Product Design Questions

Question 1

Product Design CIRCLES Method

Answer 1

1. Comprehend the Situation
   a. Context
   Ask interview questions if you need clarification of the product: 5 W 1 H method
   1). What is it?
   2). Who is it for?
   3). Why do they need it?
   4). When is it available?
   5). Where is it available?
   6). How does it work?

   b. Goals and Metrics
       Revenue
       User acquisition 
       User retention 
       Market share 
       Customer satisfaction 
       Conversion rate
       Basket size 

   c. Contrastraints and Assumptions
       Example: Design a new airport - Don't forget to aks how much land you have for the airport before you 
        craft a design. 
       1) Deadline 
       2) Resources
       3) Scalability 
       4) Platform 
        5) Geography 

2. Identify the Customer
   List potential customer (i.e. food lovers, soccer moms, college students, small biz owners, etc) and focus
   on one customer type.
   Help interviewer to visualize the customer with a 2x2 matrix
   Who, Behaviors, Demographics, Needs and Goals

3. Report the Customer's Needs
Gather requirements and create user stories, aka report customer's pain point. 
As a (role), I want to (goal) , so that (benefit)

4. Cut, Through Prioritization
   From a big backlog of user stories, with limited time, money, labor. Which one do you do first
   User Matrix and frame work for prioritization
   1) product prioritization matrix
   Revenue, Customer Satisfaction , Ease of Implementation, Overall rating
   2) Additional criteria
   Strategic importance, probability of success, work-around availability
   3) RICE method
   Write a book sample
   Reach. How many people will be impacted (100,000 people)
   Impact. What’s the benefit of that US from low to high? (8 of out 10)
   Confidence. What’s the probability of success? 5(0%)
   Effort. How much time will it take? (8 months)
   RICE score = Reach x Impact x Confidence / Effort 50,000 units of impact per month of effort
5. List Solutions
   Reversal method
   Example: Create a new car-buying experience
   Need: Buyers don’t have time to travel to the car dealership
   Solution based on reversal: Dealership can deliver test drivees to the buyer’s home

Think big! Don’t give ‘Me too’ and ‘Integration’ ideas.
Have at least 10 ideas. At the interview, brainstorm at least 10 ideas but only share 3 most promising ones.

6. Evaluate Trade-offs
   Customer satisfaction
   Implementation difficulty
   Revenue potential
7. Summarize Your Recommendation
   1) Tell the interviewer which product or feature you’d recommend
   2) recap what it is and why it would be beneficial to the user and /or company
   3) Explain why you preferred this solution vs. others
   4) Note any next actions you’d take to explore this idea further