Demo Interviews

Why Are Demos Important?

For an SA, the demo is one of the most important points in the sales process.

Demoing the proposed solution gives the SA a chance to showcase the power of the product in a personalized way that integrates the insight unearthed during discovery.

Because effective demos are critical to the day-to-day of solutions architecture, many companies ask interviewees to perform a mock demo at some point during the panel interview. Later in this lesson, we'll give you a framework to follow for acing interview demos.

Let’s assume that we’re a Solutions Architect at Databricks, demoing the Databricks solution to a potential new client.

Tip: Watch a Sr. Solutions Architect @ Salesforce demo Snowflake for a banking client here.

Interviewers Look For

Demo interviews are a unique opportunity for interviewers to assess on-the-job ability. Ultimately, they're looking for you to demonstrate the entire core SA skillset. That is:

• Concise and clear presentation / communication skills: The demo must have a clear storyline that is aligned with solving a prospect’s problem.
• Ability to handle difficult questions / situations: It is impossible to know everything about a product. Interviewers typically also look for how an SA handles difficult questions, especially those where they don’t know the answer.
• Staying on track: A demo aims to touch high-level capabilities of the product in the context of the prospect's problem. It is not a deep dive into every possible area and does not aim to showcase all possible functionalities of the product.

How to Ace Demo Interviews

Concise and Clear Presentation/Communication Skills

Ensure that you have a clear storyline focused on the customer problem and leave enough time for questions at the end. If you are expected to demo a product for 1 hour, assume about 30 minutes for the actual demo, 15 minutes for diversions during the call, and 15 mins for Q&A.

Ability to Handle Difficult Questions

While an SA is not expected to know the answer to everything, you'll need to be able to articulate why the feature you're demoing is important for the customer. This includes preparing for expected follow-up questions at the end.

For example, the customer might ask: “What are the ML algorithms that Databricks supports out-of-the-box?” While an SA might know all of the algorithms, it is important to ask the customer if he/she has any preference for a particular algorithm and what is he/she currently using. This ensures that when a SA comes back with an answer, the answer can be tailored to the prospect’s specific requirement.

It's also critical that SAs get comfortable saying "I don't know." No client will expect you to have all the answers. Interviewers know that it's easy to be swept away by the desire to overpromise, or give a guess to avoid looking unprepared. They like to try to trip candidates up with questions they couldn't possibly know. Don't be fooled! When you don't know, say so.

Staying On Track

The interviewer normally tries to steer the SA off-track over the course of an interview. Why? Because it happens frequently on the job. As an SA, it is your job to complete your presentation. It's critical that you touch on each topic you had planned to demo, at least at a high level. While a detour of two or three minutes is totally okay, especially if you're answering a question or explaining a particular aspect in more detail, it is important to stay on track and finish the presentation on time -- ensuring that the prospect walks away with an accurate view of the solution.

A Framework For Giving Effective Demos

Step 1) Introductions

Introduce yourself and validate the problem. Sometimes things get lost in translation, and it is always useful to provide a high-level problem statement of the problem you are trying to solve to ensure that the SA and prospect are on the same page.

Step 2: Introduce the tool

A very quick high-level summary of the overall solution, in this case, Databricks, and its capabilities to set the scene.

Step 3: Dive into customer problems

Talk about the customer's problems, in order of decreasing importance. For example, if their main problem is consolidating all data pipelines into a single platform, start by showing how Databricks can enable different teams to create secure, resilient, and scalable data pipelines on a single platform.

Step 4) Ask about NFRs (Non-Functional Requirements, i.e., security, scalability, etc.)

Ask what security requirements, scalability considerations, etc. they have and proactively talk about how Databricks can fulfill them. This increases the customer’s confidence in the product.

Step 5) Summary

Finally, provide a quick summary (1 slide, 30-45 seconds) of what was discussed, and confirm next steps:

Candidate: "So just to wrap it up, we discussed [challenges 1, 2, and 3] and we saw how databricks can effectively solve these problems, thus saving your organization [X dollars] or improving [Y business processes] by [Z.] In terms of next steps, should we set up a meeting with the platform team to understand a bit more about the challenges they are facing?"

For a thorough demo, where there is significant complexity, and you have a lot of time, you might want to repeat this process for each specific problem.

Tips For Success

• Make it a conversation, not a presentation. An SA’s goal is to have the interviewer confirm their thoughts during the interview process and ideally refine any vaguely-defined requirements during the course of the demo.
• You are likely to be put under pressure in the interview. Don't panic, and remain calm. You might be asked questions about a technical matter you do not know. A graceful way to handle this is to try to get as much information as you can (especially why that topic is important for the interviewer) and close the issue by saying you'll come back with an answer by a specific date.