How we do Product, Design and Tech recruitment at Mentimeter

About the author: Lena Wiberg is an Engineering Manager at Mentimeter.

Why do we choose to be public with our process, the structure and even example questions? We believe being transparent will increase diversity and allow you to be at ease and feel prepared. We want our interviews to feel comfortable while diving deep into your experiences and thought processes around situations you might face while providing a fair and equitable experience. In short: We want you to shine. 

The process

We use the same general process for all roles in the Product Department, so when applying for a job with us, you will have

• An introduction interview with a Talent Acquisition Specialist 
• A code test or a case - tailored for the role 
• A competence interview focusing on skills and craft relevant to the role
• A culture interview focusing on cultural fit and add

In addition to that, we will do:

• A wrap-up call where everyone involved in the process has an equal voice
• Reference checks
• Thorough research to give you a good offer

We pick a hiring team from people who would be your future colleagues and potential managers. Everyone involved has undergone interview training where we talk about our process, the importance of each interview having a clear purpose and what kinds of questions we do (and don’t) ask. To deal with different types of bias, we use a predefined structure where you can choose from a specific set of questions. It might sound impersonal, but it is to give everyone as equal a chance as possible. We will, of course, ask follow-up questions or ask for clarifications but the general structure is the same for everyone.

We want you to shine and show us your best self, so we want the interviews to be friendly and inclusive. The better we get to know you and you, us, the better chance we have to see if this is a good match. We want you to experience “the real Mentimeter experience”, or as close to it as possible, already while interviewing. 

The practical element 

Our processes always include a practical element in the form of a test or a case. Depending on the role, this could be a code test, a case and/or a personality test combined with a logical ability test. The aim is to help us place the right people in the right role with as many data points as possible and with as little bias as possible. 

For our engineering roles, we use code tests from either DevSkills or DevSkiller. We will offer you a choice of a few different programming languages to make sure you can make your best impression. The code tests are analysed, partly automated and partly by our engineers, and you will either get an invitation to a competence interview or feedback on why we chose not to move forward. Of course, your level of seniority is taken into consideration when we look into your solution.

For other product department roles, we tailor a case that is relevant to the role. The case should reflect situations you might be asked to handle in your regular job. If you are applying for an engineering manager role, you might be asked to share your thoughts on diversity in hiring, how to keep culture while in hyper-growth or how to deal with conflicts. If you are applying for a product manager role, perhaps we’d ask you to share ideas on working with MVPs and cross-team planning. 

They are meant to be doable in a few hours or less. They are intended to be relevant. They are meant to show you what you might be challenged with and allow you to show us who you are in a professional setting.

Competence interview

The focus in this interview is knowledge, competence and skills. The goal is to identify that you match the requirements specified in the ad. 

We always work in pairs, with one person leading the interview and one person taking notes and adding comments and questions along the way. We strive to ask each candidate the same set of questions, and we work hard to make this a pleasant experience. No brain teasers, no “How would you move Mount Fuji”-questions. Your interviewers will typically be engineers and line managers with skills that match the role we are hiring for. 

The interview is normally 90 minutes long and typically structured like this:

Introduction 

We go through the structure of the interview, set expectations and introduce who we are and what we do at Mentimeter. You get to do the same.

We talk a bit more about the role to add some context to it and ask a few questions about your background and relevant experience. 

Typical questions could be:

• “What specifically in the ad made you apply/agree to interview for this role?” 
• “Are there things in the description that you don’t like or feel are unclear?”
• “Could you tell us more about how you have worked with * before?” 

* being something related to the role such as setting up a strategy, coaching or mentoring experience.

General competence and motivation questions

Moving on from the introduction, we go through a few questions relevant to the role you are applying for. It could be asking you to talk about an exciting project you’ve done and what you learned from it. It could be asking about a fun technical challenge you faced. It could be talking about what you like and dislike about Typescript. It could be what monitoring and observability tools you have used and what you thought about them. It could be how you want to work with stakeholder management or the MVP concept. It could be your experience with mentoring. The aim is to understand a bit more about the level you are at right now and what you might be interested in learning more about in the future. 

Note: The order of the general part and the practical part might shift depending on the interviewer. 

The practical part

In the case of a case, you get time to present your case, and we will ask some follow-up questions.  If you have done a code test, we talk about your choice of solution, potential other ways of solving it, if you would have done anything differently given more time etc. Typical questions could be in the format of “You chose to solve * this way, could you tell me more about that?”

* being something related to the case or code test. Such as choosing a particular algorithm or using a specific tool in your case.

For some roles, we do a high-level whiteboard exercise where we discuss how you build certain features in our product. No tongue-twisters: something closely related to the work you will actually be doing. 

Open the floor and wrap up

At this point, there should be at least fifteen minutes left. After asking you if there is anything you would like to add, we leave the floor to you: Ask us all the questions you have! We also shortly discuss when we believe we will get back to you and what the next step looks like. 

The office - Stockholm

Culture interview

In the culture interview, we focus on mindset, attitude, values and behavior. The goal is to identify if you would thrive in our company culture by getting a deeper understanding of your motivation, attitude, mindset, values and behaviour.  A big part of this interview is centered around our core values: Include Everyone, Embrace Responsibility, Work smart, Be Humble and Have Fun. 

As in the competence interview, we always work in pairs with a predefined set of questions and a lot of focus on making this a good experience for you. Your interviewers will likely be the hiring manager and another line manager. 

The interview is generally one hour long and typically structured as follows:

Introduction 

We go through the structure of the interview, set expectations and introduce who we are and what we do at Mentimeter. You get to do the same.

We ask a few introductory questions about motivation and what brought you to this interview. 

Typical questions are: 

• “Why are you here today?”
• “What is important to you at work and why?”
• “What do you need from your future manager?”

Mentimeter Values

We go through each of our five values, exemplify what they mean to us and ask you questions relating to them. A good way to prepare is to take some time to read about our core values here and reflect on what these mean to you and how you've worked with similar values in your day-to-day work.

Typical questions you could get are: 

• “How do you make other people feel safe and welcomed at work?” 
• “Tell us about a situation where you collaborated with others to reach a result?”
• “When your opinion clearly differs from another person, how do you go about it?“
• “Tell us about a time when you had to give someone a difficult message.”
• “How do you approach things differently now compared to a few years ago?“
• “What is working smart for you?“
• “Tell us about a time when you did something that added scalability?” 
• “Describe a situation where you received feedback and how you acted on it.”
• “How do you approach something that you haven’t worked with before?” 
• “How do you celebrate success, and what is success to you?”

We like to end this part of the interview by asking you to pick a favourite and why you chose it.

Open the floor and wrap up

At this point, there should be about fifteen minutes left. After asking you if there is anything you would like to add, we leave the floor to you: Ask us all the questions you have left! We also shortly talk about when we believe we will get back to you and what the next step looks like. 

Wrapping up

The whole hiring team does the final assessment of candidates in a meeting coordinated by the Talent Acquisition Specialist.  We look at a combination of skills, experience, role & seniority fit, culture and attitude. We believe it all has to match for you to flourish here.

Normally we ask for two references who we call before moving on to the last stage: calling you up with an offer!

In the call, we will check if there are any outstanding questions or unclarities and talk about them before we move on. We will outline our offer and benefits and go through any details you might be interested in, whatever is important for you. 

After the call, we will send out a contract for you to read through. You will, of course, get reasonable time* to look over the details and make your decision. 

*What “reasonable time” means is up to you and the hiring manager to agree on.

Once we are in agreement, we will do a little dance of joy on our end and get started on our onboarding process, which is a topic for another article.  

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