The interview process at Mastercard was structured and insightful. It began with a recruiter call that focused on aligning my skillset with the role while providing valuable insights into Mastercard's culture, team dynamics, compensation, and benefits. The next round was with the hiring manager, where the questions were more process-oriented rather than strictly behavioral. The focus was on goal planning, collaboration, communication, and understanding how I approach cross-functional work. The final stage was a panel interview with the Engineering Director, Product Director, and Lead TPM. This round was more rigorous, featuring real-world Mastercard scenarios and behavioral questions that tested situational thinking, problem-solving, and alignment with Mastercard's principles.

Read all for my interesting experience. 1. Recruiter called to say technical screen would be scheduled. She talked about one interviewer, but two 45-minute technical screens were scheduled. The original interviewer did not recognize the name of the second interviewer (so not sure why 2nd was relevant to the process). 2. The job description did not mention Agile or program methodologies/tools. Recruiter said hiring manager was looking for strong soft skills. The second interviewer mentioned above was an Agile screener - looking for program experience dealing with Agile, Scrum, tech stack, tech architecture and SW development. Talked to an actual MC employee who said groups in MC have varying degrees of Agile maturity. 3. Original interviewer (who was moving to another role) gave a full description of the job. The "program manager" scope in the JD was about 15% of the role. The rest had to do with operational, day to day activities that are typically not part of a program manager's scope. 4. Additional interviewer had about 20 minutes for questions. After the first question, interviewer cut off by saying I was a mismatch for the role and ended the interview. Felt very disrespected and surprised I wasn't given the full time for questions. Now, this interviewer was the second added interviewer above - who was NOT the hiring manager, was screening for Agile (not indicated in JD), and who was unknown to the original interviewer.