# Software Engineering Manager
**Role:** Software Engineering Manager · **Level:** Head of Engineering
**Company:** [Avito](https://scaleengineer.com/companies/avito)
**Difficulty:** High
**Salary:** US$180000 - US$250000
**Experience:** 8 - 15
**Timeline:** ~14 days
This interview process is designed to assess candidates for the Head of Engineering role at Avito, focusing on leadership, technical strategy, team management, and execution capabilities. The process aims to identify individuals who can effectively lead and scale engineering teams, drive technical innovation, and contribute to Avito's overall business objectives.
Canonical: https://scaleengineer.com/interviews/avito/head-of-engineering-software-engineering-manager
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## Overall evaluation

- Leadership & Strategy
- Team Management & People Development
- Technical Acumen & Execution
- Business Acumen & Collaboration

## Questions asked

- Describe your leadership philosophy and how you build and motivate engineering teams.
- How do you balance the need for innovation with the need for stability and reliability in a production environment?
- Tell me about a time you had to make a significant technical decision that had a major impact on your team or product. What was the situation, your decision, and the outcome?
- How do you approach performance management and career development for your engineers?
- Describe your experience in hiring and retaining top engineering talent.
- How do you foster a culture of collaboration and knowledge sharing within your team and across different teams?
- What are your strategies for managing technical debt and ensuring code quality?
- How do you stay updated with the latest technology trends and ensure your team is leveraging them effectively?
- Tell me about a time you failed. What did you learn from it?
- How do you handle conflicts within your team or with other departments?
- What is your experience with budgeting and resource allocation for engineering projects?
- How would you scale an engineering team from 10 to 50 engineers?
- Describe your approach to setting technical direction and roadmap for a product.
- How do you ensure effective communication between engineering and other business units (e.g., Product, Marketing, Sales)?
- What are the key metrics you use to measure the success of your engineering team and its output?

## Preparation tips

### lists

- Deeply understand Avito's mission, values, and current business challenges.
- Review your past experiences and prepare specific examples using the STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result) for behavioral questions.
- Familiarize yourself with common software engineering management frameworks and best practices.
- Think about your leadership philosophy and how you build and motivate teams.
- Prepare questions to ask the interviewers about the role, the team, and Avito's engineering culture.
- Brush up on system design concepts relevant to large-scale applications.
- Understand Avito's product and the market it operates in.

### studyPlan

- {"title":"Company & Self-Assessment","longDescription":"Weeks 1-2: Focus on understanding Avito's business, product, and engineering organization. Research their tech stack, recent news, and any public statements about their engineering culture. Review your own career history, identifying key leadership achievements and challenges. Prepare STAR stories for common leadership and management scenarios.","shortDescription":"Weeks 1-2: Avito research, career review, STAR stories."}
- {"title":"Leadership & Management Fundamentals","longDescription":"Weeks 3-4: Deep dive into leadership and team management principles. Study topics like agile methodologies, performance management, conflict resolution, hiring best practices, and fostering psychological safety. Read relevant books or articles on engineering leadership.","shortDescription":"Weeks 3-4: Leadership principles, team management, agile, performance."}
- {"title":"Technical Strategy & System Design","longDescription":"Weeks 5-6: Refresh your knowledge on system design, scalability, and architectural patterns. Consider how you would approach technical strategy and roadmap planning for a company like Avito. Practice explaining complex technical concepts clearly.","shortDescription":"Weeks 5-6: System design, scalability, technical strategy, architecture."}
- {"title":"Behavioral & Situational Preparation","longDescription":"Week 7: Focus on behavioral and situational questions. Practice articulating your leadership style, decision-making process, and how you handle difficult situations. Prepare thoughtful questions to ask the interviewers.","shortDescription":"Week 7: Behavioral questions, situational judgment, question preparation."}

