Explain API to a 5-year-old kid [#Uber]
Can you answer this?
Explain ‘X’ to a 5-year-old kid is the most common interview question in product management interviews.
Through this sort of questions, the interviewer wants to understand-
How clearly do you understand a topic? [Your understanding]
Can you explain complex topics and simplify them for others? [Your presentation skills]
Explain API to a 5-year-old kid is the most common product management interview question.
Before seeing the solution, take your time and try answering this question.
Solution
By Matt Z
Wait! If you are a non-tech Product Manager and don’t know what an API is; I would recommend checking out the most simplistic yet comprehensive course on APIs for non-tech Product Managers here -
Just imagine this scenario.
You alone went into a warehouse and trying to retrieve something, for example, 3 screwdrivers, a toolbox, and 15 Phillips screws.
But you do not know, where those things are in the warehouse.
At this time, the warehouse manager gave you a menu that stated where to retrieve those stuff. And he warned you to use this set of instructions only and do not touch other things in there, because the manager does not want you to mess up their organized warehouse.
Then, you take the menu, took out all the stuff you need, and left the warehouse happily.
So, in the above story,
The warehouse is other companies’ database
All the things in the warehouse are their data
The menu the store manager gives you is an API, basically, a menu that tells you how to retrieve some of their data, without messing up their database.
The above story is the perfect (self-proclaimed) example to explain, what is an API.
If you want to learn more about APIs; I would recommend checking out this course on APIs for non-tech Product Managers here -
In this course, you will learn -
What, how, and why of APIs?
Request-response, query parameters, endpoints
How to read the API documentation, and work on new API integration?
How to work with Postman
And a lot of mini-projects.
Want to practice more PM interview questions? Subscribe to this newsletter.