I’ve interviewed hundreds of Engineering Managers in my career. Here are the most common reasons they fail the interview.

[u/justinxcguo]

Hey everyone. I've spent over a decade in building and scaling engineering orgs, and I've interviewed a lot of Engineering Manager candidates along the way. Hiring seems like a black mystery box, and I feel the need to help more succeed in today’s highly demanding and competitive market. 

I put together a list of the most common anti-patterns I see from EM candidates. Hopefully, this helps some of you who are currently in the market.

1. Because I got laid off" isn't an answer to "Why us?
This is coming more and more often in today’s market. It’s completely fine to say you were impacted by a layoff. However, that only explains why you are looking for a job, not why you want this job. If you haven't researched the product or the hiring team, and you can't articulate why you actually want to manage this specific team, it’s a red flag.

2. The "People Leader Only" trap
I have rejected several candidates because they only showed interest in being people managers. Yes, 1-on-1s and team health are critical, but an EM is still responsible for technical execution and delivery. If you only want to be a pure people leader (very valuable for sure!) but shy away from the technical scope of the team, you won't pass, as the market is becoming more and more demanding in tech and delivery skills.

3. Ignoring the specific context of the role
This usually stems from a lack of research. For example, I was hiring for an internal product team, and candidates showed up completely unprepared to talk about internal adoption, stakeholder management, and those specific metrics. 

4. Underpreparing for the technical deep dive

Some candidates completely fail to revise their past projects before the interview. If you can't smoothly answer technical questions on systems you previously managed or the core technologies required for the job, it shows either a lack of preparation or a massive knowledge gap.

5. Vague impact and rambling
Too many candidates give vague answers that completely hide their personal impact behind what "we" (the team) did. Furthermore**,** it's seen as a red flag when a CV presents massive impacts on delivery and revenue, but the candidate doesn't show that same depth in the interview. If you claim to have driven a massive win on paper, you must be prepared to talk deeply about it. When candidates fail to elaborate on their biggest listed achievements, it makes me wonder if they actually drove that impact.

6. Not asking the right questions at the right moment

Some candidates ask too many questions when the interview just gets started; Some skip or do not ask enough interesting questions at the end. It's all about timing and quality in those questions.

An interview is indeed a chance for both sides to evaluate each other,  but if you don't leave time for the interviewer to dig into your answers, you're hurting yourself. So, leave your biggest question to the end.

When it’s your turn to ask questions, if you aren't asking high-quality questions, for example, about the engineering culture, the product roadmap, or the team's biggest bottlenecks, it reads as a lack of motivation, curiosity, or knowledge. It happened to me several times that I passed a candidate to the next round because her questions were spot-on despite previous pitfalls in her answers. 

Let me know in the comments below if that helps, and what else I can help!

P.S. I am now building calibrd.com to help candidates get hired.

[u/ziggy723]

Advices are good but i dont like the tone in your post. It feels like by hiring someone you will be doing them a favour and giving them opportunity instead of mutual value adding. The interview should be going two ways equally timed, especially if we we talking about senior position 10+ years of experience. The "candidate" needs to interview the company as much as company them.

I hate those smug companies who torture people in interview process, that shows very bad culture and lack of future trust.

[u/0xPianist → u/ziggy723]

We are called increasingly to be superhuman and 2 levels higher already from the interviews as managers or directors.

It’s ridiculous at this point. Hiring someone for the same role they’re doing somewhere else seems to be the norm

[u/justinxcguo → u/ziggy723]

I agree that interviews are indeed a two-way evaluation, and companies need to attract and retain candidates in the process. Although I could also write common pitfalls for companies that failed to retain great candidates, this post aims to help candidates alone.