Presales Interview Questions

1. Define Executive Summary in a RFP: What points you cover in this section? What is the word limit to it?

Tips: It is brief descriptions of the problem /objective and how our organization can help you achieve you goal and get rid of your problem, it will give background information, brief analysis and main conclusions. it is most important part of the RFP and will cover gist of the document. 

You generally get this information by sales lead, Account manager, Business manager or all of them contribute their share in making it impactful. We generally concise the word limit to 500 max. 

2. Define your Approach/Methodology in a RFP.

Tips: It’s solution Architect’s choice which approach he will follow considering the scope of work. I follow an approach that has entire scope of work followed by solution of every specification with its requirements. We generally include Project Timelines along with every phase or milestones based on different frameworks like waterfall, Lean, SCRUM etc.

For e.g. I generally include below workflow on high level.

• Requirements
• Solution
• Timelines
• Assumptions and Dependencies
• Cost
• Deliverables

3. What all tools you use for costing? Can you give example of any costing you have done in last few deals?

Tips: Generally Microsoft Excel is used for costing but in many organization they have excel based tools  to fix the contingency , margin , other cost  associated with finance to pop out the final pricing.  

4. SDLC – Which one is better Iterative/Waterfall/Lean/Scrum?

Tips: For proposing a tentative timelines, phases and project delivery, Solution Architects always follow an Agile framework in their solution approach. Majorly these frameworks are designed for application development but these days SA’s use these models largely in managing any projects.

Waterfall Framework –  It is traditional approach in which you follow step by step in phases. First complete one phase before moving on to the next phase.

Lean Framework – In this model we follow features/Stages as milestone in project. We plan, build, test and deploy one feature before you do it for next feature.

Scrum Framework – In Scrum Model we need to plan, build, test and Deploy on delivering fully-tested, independent, valuable, small features /stages. 

5. What is your contribution in any RFP?

Tips: Generally, Solution Architects work on many section like:

• Requirement response/ Solution
• Scope of work
• Solution Approach
• Risk and Mitigation
• Governance Model
• Assumptions
• Cost
• Pricing
• Service Levels Assumptions (SLA)

 My contribution for any RFP cover all these areas.

Suggestion: Tell specific contributions that you generally do it for RFPs in your organisation. 

6. Please explain how will you propose ROI in RFP for infrastructure outsourcing?

Tips: ROI means Return on Investment. It is a term that is used to measure performance and cost.  As I have mentioned in all my articles, Solution Architect needs to have a blend of technical and sales skills so that they can work a solution and showcase ROI to the client. It’s all about how you can convince the CTO/CEO and other stakeholders to invest in your project.  We can achieve ROI by re-architecting or redesigning your existing solution that will reduce the existing human’s efforts, Time, and TCO. Let’s take an example.

For example: Suppose we have 1000 database server that needs to be refreshed with new hardware because they are approaching end of life. We can propose database consolidation, Cloud or SaaS to reduce the number of servers from 1000 to 500 based on their potential candidature to qualify for consolidation. Further we can apply Automation to reduce the repetitive tasks that will reduce the total human effort. This way customer need to invest in on-premise to cloud migration with some  one time cost and within 6 months there will be visible ROI in monthly maintenance of services because we have already reduced total no of servers.

7. Explain Onsite Offshore Model in IT industry?

Tips: The Onshore /offshore model is based on client requirement and SA proposed solution. This model is a mixture of onsite, offsite resources. The blend of onsite-offsite of resources provide the cost-effectiveness of the offshore model along with client representation at the onshore. The onsite resources fill in the crucial communication gaps and safeguard projects’ escalations if any.  The hybrid Onsite-offshore model, are very cost effective and popular in IT industry.

8. Please elaborate “Table of contents” for any RFP?

Tips: For any RFI and RFP document building” Table of content” is one of the most important part. It’s always a discrete approach followed by solution architect how he or she prefer to design their response. However, in some cases client RFI and RFP clearly state the response document and strictly define the format, table of content and response which has to be followed by SA’s.

In general Table of content covers the following area:

• Executive Summary
• Company Portfolio
• Competitive Advantage
• Requirement response/ Solution
• Scope of work
• Solution Approach
• Risk and Mitigation
• Governance Model
• Assumptions
• Cost
• Pricing
• Service Levels Assumptions (SLA)
• Appendix

9. Have you been part of Bid Complexity process? What’s was your role?

Tips: It is a team work, all organization spends lots of their energy in Analyzing the contract, the bid process, the margins, the profit and how they have competitive advantage with other bidders. The process is complex as a SA pays a pivotal role and providing optimum price for the contract. The Bid optimization covers rigorous efforts between margins and actual cost and the specified work.

