Patterson Companies Interview Questions
& Process

I did a phone screen and then a virtual interview. The virtual interview was very unprofessional. The night before, I got an email saying I wasn't selected, but I still attended. It was supposed to be with two people, but one didn't show up, and the other barely appeared on camera. The interview felt like a joke and a waste of my time. Super disappointing and unprofessional.

So I withdrew from the interview process before getting an offer. It started off pretty standard, first a recruiter call, then a chat with the hiring manager. Then there were two panel interviews, each with two interviewers. The questions were pretty standard for a PM role, asking about how I handle stakeholders, tough situations, and failures. Funny thing, one of the panelists, the president, missed the first interview, but it went on without him. I had another panel interview the next day. The people in the panels were great, really engaged and asked good questions, and gave thoughtful answers to my questions. After two business days with no update, I checked in to see if it was over or if more interviews were coming. I was told everything was finished and I'd get a call with a decision on a certain date. That same day, after work, I got emails from both the recruiter and the president who missed the first interview. The president didn't apologize for missing, he just asked if I could meet early the next morning or afternoon. The recruiter did apologize for his earlier email about my progress and said I was done after this makeup interview. During that makeup interview with the president, he mentioned there 'might be more people looking to do last minute interviews' but that I should be 'excited because that means I'm moving through the process.' He also didn't apologize for missing the earlier call. And sure enough, about an hour later, the recruiter emailed saying the VP of product wanted to meet with finalists to make a decision, asking if I could meet that afternoon or the next afternoon because they wanted to decide before the weekend. This kind of last-minute stuff made me withdraw. After explaining to the recruiter why I was withdrawing, the president did send an email apologizing for not representing the organization well.

I went through 4 interviews for the Product Owner role. First was the recruiter screen, which was fine. Then I interviewed with the hiring manager who was impressed and said I was moving to a panel interview. The next interview was supposed to be the 'final' one, and the recruiter checked if I had other offers to ensure their timing was right. But when I joined the third interview, it was just one person who was quite negative and confrontational, with a completely different understanding of the Product Owner role and its required expertise. After that, I was asked for yet another interview because the intended panel participant couldn't make it. This fourth interview also focused heavily on technical skills, which made me question their understanding of the Product Owner's function. They took a couple of weeks to get back to me and then informed me I didn't get the job.

I met with the service manager and operations manager at the company's location. We had the interview in a small conference room. It felt professional and the atmosphere was good. They asked about my willingness to travel locally, though the travel involved isn't strictly local.