps that you will take or are currently taking to overcome it. 

Q20. What is a product roadmap? 

A fundamental question judges a candidate's understanding of product development. It is crucial to the role, and hence, the answer must encompass all the factors, such as a timeline of product delivery, strategic planning, developing long-term and short-term goals and how to get the product delivered efficiently. 

Q21. What do you mean by vision, strategy and roadmap? 

The question is again an essential aspect of judging a candidate's relevancy and capabilities for the role. The answer must be curated by the individual by self-based on the fundamental understanding they hold of the terms. Giving examples related to these terms can also be a way to approach this question. 

Q22. How would you deal with a situation where the purchase of a specific product is declining? 

The question evaluates the candidate's strategic and problem-solving skills, so the answer must be framed accordingly. The candidate must indicate their priority actions, including understanding the situation thoroughly through analysis and data collection. They should then develop a plan and effectively communicate among the diverse teams and their members. 

Q23. When would you not implement Scrum? 

This question should indicate your conceptual clarity regarding ScrumScrum. You can tackle this by enlisting all the scenarios where Scrum is inappropriate to implement. These include the organization's rigidity toward the Scrum framework, the involvement of many people, and the need for significant changes in the projects. 

Q24. How would you deal with uncooperative stakeholders? 

Judging a candidate's communication skills and conflict resolution abilities is a good and fundamental question. The candidate can approach this question with a strategy that can be helpful in the situation. For instance, they can highlight the positive points of their work or deliveries to win their trust, answer their queries and concerns and understand the issues or nature of the stakeholders. 

Q25. Who is the priority stakeholder for you? 

The question has a direct answer: customers. However, you must indicate why they are the priority. It is because they are the product's end users. However, the importance of meeting other requirements and demands should be included. 

Q26. Which is the best product in your view? 

The question assesses characteristics and values that are essential for the candidate. The answer must exhibit the candidate's critical thinking skills while describing the product and associated features. The future scope of improvement and the strategic plan for achieving it should be incorporated to make a lasting impression. 

Q27. What do you mean by 'Definition of Done'? 

The question has yet to have a definite answer. State that the 'Definition of Done' varies with the user story and state which activities can be included in the list. These can be unit or integration testing, coding comments, release notes, writing code, design documents, etc. 

Q28. What do you think about canceling the Sprint? 

This question indicates candidates' awareness of their professional rights. You can state that you hold the right to cancel the Sprint; however, you can collaborate with the development team and business stakeholders. You can also mention the situation where the decision will be applicable. 

Q29. What is the release burndown chart? 

It is also one of the technical questions to be answered thoroughly. The answer must include the use of the chart, its representation, importance, and other critical aspects that must be known. 

Q30. Is maintaining a work-life balance possible for product owners? 

Talking about one's outlook on the answer is permissible here. Indicate what you know about the role and how you expect to follow your day-to-day schedule. State your competency in achieving the work-life balance by following effective steps. 

Q31. What do you know about the Moscow technique? 

While we have indirectly asked this question, this directly mentions a technique to evaluate your knowledge and familiarity with it. It is recommended that you state when the technique is used and the interpretation and priority of each phrase or letter in the technique. 

Q32. What are the effective metrics for product success?

The answer will vary depending on the product. Communicate this while answering the question, along with examples of different types of metrics. Ensure you indicate which metric suits each product and include the importance of aligning the metrics with business objectives. 

Q33. Which qualities must be completely absent in product owners? 

This is also the question to analyze a candidate's understanding of their responsibilities. Hence, state the factors while keeping the required skills in mind. The answer can include:

• The need for proper communication.
• Being conservative or resistant to change.
• Being close to feedback or criticism are some qualities that should not be present in the potential employee for the product owner role. 

Q34. Where will you incorporate non-functional requirements? 

Approach this question by providing the rules or locations for incorporating non-functional requirements. Couple this with real-life examples related to any product. 

Q35. Differentiate between the Scrum team and the Development team? 

To answer this question, you can provide a broad overview of the scrum team, followed by the specific roles and responsibilities of the development team. Indicate the different hierarchies present in the former team. The distinct requirements regarding skills and the teams or designations each of the two deals with can also be answered here. 

Q36. What challenges do you expect to face in the role? 

This question is another way to evaluate your understanding of the job role. If you are experienced, state the challenges you have previously faced and how you tackled them. If you are a fresher, consider getting familiar with the possible difficulties in the role. Know the effective mitigation techniques and devise a few to answer this question. 

Q37. How do you perform feature prioritization? 