Suggestions: Being in solution architect role I would discuss pricing with all stakeholders (Delivery, Sales , Bid manager , SA’s and Technical Architects )“How can we be more competitive with Margins” and based on our analysis we conclude or bid. Below are the questions which we discuss:

• Are we getting reasonable profit post being competitive?
• If being competitive and we lost money on the initial contract can we assume high possibility of getting follow on work with considerable amount of profit?
• If being into Business (initial contract) with no margin will increase our chances to eliminate other bidders from any associated contract?
• To bid or Not to bid? How it changes the probability of getting future deals?

10. How will you differentiate between Team Structure and Governance Model?

Tips: 

Team Structure – In Organization employees are structured in different projects and category. The set of employees who will work on project together are essentially called as a Team. Based on their respective responsibilities the Team is structured to perform individual task.

Governance Model – Governance Model define power and its accountability in governing or management roles in an organization. The Model designate operatives who will set rules, procedures, and other informational guidelines. In addition, governance frameworks define, guide, and provide for enforcement of these processes.

11. Difference between Incident and Problem in terms of ITIL framework?

Tips: An Incident is an event which could lead disruption of the services or Business.

Any problem which occur during Business Hours is considered as an Incident (ITIL Def.). A problem is the original cause that leads to an incident. For e.g. A website URL is not reachable as Database is down. This issue will be raised as in incident as it has disrupted the Business.

The actual root cause of problem was space issue in database. A problem may be something that could lead to the same incident occurring again, or lead to another incident entirely. A problem is the original cause that leads to an incident. For e.g. During maintenance hours due to some problem database was down, but it did not cause any service disruption hence it was just a problem that needed to be fixed.

12. What is the difference between RFI and RFP?

Tips: Please read my attached article to learn about RFI and RFP.

• Difference between RFI and RFP

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Read More:

• Learn Presales Management in IT Solutions
• Is Presales a Good Career Opportunity in IT?
• Presales Interview Questions & Answers – Part 1

The post IT Presales Interview Questions & Answers – Part 2 appeared first on Techyaz.com.

Typically, presales means prepare yourself before selling your services or products. It is imperative to understand pre-sales consultants are technical person who fully understand the domain he or she decided to represent or work upon. However, in most of the cases these consultants choose their domain based on their experience for e.g. Infra Consultant, Platform consultant, product consultant, software consultant in cloud (IaaS, PaaS & SaaS).

As the name pre-sales suggest preparing yourself to present, respond and demonstrate your services in smartest way to win deal for your organization. Essentially Sales and Presales consultant work very closely for any Request for Information (RFI) and Request for Proposal (RFP). Refer to my article on for additional information on RFI and RFP.

• Is Presales a Good Career Opportunity in IT/ITeS? 
• IT Presales Interview Questions & Answers – Part 2

Presales Interview Questions

Question 1 – The very first question in any presales interview will always be “Tell me about yourself”?

Answer: As you introduce yourself to the interviewer you need to understand he/she wish to know lesser about you more about your profile and how you can fulfil their requirements.

Tips:

• Start with your introduction and try rapping it up in a minute.
• In Introduction give brief about your educational qualification.
• Precise introductions about your overall experience in industry or as mentioned in your CV.
• Give 2 minutes to talk about your relevant experience in pre-sales how it started and how you have grown up in this role as a consultant.
• Rap up on positive attitude about your hobbies or interest.

Question 2 – Tell me about your current role in your organization as a presales resource?

Answer: There are many roles in Presales consulting, you need to be specify and talk about your role. You must ensure you choose wisely the profile you mention as it will decide the course of interview session.

• Deal Managers (Could be different abbreviations in your firm)
• Finance Operative (Could be different abbreviations in your firm)
• Solution Architect
• Technical Architect
• Sales Consultant
• Legal Consultants

Tips:

1. Explain your role as a solution Architect and in what stage you get involved.
2. Explain what kinds of deals you have handled so far and you can provide generic details about the deal Size (Number of FTE’s), total deal cost and domains involved but remember never to mention the client name as you need to ensure Data Privacy norms.

Question 3 – What all area you cover in deal scope (e.g. Infra, Software, help desk, support or overall deal)?

Answer: Consider below points while answering this type of questions.

• Here you need to choose the best technical domain of yours and then brief about the same.
• All Scope of work or service catalog of your technical domain or you could provide solution in a deal.
• Explain how you gather the client requirement and how you planned a solution
• Brief on documents you prepared for the solutions. 

