Prioritization & Execution
What would be the worst problems in the delivery experience after buyer has placed the order? How would you prioritize the problems to solve? How would you go about solving it?
Delivery delay is the most important problem after a customer has placed an order.If there is a significant increase in delivery delays, then it is important to collect the data, diagnose the issues, and then adjust the ETA with a buffer to increase On Time delivery accuracy.
As a Live Operations Associate - what goal will you set, and how will you measure its success?
Goal - Based on what I know about the Live Operations Associate position, the primary goal is to ensure high quality fulfilment for customer, shoppers, and retailers. Affect - The elements that could affect high quality fulfilment would be number of orders, shopper hours, and lost deliveries. Metric & Evalutation - Evalutating & monitoring On Time % and 5 star ratings will give me an idea of Instacarts quality fulfillment, but its important to remember that there are other factors that may contribute to low on time % and 5 star rating that can be out of the control of Instacart such as: weather related events and stock outs at retailers.
How do you know there are enough shoppers for grocery orders at any given time and area?
I know there are enough shoppers for grocery orders in a given time and area by monitoring the relationship between order numbers and shopper hours per order. If shopper hours per order are reacting congruently with the changes in order numbers, I know that there are enough shoppers for grocery orders.
What is your daily routine?
I like to map out my day the night before and make sure to have my clothes ready for the work day. I also like to make sure that my house is clean before going to bed so I can feel fresh and never overwhelmed when I wake up. I love listening to podcasts on life, meditation, and current news and I find this helps me wake up in the morning while getting ready for the day. I like to leave my house with extra buffer minutes to ensure I will not start the day feeling stressed. Then when i arrive at the office I take the time to consult with my team and see if there are any changes in tasks prioritization. From there I plan out all tasks needed to be completed for my day.
Have you ever missed a deadline? If so, what happened? If not, how do you make sure you're not falling behind?
I was once given a deadline to produce a forecast for UCPA's Winter 2022 season which required me to learn and use a new system. I believed I could handle the project in addition to the workload I already had, but I miscalculated how long it would take for me to complete it. The week the project was due, I realized I would not make it in time and contacted my boss to explain the situation. I apologized, explained what happened and asked for an extension, which he granted. I learned that I need to be honest with myself about the workload I can handle each day. I also learned that when accepting projects, I need to include a time buffer to ensure that even if unforeseen events arise, I am able to meet my deadlines.
As a Live Operations Associate you have several system issues - what issues would you prioritize?
I will prioritize the issues based on Impact, Urgency, and Cost. From there I will diagnose the high priority issue to see how frequent the issue arises and whether its an internal issue Then I will communicate the department necessary
What are the different problems that Instacart would see in their delivery experience? How would you prioritize the problems?
Issues that instacart would see in their delivery experience could be due to weather related logistical disruptions, system issues, and shopper shortages. I will prioritize the issues based on Impact, Urgency, and Cost. From there I will diagnose the high priority issue to see how frequent the issue arises and whether its an internal issue Then I will communicate the department necessary
What productivity tools (e.g. time-management or project-management software) have you found useful?
Meeting deadlines is important to me, so I use excel spreadsheets to keep track of all my tasks and their due dates. As new projects come up, I add them to my list within the spreadsheet and include the deadline, which helps me prioritize items that must be completed before others on my to-do list. I also split large projects into smaller, more manageable tasks so I can easily complete them in the days leading up to the deadline.
Instacart's number of orders are significantly down in a particular location, how would you identify why this may be happening?
Step 1 - Clarification I am assuming down means a decrease in the amount of ordersStep 2 - Metrics to Track Two important metrics to track is the number of lost orders & shopper hours per orderStep 3 - Understand the down pattern How long has this downward trend been there? Have orders decreased gradually or is there a sudden drop?Step 4 - Identify all possible reasons for message drop Issue on Retailers side? Issue on our side? (systems issue) Schocastic Event - wildfire hurricaneStep 5 - Communicate with the necessary department
How would you improve instacart?
Step 1 - Clarification Would you please be specific on the goal of the improvement? Would you like to improve 5-star ratings? On time Delivery? Step 2 - Mission The goal of the central operations team at instacart is to ensure quality fulfillment for all customers, shoppers, and retailers. In order to improve quality fulfillment we should focus on the number of orders and shopper hours Step 3 - Metrics Its important to analyze 5 star ratings and on time percentage as these will indicate if there could be issues with supply/demand. Its important to improve Shopper orders per hour in order to keep supply/demand at an equilibrium Step 4 - But, it is also important to keep in mind that 5 star ratings and on time percentage can be impacted by things out of instacarts control. such as weather related events or stock outs at retailers.
You are monitoring the home page of a subscription video streaming company called PetFlicks. A recent feature you are testing has increased the watch minutes per video by 15% but has droppped the # of videos watched by 10%. Should you ship this feature?
Step 1 - ClarificationHow does the subscription work? What is a watched video? How do we define watch time? What was the actual user experience?Step 2 - Define the mission of the teamHelp visitors watch engaging pet videosStep 3 - North Star Metric (How will you evaluate your mission)Monthly Active WatchersStep 4 - User usage funnel
How would you handle negative user feedback about Instacart and how might you address it with the engineering team?
Step 1 - ClarificationWhat does negative feedback mean? How do we classify negative feedback?Step 2 - MissionInstacarts Central Operations team's mission is to ensure quality fulfillment to its customers, shoppers, and retailers.Step 3 - Identify and classify the feedbackWhat type of user? Customer, shopper, or retailer?What type of negative feedback? Technical difficulties?Frequency & Magnitude. How often is this being reported and how has the problem directly hindered the mission?Step 4 - Prioritize the feedback based on the frequency and magnitudeStep 5 - Report the frequent and urgent feedback to the engineering team
You return to work after a two-week vacation and find fifty new emails in your inbox. How do you choose which emails to open and answer first?
The filter rules I have setup on my icloud should group the most important ones into key folders and then I scan through the sender names and subject lines for the most critical ones first which need my input for a task.
How do you measure the success of Instacart?
The goal of Instacart is to deliver groceries to the end-user with the highest quality and as convenient as possible. After Instacart's inception there have been other companies wihtin the same playing field, therefore to define success of the company I would look at retention, activations of new customers, and customer satisfaction to be the top metrics. Given this, I would focus on positive feedback rate and the number of orders created and completed to measure the success of Instacart
How do you manage and prioritize tasks?
To prioritize tasks and manage tasks I look at the following: -Impact -Priority (critical path tasks) & Status (ready to develop) -Resources needed (Task size) -Create a timeline of the order in which each task need to be done
How do you organize your work when you have to juggle multiple projects/clients at the same time?
To prioritize tasks and manage tasks I look at the following: -Impact -Priority (critical path tasks) & Status (ready to develop) -Resources needed (Task size) -Create a timeline of the order in which each task need to be done
