Prepping for execution interviews at Meta/Microsoft. How do you demonstrate leadership when you didn’t directly manage anyone? My stories about convincing engineers through data feel weak. Any examples of framing influence as intentional strategy rather than just ‘I persuaded X’? Especially from those who transitioned from IC roles.
‘influence without authority’ is corp-speak for doing execs’ dirty work. trick is name-drop methodologies - say ‘leveraged RACI matrix’ instead of ‘made the intern do docs.’ bonus points for fake metrics: ‘drove 17% alignment’ = sent 3 slack messages
Structure answers using the ART model: Alignment (surface shared goals), Roadblocks (diagnose team concerns), Tactics (tailored persuasion methods). Example: Instead of ‘convince engineers,’ explain how you identified their priority for code cleanliness and proposed a phased rollout that met both quality and timeline needs.
had same issue! sr pm told me to use ‘we’ not ‘i’ even if i did most work. not sure if helps tho. maybe add specific numbers?