Question 4 – Tell me something about your projects, deals which you have worked upon?

Answer: Explain about your past projects where you have contributed as Presales Consultant. Explain your part of contribution.

Tips:

• Brief descriptions on overall experience on projects as per your CV.
• Brief on Distinct deals you handled during the tenure of your service as a presales consultant. 

Question 5 –  What was your role in projects or deals you have worked upon?

Answer: Specify your role as a Solution Architect or whatever suits your profile as described below along with some of your contributions to the deals.

• Deal Managers (Could be different name in your firm)
• Finance Operative (Could be different name in your firm)
• Solution Architect
• Technical Architect
• Sales Consultant
• Legal Consultants 

Questions 6 – What’s all frameworks have you worked upon?

Answer: This is very important question and need to be answered carefully with full knowledge of framework you decided to speak on. See below few frameworks for e.g.

• ITIL
• COBIT

Question 7 – Have you ever designed an operating model for Level 1 Support / Help Desk? Provide a brief description of the same?

Answer: Consider below points while answering this question.

Tips:

• As in presales each client comes with their own set of requirements hence every deal needs different operating model.
• Prepare in advance your well versed operating model which you can explain in few minutes. It should be easy, short and quick to explain best is L1, L2 support or Help desk. You can explain the onsite off shore model here.

Question 10 – How good are you with Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Project, MS Word and Power point?

Answer: Be honest and answer whatever knowledge you have about these applications.

Tips:

• You can rate your skills on the scale of 10 based on your expertise. These are much needed skills in presales so you can say you are well versed with these software’s.
• You can name excel functions for e.g. v-look up, If and else statements, Sum, Average, count, password protection etc.

Question 11- How will you manage Shortfuse deals?

Answer – Shortfuse deals are the ones with short deadline to submit solution. You can take any example where you got < 2 days for providing solution, getting approval, costing etc. and describe its challenges and how did you overcome it. Explain how you planned it.

Example/Tips:

• Get all stakeholders on call to gather requirement / scope and provide solution in power point.
• Send solution deck to all stake holders for approval and suggestions.
• Inform the Finance team in advance about costing request.
• Onboard delivery team to participate in solution approval and cost drill down exercise.
• Divide submission documents among other stake holders to finish the docs on time.
• All documents should be versioned and kept on SharePoint repository and Quick follow calls twice /thrice a day should be scheduled to wind up the short fuse deal on time.

All the above steps will allow you to manage short fuse deals but onboarding stake holders, Quick follow-up calls and Team work is mandatory for successful submission and win.

Question 12– Have you ever presented to client/Client Orals?

Answer: Share your experience by picking any relevant deal where you presented your solution.

Tips:

• Talk about you preparatory work.
• Then describe the audience and Presentation challenges.
• Explain how your presentation provided a positive impact.

Question 13 – Did ever presented to CTO’s or CEO what was your preparation?

Answer: Share your experience if you have ever presented any solution to CTO/CEO.

Tips:

• Talk about you preparatory work.
• Explain how your presentation provided a positive impact.

Questions 14 – Did you ever analyze the lost deals and prepared report for the same and shared with all stakeholders?

Answer:  Yes, every firms do root cause analyses of lost deals. There is various factor which we analyze. Some of the factors are given below.

• Less competitive pricing
• RTO & RPO was not presented
• Lack of experience in domain
• Solution provided was not cost effective
• Solution not fit to the Client requirement

Question 15 – How good are you in handling pressure?

Answer: I hardly feel pressure as presales is my passion and don’t feel weight about it. I get excited about the dynamic which presales brings in my life. I believe if we have technical knowledge with blend of confidence and motivation there is no pressure which can oppress us. 

Question 16 – How did you manage escalation for a short fuse deal?

Answer: The Short fuse deal comes with pressure and panic among all which could lend us to escalation in some cases. However, if I decided to take responsibility I ensure I complete it and I have hardly faced any major escalation in my tenure. I always plan my work in 3-way process.

1. Acknowledge the responsibility / Area of scope which I can provide solution with timelines
2. Address the concern of Sales and delivers teams in my area of scope
3. Timely sending the progress report to stake holders to avoid panic and escalations. 

Question 17 – What all certification have you done on Solution Architect?

Answer: Answer about your certifications or trainings you have done to learn presales role.

Tips:

It’s not mandatory to have Solution Architect certification however if someone wishes to excel in the same. BCS Intermediate level certificate is there or either TOGAF 8 or TOGAF 9 level 2 certificate could be useful.

Question 18 – Do you have any experience in Upsell?

Answer: In case you have any experience, you can talk about it.

