I reached the first round interview for a Principal Product Manager role. Yelp tests your product sense and your ability to handle ambiguity, so they want to see how you handle this with structured thinking. First, I get on the video call and the interviewer looked like he had just rolled out of bed. He seemed disengaged, unaffected, arrogant, and that he wanted to just go through the motions and tick the box that he interviewed a candidate. Personally, with all the unachievable interviewing demands these days of being a superhero, this person was a horrible representative of Yelp and did not represent Yelp's company values. He had an aura of someone who was miserable working at Yelp; I wouldn't be surprised if he is leaving Yelp in the next few months or gets fired. I tried several times of breaking the ice, but he wouldn't impart any human emotion. I get that maybe this could be a ploy to make the interview more challenging, so I moved on aware that most likely, he already made up his mind about me. I received the case study and frankly, it was so out of scope for what I had anticipated, but I stuck to the structured approach and logical flow they shared with me in the prep doc. In hindsight I could have done much better in the real world where I didn't have the pressure of the video call, the lights, trying to engage the viewer, etc. I do my best and deepest thinking alone and I've earned the reputation for being a critical and creative thinker with all the jobs I've had. I get it though, Yelp and Google, who have the same structured format, want to see how you react in spontaneous situations, in front of execs, for example, so you have to display quick thinking skills. I those scenarios I thrive and can do it, but in this particular interview, I wish I had followed the same logical process I would follow in real life. This interviewer was also in a completely separate group and I had prepared questions related to the role in the group I was interviewing for. He admitted he had nothing to do with that group which was frustrating. My experience and skills are a great match for this role and this interview was incredibly disappointing. My interaction with the interviewer does not reflect my abilities at all nor does the case study format reflect real world scenarios. I can see the case study working in a class format but if you want to get a realistic perspective of how the candidate really operates, then allow the candidate to present their product journey for one of their products and put the ownness on the interviewer to ask tough questions.