Technical practice
How would you align a Data or AI project with broader business and IT programs?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Explain how you would establish the intended business outcome, identify related programs and agree on decision-makers. Address how you would handle a conflict between a project goal and a wider program priority.
How would you turn business and technology priorities into a delivery plan?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Describe how you would define deliverables, milestones, timelines and owners with the relevant teams. Explain how you would make assumptions and dependencies visible before committing to dates.
How would you manage dependencies between parallel workstreams?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Discuss how you would track handoffs and sequence Data and AI deliverables within a wider program plan. Cover what you would do when one workstream slips and affects others.
How would you coordinate AI specialists, data teams, IT, business stakeholders and external partners?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Explain how you would clarify responsibilities, decisions and handoffs without assuming every team works the same way. Address how you would resolve an ownership gap that stalls delivery.
How would you manage a project budget and limited resources?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Describe how you would compare planned and actual use of budget and people against upcoming milestones. Explain the trade-offs you would present if capacity could not support every requested deliverable.
How would you distinguish and manage a project risk, issue and dependency?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Define each in practical delivery terms, then explain how you would assign an owner, track a response and escalate when needed. Keep the example tied to a cross-functional Data or AI initiative rather than an assumed WSA project.
How would you report progress and delivery expectations across functions and regions?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Explain how you would communicate milestones, decisions, risks and changes in expectations to audiences with different needs. Address how you would report uncertainty without obscuring its effect on delivery.
How would you plan for business adoption after implementation?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Describe how you would involve business stakeholders before release and establish what they need to use the deliverable. Explain how feedback after implementation could inform the remaining project plan.
How would you evaluate whether a Data or AI initiative achieved a business outcome?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Propose agreeing on an intended outcome and a practical measure with stakeholders at the start, then comparing results with that baseline. Distinguish completing a deliverable from its adoption and business effect; these are suggested evaluation approaches, not stated WSA measures.
What should a project manager understand about LLMs, AI agents and RAG?
What to coverSuggested preparation: Explain these concepts at a foundational level and how their differences could affect planning discussions with AI specialists. For example, consider what information a RAG approach needs and what additional steps an agent might take, without claiming the role requires designing either system.
Behavioural practice
Tell me about a time competing priorities threatened a deadline.
What to coverSuggested preparation: Give the situation and the competing demands, then describe how you agreed on a practical priority or trade-off. State the result, including any change to scope or timing.
Tell me about a time you coordinated stakeholders across functions or regions.
What to coverSuggested preparation: Set out the situation and why the groups needed to work together. Describe your communication and coordination actions, then explain the effect on decisions or delivery.
Tell me about a time you resolved a problem between interdependent teams.
What to coverSuggested preparation: Describe the delivery blockage and each team's role without assigning blame. Explain how you established ownership or a workable handoff, and what happened afterward.
Tell me about a time you helped people adopt a delivered change.
What to coverSuggested preparation: Explain the situation, who needed to use the change and what stood in their way. Describe your actions with stakeholders and the observable result, distinguishing launch from actual use.
Tell me about a time you had to communicate an emerging delivery risk.
What to coverSuggested preparation: Describe when you identified the risk, whom it affected and how you communicated its likely impact and options. Explain the decision or action that followed and the outcome.