Google Engineering Manager Interview (questions, process, prep)

Google engineering manager interviews are challenging and rigorous. Expect to go through multiple interview rounds where you’ll be probed on your technical leadership experience, system design skills, and code judgment. 

In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know to prepare strategically for your Google EM interviews. 

We’ve gathered insights from real candidate reports and updated interview process information and tips from experts who’ve coached and interviewed EM candidates at Google. We also provide free resources and a step-by-step prep plan you can use so you can walk into your interviews with confidence.

Here's an overview of what we'll cover:

• Role and salary
• Process and timeline
• Example questions
  • Leadership interviews
  • System design interviews
  • Code review interview
• Interviewing tips
• Preparation plan

Ready? Let's get into it.

Click here to practice with top engineering manager interview coaches

1. Google engineering manager role and salary ↑

Before we cover your software engineering manager interviews at Google, let's take a quick look at the role itself (alternatively, feel free to skip straight to the sections on the interview process or interview questions).

1.1 What does a Google engineering manager do?

As an engineering manager at Google, you'll combine technical expertise with leadership to drive major projects forward.

You'll contribute to product strategy, make architecture decisions, and craft solutions to complex challenges while fostering team growth. You'll manage engineers across diverse teams and locations, handle substantial budgets, and coordinate large-scale projects globally.

However, Mark K (ex-Google EM) told us that the day-to-day of your role will vary depending on four factors:

• Project. You could be assigned to a new product that's about to launch, iterating a current product, or working on technology migration. Each has its unique challenges.
• Domain. You could end up working on: infrastructure, Google Cloud Platform, user-facing apps, artificial intelligence, security, data compression, etc. Again, each domain presents unique problems.
• Level. If you're an L6 EM, you'll be a direct line manager for your team. At L7, you're a senior EM and a step removed from the day-to-day concerns of regular engineers.
• Discipline. We're writing this guide assuming you're applying for a software engineering position, but of course, Google needs SRE (Site Reliability Engineer) managers and SET (Software engineers in Test) managers too.

Mark also emphasizes that engineering managers' role in shaping the direction of projects relies heavily on trust in their technical skills. To earn this trust, you need to demonstrate technical expertise by:

• Getting hands-on (e.g., reviewing code, getting stuck in on designing architecture, being on-call)
• Asking critical questions (e.g., how will a proposed design address a specific requirement?)
• Presenting team technical architecture in a concise way to stakeholders

1.2 How much does a Google engineering manager make?

As you’d expect, Google EMs are highly compensated. According to Glassdoor data, they make 66% more than the average EM in the US.

Compensation at Google mainly depends on two key factors: location and level. 

• Location: Salaries are adjusted for cost of living. For example, Google EMs in the US make almost 300% more than their counterparts in India.
• Level: Both base salary and total compensation go up with each manager level.

Note that the EM L5 role at Google is not an external position but more of an internal career track for senior engineers gradually getting into the EM role.  

To be considered for a senior EM role (L7), you'd need around 5+ years of technical leadership experience.

To be a director of engineering (L8+), you need 15+ years in engineering and have experience in leading engineering orgs. 

Compensation packages are always negotiable, even at Google. So if you do get an offer, don’t be afraid to ask for more. Read our Google salary negotiation guide for tips or practice with a salary negotiation expert.

2. Google engineering manager interview process and timeline↑

What's the Google interview process and timeline for the engineering manager role? It usually takes between two and three months and follows the steps below. If you're interviewing at Google Cloud Platform, you can expect a similar process.

Let's take a closer look at each step in the process and how the hiring decision is made.

2.1 Stages in the interview process

2.1.1 Resume screen

First, recruiters will look at your resume and assess if your experience matches the open position. This is the most competitive step; millions of candidates do not make it past this stage.

Read this engineering manager resume guide to see successful examples and tailor your resume to the position you’re targeting. 