## Location differences

- {"location":"Moscow","differences":{"tips":["Research Avito's presence and engineering culture in [specific city/region].","Be prepared to discuss your experience managing remote or hybrid teams if applicable to the location.","Highlight any experience you have with local tech communities or meetups."],"interviewFocus":["Understanding of the local tech talent market and competitive landscape.","Adaptability to local business practices and cultural nuances.","Experience with scaling teams in a specific regional context."],"commonQuestions":["How do you handle a conflict between two senior engineers on your team?","Describe a time you had to make a difficult decision that impacted your team negatively. How did you handle it?","What are your strategies for attracting and retaining top engineering talent in [specific city/region]?","How do you balance the need for rapid feature development with maintaining code quality and technical debt reduction in a fast-paced market like [specific city/region]?"]}}
- {"location":"Remote","differences":{"tips":["Emphasize your experience with remote work best practices.","Be ready to discuss how you've managed stakeholder expectations across different regions.","Showcase your ability to build a cohesive engineering culture regardless of physical location."],"interviewFocus":["Global team management and cross-cultural communication.","Experience with distributed systems and asynchronous collaboration.","Strategic thinking on scaling engineering operations internationally."],"commonQuestions":["How do you foster a culture of innovation and experimentation within a geographically distributed team?","What are your approaches to managing cross-functional collaboration with product and design teams located in different time zones?","Describe your experience in building and scaling engineering teams in a global context.","How do you ensure alignment and effective communication across multiple engineering teams working on different product lines?"]}}

## Round 1: VP of Engineering / Senior Leadership Interview
**Type:** Strategic Leadership Interview · **Difficulty:** High · **Duration:** 60 min
Assesses strategic thinking, business acumen, and leadership vision.
This round focuses on your high-level strategic thinking and leadership capabilities. The interviewer will assess your ability to define a vision for the engineering organization, align it with Avito's business objectives, and articulate how you would drive innovation and growth. Expect questions about market trends, competitive analysis, and your approach to building a scalable and effective engineering function.
**Interviewers look for:** A clear and compelling vision for the engineering organization.; An understanding of how technology drives business value.; The ability to think long-term and anticipate future challenges.; A strategic approach to resource allocation and roadmap planning.
**Evaluation criteria:** Strategic thinking and vision.; Business acumen.; Understanding of market dynamics.; Ability to align technology with business goals.
**Common rejection reasons:** Lack of clear leadership vision.; Inability to articulate a compelling strategy.; Poor understanding of business objectives.; Failure to demonstrate strategic thinking.
## Questions

- What is your vision for the engineering department at Avito in the next 3-5 years?
- How would you prioritize technical initiatives to maximize business impact?
- Describe a time you successfully drove a significant technological transformation within an organization.

## Preparation tips

- Understand Avito's business strategy and market position.
- Develop a clear vision for an engineering organization at Avito's scale.
- Be prepared to discuss your approach to technical strategy and innovation.
- Think about how you would measure success at a strategic level.

## Round 2: Director of Engineering Interview
**Type:** People Management & Team Leadership Interview · **Difficulty:** High · **Duration:** 60 min
Evaluates your skills in team building, people management, and fostering a positive culture.
This interview focuses on your ability to lead, manage, and develop engineering teams. You'll be asked about your experience in hiring, onboarding, performance reviews, career development, and fostering a positive team culture. The interviewer will want to understand how you handle team dynamics, conflicts, and motivate individuals to achieve their best.
**Interviewers look for:** Proven ability to attract, retain, and develop engineering talent.; Effective strategies for managing team performance and growth.; Skills in conflict resolution and fostering collaboration.; A focus on creating a supportive and productive team environment.
**Evaluation criteria:** Team building and development.; Performance management.; Conflict resolution.; Communication and interpersonal skills.; Fostering a positive team culture.
**Common rejection reasons:** Inability to build and motivate teams.; Poor people management skills.; Lack of empathy or understanding of team dynamics.; Failure to address performance issues effectively.
## Questions

- How do you approach hiring engineers, and what qualities do you look for?
- Describe a challenging situation you faced with a team member and how you resolved it.
- What are your strategies for mentoring and developing engineers?

## Preparation tips

- Prepare examples of how you've built and scaled teams.
- Think about your approach to performance management and career pathing.
- Be ready to discuss how you handle difficult conversations and conflicts.
- Highlight your strategies for creating an inclusive and engaging team environment.