The answer to this question can depict your critical thinking and strategic planning skills. You will proceed by discussing different methods for determining the priority of features, including the RICE method. Be sure to include the various factors that will influence your decision. 

Q38. What is scope creep? How do you manage it? 

Answer the question effectively to depict your capability to handle the role. Define scope creep and how it impacts the project. Include the methods to manage scope creep, focusing on goals and requirements. You can also include scope adjustment, regular reviews, feature prioritization and other approaches. 

Q39. Please walk us through the situation where you had to perform a never-before-done action. 

The market is dynamic, and this question will evaluate your ability to adapt to changes. It would help if you answered this question using the approach that you will take in this situation. It includes collecting information on the process and data and making a map of the following steps you would take. For a never performed action, you can also talk about what you learned from others' actions and how you planned to do that task based on what you saw others doing. 

Q40. How do you ensure clarity in expectations among the development team? 

The question assesses your leadership and communication skills. Reflect the same with your approach that exhibits clear understanding among the team members. For this, you can emphasize meeting and doubt-clearing sessions. Further, you can also talk about using tools like simplified flowcharts or other visual methods to allow clarity and understanding. 

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Q41. Tell us about your experience in data presentation to senior executives and/or management. 

The interviewer will want to judge whether the candidate is capable of handling the type of responsibilities being asked about. While senior-level presentations need customization, executive-level presentations should be coupled with confidence and customization per specific needs. Exhibit the mentioned while also indicating the difference in the content you will present during the two meetings. 

Q42. Enlist different estimation levels in Scrum. 

The question will evaluate your knowledge and relevancy for the role. Here, you must approach it by explaining what estimation is, the problems created with wrong estimation, and heading to two levels of estimation. The estimation levels to be included and described in the answer are product and sprint backlog levels. 

Q43. What do you understand about technical debt? 

This is an important question asked to judge the understanding of the work. Answer this question directly with the definition, example and the problems that come along while practicing it. You must also indicate the ways to overcome the issues. If there is time, it's preferred that you share your experience in handling technical debt.

Q44. What is the reporting structure for the product owner? 

The question judges the candidate's information about their work and reporting head—the actual head to report to might vary among the companies. However, ideally, the product owners must submit their reports to equal levels of development management associates. 

Q45. What is your approach to managing remote or distributed teams? 

The question allows you to show your leadership and management skills. So, it would help if you told different ways to tackle the challenges that arise in managing remote teams and how you can overcome them. It would be best to mention the importance of co-location and the usage of collaboration tools such as Skype, Google Meet, and others. Any regular update plan can also be included here. 

Q46. State a few project management tools you have worked with. 

The question on project management tools is based on your work experience. You must enlist the names, the type of work done on the project, or the specific functions performed on those tools. You can also add extra points based on your experience. Some essential tools to be included in the list are Version One, EasyBacklog, Agilefant and others. 

Q47. What is your approach to working on products or projects that don't belong to your area of expertise? 

The interviewer wants to judge how you handle new projects and understand your adaptability. The most essential thing here is to show that you have a plan to gain knowledge in such projects. You must include your priority on understanding basic concepts, setting up meetings for better clarity, clearing doubts, and requesting access to detailed content for better clarity. You can also include other approaches. 

Q48. What do you know about extreme programming? 

This question is most likely asked in software development projects and interviews. The approach to this question must begin with the definition and special characteristics of extreme programming. You must also include the role of the product owner in extreme programming, which involves communicating with stakeholders and making decisions about the priority of product backlog items. 

Q49. What do you mean by a cone of uncertainty?

Answer this question by stating its definition or meaning in your terms, followed by its significance. Do talk about the changes in fixed and variables associated with the concept. 

Q50. Which agile certification do you have and why? 

If you don't hold any certifications currently, you can talk about which certification you aim to gain and why you chose it. However, if you have the certification, name it with reason. There can be distinct certifications like the SAFe Agile Product Owner certification for strengthening your knowledge of lean-agile principles, the Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) certification for validating scrum knowledge, and so on. 

Q51. State the basic components of the product roadmap. 

The product roadmap is not a mandatory part of the product owner's daily responsibilities but an essential aspect of the overall product journey. Hence, familiarity with its intricacies is necessary. Thus, this question will be answered by including components like product initiation, development, release, support, and maintenance. Also, enlist the information the product roadmap conveys. 

Q52. Should you communicate changes in the marketplace to the Scrum team? 

Indicate your knowledge of your responsibilities as a product owner with logic. While it is necessary to communicate the information, it is recommended to couple the answer with the reasons. Besides common reasons, do include how personally you witnessed its importance or the benefits you obtained when the team knew compared to when it didn't. 