And if you’re looking for expert feedback, you can also get input from our team of ex-Google recruiters, who will cover what achievements to focus on (or ignore), how to fine-tune your bullet points, and more.

2.1.2 Recruiter phone screen

The interview process usually starts with a phone screen with the recruiter. They’ll want to check that you meet the basic requirements for the position and stand a chance of getting hired. 

Prepare to answer behavioral and resume questions, “Why Google?” and "Tell me about your current day-to-day as an Engineering Manager." If you’ve applied to a specific domain like ML, expect questions confirming your subdomain/s and other relevant expertise.

If you get past this first HR screen, the recruiter will then help schedule your technical screening. 

2.1.3 Technical screen

According to Alex (ex-Google Sr. EM), the technical screen for the Google EM role most commonly involves system design and Googleyness and Leadership (G&L) questions. Your recruiter decides what type of screen to schedule, so they should be able to let you know what to expect and give materials for prep.

Recently, Alex has observed more instances of technical screens being handled by the future hiring manager for the role or someone from their team. This means Google is already pre-matching candidates to teams, instead of putting them through team matching when they get an offer.

2.1.4 Onsite interviews

If you pass the first-round interview, you’ve made it to the real test: the “onsite” interviews. You'll typically spend a full day at a Google office or do virtual interviews via Google Meet. You’ll undergo five or six 45-minute interviews in total, consisting of:

• Leadership 
• System design 
• Code review

In the past, Google gave EM candidates a choice between coding and code review for one round. But according to Alex, the code review interview is now the default interview for the L6 EM (L7+ don’t get one). Coding may still be offered as an option in some regions, but he has observed that it rarely happens these days.

We’ll dig deeper into the rounds in section 3.

2.2 Hiring decision

Once you’ve gone through the entire interview process, this is how Google makes a hiring decision.

• Interviewers submit feedback. After your onsite interviews, your interviewers will grade your answers and submit their feedback. 
• Hiring committee recommendation. Their feedback will then be submitted to a hiring committee that will review this along with your resume, internal referrals, and any past work you’ve submitted. Then the committee will recommend whether Google should hire you or not. 
• Senior leader review. A senior manager will review and validate the hiring committee's recommendation. 
• Compensation committee recommendation. Once validated, your candidate packet will be sent to a compensation committee, which will decide how much you’ll be offered.
• Final executive review. Finally, a senior Google executive will review a summary of your candidacy and compensation before the offer is sent to you. An offer is only extended for a specific team and open position.
• You get an offer!

3. Google engineering manager example interview questions↑

As we mentioned above, you can expect three types of interviews for an engineering manager role:

• Leadership interviews in which you can expect mainly behavioral questions that assess your past experience and your ability to manage people and projects.
• System design interviews assess your technical knowledge, your thought process, and your knowledge of architecture and scaling.
• Code review interviews assess your code judgment and ability to collaborate with engineers in optimizing their code.

In this section, we'll dig deeper into those three types of interviews to give you a clearer idea of what questions to expect. We'll also provide example questions that you can practice with.

The questions we'll list in the next few sections are real Google EM interview questions that were reported on Glassdoor. We've categorized the questions and changed the grammar and phrasing in some places to make the questions easier to understand.

3.1 Leadership interviews↑

You’ll go through multiple leadership interviews as a Google engineering manager candidate. 

The themes include: Googleyness and leadership, people management, project management, and org leadership. The mix of themes you’ll cover will depend on your level and will be decided by your recruitment team. 

Questions in a leadership interview can take the form of behavioral questions (questions about past experiences) or hypothetical questions (questions about situations you may not have encountered yet).

To ace the leadership interviews, you’ll need to demonstrate strong leadership and management skills and incorporate specific Googleyness signals in your stories. In some cases, you may also get asked to demonstrate AI fluency.

Expert tip: According to Alex (ex-Google Sr. EM), Google rarely asks plain ‘Tell me about a time you handled a conflict’ these days. Instead, conflict is mostly framed as getting buy-in or challenging decisions. So find a story that demonstrates how you handled such situations instead.