Tips:

Basically, in this question you can showcase your sales skills. How did you analyze client requirement and able to convince them to buy proposed solution to solve their concerns. 

Question 19 –  what was your role post you won the deal?

Answer: You can explain about your role post winning the deal and tell about till what stage you were involved.

Tips:

• SOW (scope of work)
• Final contract
• Project Initiation
• Handover to delivery  

Question 20 – How good are you in preparing SOW and what all you cover in the same?

Answer: You can define scope of work providing few major headings below.

• Scope of services
• Cover client requirement
• Terms and condition
• Final deliverables
• Sign off procedure
• Any legal contractual terms and conditions/Governance
• RACI Matrix
• Assumptions & Key Dependencies
• Termination/Exit Plan

Questions 21 – How comfortable are you with travelling on short notice?

Answer: I am comfortable in travelling considering the fact presales /Sales is a Travel job. 

Question 22 – How many deals you can handle in parallel?

Answer: I can work on 3-5 deals in parallel depending on the size of the deal.

Tips:

It is imperative that you speak truth in this question. As it’s like commitment so unrealistic figure can get you in trouble. With Presales as carrier 3 deal at a time is Business as usual so Be Honest here. 

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Related Article:

• Presales Interview Questions & Answers – Part 1
• IT Presales Interview Questions & Answers – Part 2

What is Presales in IT?

Pre-sales team work hard to accomplish the client requirement which includes Solutioning, Costing, Resourcing, Presentation etc. There are dedicated, passionate and Technical Presales resources behind every deal won by any organization.

These days Presales has been providing very fascinating and promising career prospects in IT/ITes. Maximum beginners are not aware of this career option. It’s not mandate to be an MBA for starting your career as presales consultant but it’s always an added advantage.

Presales resources are individual contributor and work closely with sales teams. The focus of Presales job profile is essentially in gathering requirement, running feasibility checks, design and build solutions.

Effective career as pre-sales consultant is a blend of technology and finance, as an Individual contributor this team is part of CoE (Center of excellence) in many organization.The basic job of pre-sales folks is to understand client requirement from a business standpoint is significant and then leveraging your writing, presenting and designing skills to stich the solution into a proposal.

The nature of the job is so dynamic that every Request for Information (RFI), Request for proposal (RFP) comes with new challenges and set of prerequisite, so need humans to analyze and manage the client requirement. Hence the presales job cannot be automated or done by robots but there is always a scope of automation that can be done at process or task level.

Presales Job Responsibilities

The benefits Pre-Sales resources get in front of client is that they can show actual expertise on the products or solutions they sell. Below are the list of responsibilities an organization expects from a Presales resource:

• Main responsibilities of Pre-Sales executives are to design a cost effective and competent solution that captures client requirement. Showcase your company achievements, experience and position in providing best quality service.
• A Presales consultant need to present customer finest solution which covers their need and future aspects considering market trend and forecast.
• Sales executives generally don’t have the forte in solution, hence Presales Team needs to be vigilant in designing solution which fulfill client requirement as well as  be cost effective and bring profit to their organization. It’s not just about winning deal it’s more about increasing company revenue.
• Presales consultant mostly need to be assertive for a constructive conflict with sales and delivery team both, and at times in some exceptional cases with the customer as well.
• The Pre-Sales must have good content writing skills.
• Presales accountability should be taken very serious as final scope of work(SOW) gets documented by Presales guys that becomes Bible for delivery and customer teams.

Read below article If you are preparing for a Presales Job Interview.

• Presales Interview Questions & Answers

Understanding Terminology used in Pre-Sales

Request for Information (RFI)

This is the first stage of any deal. Many Organization release RFI to understand their vendor eligibility to fulfill their project/deal/job requirement. In RFI documents client/customer may ask any of the following information to decide the eligibility criteria:

1. Technical expertise
2. Financial history
3. Overall User base
4. Credentials
5. Artefacts
6. Certifications
7. Technical Questionnaire
8. Legalities
9. Regional constraints
10. Strategy
11. Best possible Recommendation based on client requirement

It’s Presales Team who respond to RFI’s and make your organization eligible to bid for RFP’s. RFI’s response need to be crisp and to the point so that customer shortlist your company for next stage of bidding which is called Request for proposal (RFP)

Request for Proposal (RFP)

Once client will shortlist your organization during RFI process, you will be qualified for this stage known as Request for Proposal (RFP). Any company who wishes to hire/outsource/contract any piece of job/activity/project leveraging different vendors in market release their requirement in the form of RFP. The RFP contain all information related to client requirement such as:

1. Eligibility criteria for vendors
2. Submission dates
3. Client Requirements
4. Selection procedure
5. Confidentiality, Legal Terms and Conditions
6. Regional constraint
7. Quotations request details
8. Presentation request
9. Submission doc type in word document or Powerpoint presentation

Post successful bidding client will declare the deal Winner and as a final stage of process SOW needs to be signed between the customer and the successful Vendor who had won the deal.