## Round 3: Principal Engineer / Staff Engineer Interview
**Type:** Technical Deep Dive & System Design · **Difficulty:** High · **Duration:** 75 min
Focuses on technical expertise, system design, and architectural decision-making.
This is a deep dive into your technical expertise. You will be expected to discuss system design, architecture, scalability, and best practices in software development. The interviewer will assess your ability to make sound technical decisions, guide your team through complex technical challenges, and ensure the delivery of high-quality, scalable software.
**Interviewers look for:** Strong understanding of scalable system design.; Proficiency in modern software development practices.; Ability to guide technical discussions and make sound architectural decisions.; Problem-solving skills and analytical thinking.
**Evaluation criteria:** Technical depth and breadth.; System design and architecture.; Understanding of software development lifecycle.; Problem-solving skills.; Ability to guide technical decisions.
**Common rejection reasons:** Lack of technical depth.; Inability to design scalable systems.; Poor understanding of software development best practices.; Difficulty in articulating technical solutions.
## Questions

- Design a system for [specific Avito feature, e.g., a real-time notification service]. Discuss scalability, reliability, and potential bottlenecks.
- How would you approach refactoring a large, legacy codebase?
- Describe your experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and microservices architecture.

## Preparation tips

- Review system design principles for large-scale applications.
- Be prepared to discuss trade-offs in architectural decisions.
- Refresh your knowledge on common data structures and algorithms.
- Think about how you ensure code quality, testing, and CI/CD.

## Round 4: Product Manager / Cross-functional Interview
**Type:** Cross-functional Collaboration & Product Alignment · **Difficulty:** Medium · **Duration:** 45 min
Evaluates collaboration with Product and other teams, and understanding of product vision.
This interview assesses your ability to collaborate effectively with other departments, such as Product Management and Design. You'll discuss how you translate business requirements into technical solutions, manage stakeholder expectations, and contribute to a product-centric culture. It's also an opportunity to understand the product vision and how engineering fits into it.
**Interviewers look for:** How well you collaborate with cross-functional teams.; Your communication style and clarity.; Your alignment with Avito's core values.; Your overall approach to problem-solving in a business context.
**Evaluation criteria:** Cultural fit.; Collaboration and communication skills.; Problem-solving approach.; Alignment with Avito's values.
**Common rejection reasons:** Poor alignment with company culture.; Lack of collaboration skills.; Inability to articulate ideas clearly.; Misalignment on expectations for the role.
## Questions

- How do you collaborate with Product Managers to define and deliver features?
- Describe a time you had to influence stakeholders outside of engineering to adopt a technical solution.
- How do you ensure your team understands and contributes to the overall product vision?

## Preparation tips

- Understand Avito's product roadmap and priorities.
- Think about how you partner with Product Managers.
- Be ready to discuss your approach to cross-functional collaboration.
- Prepare questions about the product development process.

## Round 5: HR / Final Interview
**Type:** Cultural Fit & Final Interview · **Difficulty:** Medium · **Duration:** 45 min
Assesses cultural fit, motivation, and final alignment on role expectations.
This final round is typically with HR or a senior leader from the People team. It focuses on assessing your cultural fit, understanding your motivations for seeking this role at Avito, and ensuring alignment on expectations. They will also cover logistical aspects and answer any remaining questions you might have about the company or the role.
**Interviewers look for:** How well your personality and values align with Avito's culture.; Your motivation for joining Avito and the Head of Engineering role.; Your ability to articulate your career aspirations.; Your overall enthusiasm and engagement.
**Evaluation criteria:** Cultural fit.; Behavioral competencies.; Motivation and alignment with Avito's values.; Overall impression and enthusiasm for the role.
**Common rejection reasons:** Lack of alignment with company culture and values.; Poor communication or interpersonal skills.; Mismatch in expectations for the role or career growth.; Inability to demonstrate passion for Avito's mission.
## Questions

- What are your long-term career aspirations, and how does this role fit into them?
- What do you know about Avito's culture, and what aspects appeal to you?
- How do you handle ambiguity and change in a fast-paced environment?

## Preparation tips

- Reiterate your understanding of Avito's values and culture.
- Clearly articulate why you are interested in this specific role and company.
- Be prepared to discuss your career goals and how they align with opportunities at Avito.
- Have thoughtful questions ready about the company culture, team, and growth opportunities.