Let’s look at some examples.

For tips on how to handle leadership interviews, check out our tech interview primers (prepared with an ex-Google TPM): leadership, people management, and program management. Familiarize yourself with Googleyness by reading our guide.

3.2 System design interviews↑

Google EMs get system design interviews so interviewers can assess if you can design systems within Google’s ecosystems like Search, Gmail, etc., all of which have bn+ monthly active users. 

This is the most crucial technical interview in the process and will likely decide your level, or whether you’ll get an offer at all.

In system design interviews, you'll want to show that you can be creative and structured at the same time. The questions are open-ended and should feel like a conversation. At the managerial level, your interviewer will expect you to lead the discussion. If you’re applying for an L7+ role, you'll get asked about a system you’ve designed in the past.

In most cases, your interviewer will adapt the question to your background. For instance, if you've worked on an API product, they'll ask you to design an API. That won't always be the case, so be ready to design any type of system at a high level.

Expert tip: According to Alex, Google nearly matches the expectations of the EM to the level of SWE. For instance, EM L6 means the bar is at staff SWE for system design interviews.

3.3 Code review interviews↑

The code review interview, like a regular coding interview, will last up to 45 minutes. Your interviewer will give you a code snippet, function, or file on the revamped Google Docs with some syntax highlights. They will ask you to review it like you would in a real work setting. 

“Your aim is to identify potential issues, suggest improvements, and communicate the findings to ensure that issues are caught early in the development cycle,” says Rashmi (Google EM )

You’ll be evaluated on your technical depth, as well as on your communication and collaboration skills. In particular, interviewers will evaluate how Googley you are based on the quality of your comments provided and even your language. 

Expert tip: Don’t just be on the lookout for errors and bugs. Rashmi’s tip is to provide positive feedback for well-written code. It’s another good way to signal Googleyness.

Check our Google code review interview guide to see how the round works. It includes more expert tips, a code review checklist, and a structure for doing a thorough code review. 

4. Interviewing tips ↑

You might be an excellent engineer and a great manager, but unfortunately, that’s not necessarily enough to ace your interviews at Google. Interviewing is a skill in itself that you need to learn. 

Let’s look at some key tips to make sure you approach your interviews in the right way.  

4.1 Ask clarifying questions and check assumptions

Often, the questions you’ll be asked will be ambiguous, so make sure you ask clarifying questions and check that your assumptions are within reason before you proceed.

4.2 Think out loud

Interviewers want to evaluate your thought process, so you’ll need to talk through your solutions during the system design round and when you make improvements during the code review round. 

Talking about your thought process also helps interviewers redirect you or hint at whether you’re in the right direction.

4.3 Get comfortable with ambiguity

More than any other FAANG company, Google will put you in situations that test how comfortable you are with ambiguity. Interviewers will probe your thought process, ask about the options available to you, and the reasons you have for making certain technical choices. Be prepared for a discussion and be open to exploring alternative routes of action.

4.4 Be honest and authentic

Be genuine in your responses. Google interviewers appreciate authenticity and honesty. If asked about a failure, don’t try to hide your mistakes or frame a weakness as a strength. Instead, show what you learned and how you grew from the failure. This helps show intellectual humility and a growth mindset.

"The most compelling candidates talk about a real failure clearly, without defensiveness, with genuine learnings," Christian (ex-Google hiring manager) says.

4.5 Be proud and talk about YOU

This is not the time to be shy about your accomplishments. Highlight your impact, not what "the team" did. Not talking about YOU enough is another common mistake we see with a lot of candidates.

That being said, don’t overstate your impact. Your interviewers are trained to spot this and will surely probe you with multiple follow-up questions. Instead, be honest about your contribution, but don’t forget to go into the nuances of how you got to a particular result.

4.6 Don’t come in with a script

While it’s important to structure your answer so that you can communicate all the important details clearly, coming in with a script is a huge red flag. Google values authenticity, not perfection. 