Solutioning

Analyzing client requirement for a deal/job/project/contract to enhance client business so that they can meet market demands, equipped with latest trend & technology. The IT/third party/vendors /outsourcings firms provide optimal, cost effective resolution/ products/services to solve the concerns/hurdles of client. Presales resources analyze client requirements and convert that requirement in to best possible solution. They plan, design and build a layout document or powerpoint presentation to showcase the solution. Solutioning comes under RFP stage.

Costing

Every Deal/project/RFP have some budget. As per the type of deal client ask for quotes to deliver project in certain duration. The outsourcing company will provide cost for the job/activity in which the project would be completed. This includes complete budget plus margin to recover company expenses. Costing is part of RFP stage.

Costing includes the following:

• Travel expenses
• Asset procurement
• Software License cost
• Resources
• Any Trainings
• Governance

Sizing

Sizing means number of resources required to finish the project/job/activity. Sizing is the most crucial part of Pre-Sales, you must identify number of FTE (Full Time Employees) needed for respective technology, their tenure, total numbers and their Trainings need to finish the project on deadlines. In some cases, it also includes additional time for KT (Knowledge Transfer) and Reverse KT if needed.

Governance

For any deal/project/job there is a need of governance layer, who can manage any client escalation, communication along with entire project delivery management. The Governance layers will always be shared resources as they can manage multiple projects at one time. There could be some dedicated project managers depending upon the deal size and complexity.

Scope of Work (SOW)

Final stage of bidding for any contract/outsourcing/project is signing SOW. SOW is detailed document that clearly defines the following

1. Roles and Responsibility between the client and the Vendor
2. Details project plan
3. Project timelines
4. Terms and Condition (Legal)
5. Knowledge transfer plan
6. Project kick off dates
7. Travel plan If any
8. Governance
9. Contract signed as mutually agreed between partner and client

Presales Technical Skills Requirement

Person should have very good knowledge about overall IT infrastructure architecture or about your vertical. Apart from this you should have:

• Domain knowledge
• Ability to understand Client Requirement
• Content writing
• Good communication & presentation skills
• Good Knowledge of Microsoft Office (PowerPoint, Visio, Excel & word)

Presales Training Courses

We live in Internet age so we have lot of options to learn any technology on Internet. These days you don’t need to buy a physical book to learn anything. You can get lot of study materials available over internet that will be helpful to learn any subject.

Udemy is one of the website that promotes digital learning. They have more than 40000 online video courses that anybody can use to learn as per their interest. I have also found one of the very good Presales course on Udemy. You can click on below link to directly access this course.

• Online Training Course on Presales Management – IT Solutions & Service Providers

Who should join Presales?

Presales is very promising field with lucrative remuneration and appreciation from management. You will help generating new business for your organization which will give you all the attention needed. Considering the above-mentioned facts if you really decided to join presales it’s important to be focus on below mentioned points:

• Passionate about Technology to pursue presales as career
• Good listener and reminisce it
• Can work under pressure as mostly they had to deal with short fused deals
• Can deal and manage communication with diverse workforce
• Decent content writer is essential part of presales
• Continuous Skill development and Sound knowledge of emerging trends and technology is must
• Decent knowledge on Costing and Finances
• An Assertive leader to deal with delivery teams
• Positive Attitude to manage success and failure graciously.
• Virtuous negotiator

Who should NOT join Presales?

Presales job will come with lots of responsibility and challenges. If you don’t like new change every day than you may not like the dynamic presales filed. The nature of this job is high pressure on delivering right solution at right time. It’s very crucial how you deal with win and miss deals. So please consider below facts before thinking of presales as career option:

1. Don’t like Dynamic job with multiple skills
2. Don’t enjoy working under pressure
3. Don’t enjoy Writing & making Powerpoint presentations
4. Don’t like sudden change
5. Don’t like travel
6. Don’t enjoy long hours calls
7. Casual Attitude

Experience needed to become Solution Architect (SA) in IT?

Generally, 5+ years in IT industry which includes domain knowledge of at least 2 years. Multi-skills and good learners’ folks can enjoy this challenging role that will give you lucrative salary and Bonus along with recognition among all teams and higher management.  You can consider Presales as your career option if you have all above mentioned skills and qualities.

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