Q53. Is it necessary for the product owner to have complete technical knowledge? 

It would help if you answered the question straight: a medium level of technical knowledge is required to handle the projects, but an in-depth level isn't necessary. Join this answer with the technical expertise you hold. You can also be logical by stating where the need for technical knowledge arises and its significance in practicing the role. 

Q54. How can you make an impact on the organization by acting on the role? 

The question can be answered by conducting good research about the company. If you learn about any current weaknesses they face with the product or project and have a plan or strategy to improve them, you can answer them here. Alternatively, you can indicate the quantitative results or metrics you improved in your previous role and showcase the ability to replicate the numbers at the new organization. 

Q55. What are the parameters that decide the success of the product? 

The question is to be directly answered by enlisting the existing standard parameters. You can state the answer based on product hierarchy, such as prioritizing customer satisfaction. Alternatively, the product success can be evaluated based on product backlog strength, attaining the release goals, quality delivery and other parameters. Indicate the parameters depending on the product and other factors. 

Q56. State any changes you wish to make to a prominent product. 

The question evaluates the candidate's in-depth observation skills and efficiency as a product owner. Depending on the product, you can include technical aspects, better functionality or other information. It is up to you to come up with a logical idea for this question. The answer will reflect your capability as a product owner. 

Q57. What does a good user story encompass? 

Since product owners are responsible for developing a user story, they should know its components. The answer must include principles as stated in Scrum or Agile. The points to be included in this answer are business value, end users of the story, and the functions that should be incorporated into the product. Further, a good user story should be concise and involve other important factors like acceptance criteria. 

Q58. Can a product owner be a release product owner? 

As a candidate for product owner, you must know you can take the responsibilities of a release product owner as well. To answer this question, you will agree to indicate the duties to be performed in an additional role. 

Q59. How did your previous job role influence you to apply for the current position? 

Through this question, you can demonstrate how the experiences you have gained can contribute to your future role. You can talk about the experiences that make you suitable for the role, such as leadership or team management. You can also enlist expertise gained in technical aspects that can add to your efficiency in acting in this role. 

Q60. Which are important KPIs for you to track? 

The answer will include KPIs associated with the product, team and business. Here, you can enlist the significant basic metrics. These metrics will signify the quality of the product, the progress made, the team performance and the influence on business goals. 

How Can I Prepare for a Product Owner Interview?

Here are some helpful techniques that can assist in facing the product owner interview questions: 

• Ensure that the essential concepts of agile and Scrum methodologies, backlog management, user stories, and others are revised to tackle the technical and conceptual questions. 
• Recall your experiences in different categories essential for the role, such as task prioritization, strategic planning, delivering quality results and other hard and soft skills. 
• Understand the roles and responsibilities, possible additional roles you can take and the positions you can handle. 
• Research the company deeply, aiming to know their current issues or the specific skills they seek in potential employees. 
• Curate the responses to the interview questions to practice framing the scenarios and experiences. 

Conclusion 

We hope you would now be clear about how to prepare for product owner interview questions. With the estimated 24% annual growth for the product owner role, beginning to learn and practice now is the best plan to reach your goal as soon as possible. Going through the product owner interview questions and answers is undoubtedly beneficial to crack the interview. However, the presence of skills is more critical in showcasing them. If you have decided to excel in the field and are looking for the right mentor to guide you, the top and most experienced educational platform is here to help you. 

At Simplilearn, we offer multiple courses to help you develop skill sets Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) Certification Training provides training from certified and recognized scrum trainers. You can elevate your product expertise with this  intensive CSPO training by global CSTs. This will help you master Scrum, prioritize features, and drive customer satisfaction. You will learn through activities, simulations, and real-world case studies, which will help you unlock career growth with higher salaries, leadership opportunities, and a fulfilling journey as a product owner.

FAQs

Q1. What Qualities Make a Successful Product Owner?

The presence of a visionary mindset, the ability to make decisions based on logic, communicate with stakeholders effectively and adapt based on changing needs contribute to the success of the product owner. Some additional qualities include having the technical knowledge for better understanding, the capability to make the most out of the feedback and the ability to identify the problems leading to failure.   

Q2. What are the three main responsibilities of product owners?

The three primary responsibilities of a product owner are: 

• Management of the product backlog 
• Regularly monitor product advancement and modify the goals and strategy accordingly
• Act as the communication bridge between different departments, teams and stakeholders

Q3. What is the key skill for a product owner?

The critical skills essential for product owners are leadership, negotiation, analytical, decision-making, management, and conflict resolution skills. They must be efficient in time management and exhibit unbiasedness when dealing with the team and the project.