What’s important is to prepare stories that best demonstrate your Googleyness. Once you have one, you can practice telling them in a way that feels true to you.

4.7 Center on Google’s values

Know that you’ll be evaluated on your Googleyness (culture match) at every stage of the interview.

Familiarize yourself with Google’s core values and philosophy and align your behavioral responses with them. Google values certain attributes such as passion for technology, collaboration, and focus on the user.

Watch this video with ex-Google hiring manager Christian, where he explains how you can demonstrate Googleyness in interviews.

5. How to prepare for your Google engineering manager interview↑

Now that you know what to expect, let’s talk about how you can prepare.

Below, you’ll find links to free resources and a 4-step plan to help you prepare for your Google EM interview rounds.

5.1 Learn about Google's culture

Most candidates fail to do this. But before investing tens of hours preparing for an interview at Google, you should take some time to make sure it's the right company for you.

Google is prestigious, and it's tempting to assume you should apply without considering things more carefully. But it's important to remember that the prestige of a job (by itself) won't make you happy in your day-to-day work. It's the type of work and the people you work with that will.

If you know any engineers who work at Google (or used to), then it's a good idea to talk to them to understand what the culture is like. In addition, we would recommend reading the following resources:

• Google's mission statement (by Google)
• Google's values (by Google)
• Google research (by Google)
• Google’s engineering culture (by The Pragmatic Engineer)
• Google strategy teardown (by CBS Insights)

5.2 Learn and practice by yourself

Google EM interviews place heavy emphasis on technical leadership and system design skills. To walk through all your onsite rounds confidently, you’ll want to build strong interview habits. An effective way to achieve this is to practice structuring your answers with the appropriate framework.

Click on any of the guides below for a deep dive into each relevant interview topic. Each includes expert insights, recommended answer frameworks, and sample answers:

• Google interview process
• Googleyness and leadership interview
• Leadership primer for tech interviews
• People management primer for tech interviews
• Project/program management primer for tech interviews
• Grokking the engineering management leadership interview
• Google system design interview
• System design interview
• Staff system design interview
• Google code review interview

Interviewing for an EM role at another company? You may also want to check out our other company-specific EM interview guides:

• Microsoft engineering manager interview guide
• Apple engineering manager interview guide
• Meta engineering manager interview guide
• Netflix engineering manager interview guide
• DoorDash engineering manager interview guide
• Uber engineering manager interview guide
• Anthropic engineering manager interview guide
• Stripe engineering manager interview guide

The IGotAnOffer Engineering channel has tons of mock interviews with interview experts. Watch a few mock videos to see what a great answer looks like.

Then, when you’re ready, practice answering questions out loud. Doing so can significantly improve the way you communicate during an interview. 

5.3 Practice with peers

Practicing by yourself helps but does have its limitations. You can’t simulate the pressure of a real interview. You can’t practice answering unexpected follow-up questions or get feedback.

If you have friends or peers who can do mock interviews with you, that's an option worth trying. It’s free, but be warned, you may come up against the following problems:

• It’s hard to know if the feedback you get is accurate
• They’re unlikely to have insider knowledge of interviews at your target company
• On peer platforms, people often waste your time by not showing up

For those reasons, many candidates skip peer mock interviews and go straight to mock interviews with an expert.

5.4 Practice with experienced engineering manager interviewers

In our experience, practicing real interviews with experts who can give you company-specific feedback makes a huge difference.

Find a Google engineering manager interview coach so you can:

• Test yourself under real interview conditions
• Get accurate feedback from a real expert
• Build your confidence
• Get company-specific insights
• Learn how to tell the right stories, better.
• Save time by focusing your preparation

Landing a job at a big tech company often results in a $50,000 per year or more increase in total compensation. In our experience, three or four coaching sessions worth ~$500 make a significant difference in your ability to land the job. That’s an ROI of 100x!