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project management interview question

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Hi All,

I am a Java Developer trying my luck in UK. I am not able to get through the interview because of the reason i have been asked project management question rather than technical question what i had expected! Can anyone guide me how to answer the question mentioned below:

1.How would you start a project?
2.How many projects you handled in the past? Deadlines met? On time/ within budget? Obstacles you had to overcome?
3.What do you see yourself doing five years from now?
4.How do you perform under deadline pressure? Give me an example
5.Do you understand milestones, interdependencies? Resource allocation?

regards,
Reji

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re: project management interview question

In reply to project management interview question

1.How would you start a project?
At first, you have to get the sponsor to explain the objective of the project. Get the technical team to access various aspects of the project (Such as: time, manpower needed to complete the project; Software/Hardware requirement requirements etc?). Submit your proposal to the Sponsor and after his approval present the same to your Client for approval.

2.How many projects you handled in the past? Deadlines met? On time/ within budget? Obstacles you had to overcome?
Depends on how many projects you have handled so far. In general, many projects can?t be completed with the initial timelines and budget. Many reasons could add to this delay. Reasons such as: Scope change, enhancements or more features added as the project goes on and as the awareness increases. OR natural calamities might add to the delay. Most of my projects initially used to take more time but eventually, I managed customer expectations well and understood how to make projects into phases so that the main project can be completed with in the deadline and budget

3.What do you see yourself doing five years from now?
Usually the Project Manager path
Vertically:
Project Manager ? then to a Senior/Lead Project Manager ? then to a Program Manager and so on?
Horizontally:
(as you are a very IT technical person) doing wide range of projects ranging from Software Development project, Infrastructure Projects, Software implementation Projects, Process (such as ITIL, Six Sigma) implementation Projects etc..

4.How do you perform under deadline pressure? Give me an example
Always there is a pressure when deadline reaches. But you always need to remember a famous quote from a China’s most famous teacher, philosopher, and political theorist, ?When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.?

5.Do you understand milestones, interdependencies? Resource allocation?
When you build your WBS (Work Breakdown Structure) you will have to understand all these. Use Microsoft Project often to get these things familiar.

Also follow this URL: http://www.projectperfect.com.au/wp_index.php
Cheers
Rama Prasad Mamidi

Thanks for the info

In reply to re: project management interview question

It was informative!! Thanks for sharing such information with the team.

project management inteview question

In reply to project management interview question

Hi Reji,
in answer to your questions
1) To start a project you would first agree a project charter, by defining the inputs ad outputs, organising an objective-setting meeting where you would agree clear project objectives , produce a project deliverables list and finally a Project goal statement.
2) be honest if you haven;t project managed before, as they can almost always tell if you are lying, but show enthusiasm and talk about your experiences / obstacles and how you overcame these.
3)??? again be honest, where DO you see yourself?? working as a part of a project team, as a projectr manager??
4) Under pressure I… (relate back to the obstacles on question 2), tell them that you would look at the project charter, prioritise as necessary, speak to the Stakeholder/s (after all this is the person/s who will bale you out or help you during bad situations)
,keep an eye on your Critical path to ensure it isn;t slipping if it is then you could allocate more resources if effective to do so.
5)Milestones are tasks of 0 days in duration which represent the start or finish of a project, task or phase.
Interdependencies or dependencies is when a task start or end date is dependant on another task ending or starting.
Resource allocation is used to allocate people or materials to a task, this then allows you to calculate a start and finish date of a task or phase, telling you whether the time alocated for the project will overrun, underrun or be on target + or – 1 day.

hope this is of some help,

Regards
Tony F

Project management interview question

In reply to project management interview question

Hi Reji,

Are you looking for a break into Project management profile or only looking for a Java developer role? If the organization asks you Project management questions then there may be an issue. Or the job profile may have 90% Java development activity and 10% PM skills

Well to answer your questions

1.How would you start a project?
A well define project charter will be prepared with inputs from stakeholder, project sponsor and the project manager. Once the project charter is approved, the project is initiated. All prior activities are part of scope inititaion and may or may not result in a project.
2.How many projects you handled in the past? Deadlines met? On time/ within budget? Obstacles you had to overcome?
This is specific to what you had done.
3.What do you see yourself doing five years from now?
This is specific to where you see yourself. Would you like to be in technical side of affair or management side of affair.
4.How do you perform under deadline pressure? Give me an example
Again specific to yourself
5.Do you understand milestones, interdependencies? Resource allocation?
As part of Project planning each element defined in the scope statement is further provided with a time and cost estimate. A milestone is when a particular scope identified as an activity needs to be completed. Now it may be possible that one activity depends on another, for which there is a scheduling done in the Project plan. To meet the required time estimate you now need to add resources and this needs to be levelled as well

Appreciate if you read some material on Project management Book of knowledge from PMI.

Regards
Jairaj

What position did you apply for?

In reply to project management interview question

Did you apply for a senior development role? Perhaps they were looking for someone to double as a tech team leader?

Generally, companies that are not in the sofware business would prefer technical generalists – rather than technical specialists.

Hence funny job descriptions like:
“…we are looking for a web developer who must have 8 yrs experience in MS DOS, COBOL, PL, Perl, IIS, LINUX, LISP, ASP, J++, J2EE, ORACLE, SQL Server, VB, C#, .NET, C++, DB2, Oracle, SQL 2008, Vista, PC support, RAM, HDD, MS word, Powerpoint and Notepad.

…He should also be able to develop a static website.”

If you prefer the technical specialist role, perhaps it might help if you restricted your search to highly technical programming positions at a software house. They know what they want and will not ask you “dumb” questions.

Make sure your CV does not mislead anyone to think that you have project management skills. Remove the word “project” and replace with “Application” or “module” etc.

Otherwise you risk getting fired if you give the right answers during a project management interview and then fail to perform in a project management role…and believe me – PM is tough.

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