How to Answer: What is your experience in handling multiple projects simultaneously? How many is too many?
Advice and answer examples written specifically for a Marketing Project Manager job interview.
3. What is your experience in handling multiple projects simultaneously? How many is too many?
How to Answer
With this question, the interviewer is assessing two things: how much experience you have in managing a portfolio of projects, and how well you can gauge your own bandwidth when it comes to the volume of work. Because projects can vary in terms of timeline and scale, base your answer on how much you think you can do within a day or week. Another element you may want to touch on is your ability to say no to projects when you know the quality of your work could be compromised.
Written by M Cheryl Harkins on July 26th, 2021
Answer Example
"Managing multiple projects at once is an everyday expectation for me. I don't think there's a hard-and-fast number to say 'too many' but projects often vary in terms of how much resources they take up versus their impact revenue. For example, I could be assigned a project that's scheduled to run for six months and requires just a two-person team. That would probably take me less than an hour a day to manage, even less. However, say I'm managing a high-value project that's due in two months. That could mean more than double in terms of resources, whether that's labor hours, quality monitoring, or similar aspects. I would need to dedicate a lot of hours in a day to that type of project. If I foresee any issues with allocating enough time to manage my projects, I'll be sure to delegate what I can and refuse new projects if absolutely necessary."
Written by M Cheryl Harkins on July 26th, 2021