Silent Thinking: Continuous Narration Training

Your Challenge: Silent Thinking

You’re processing internally but not giving the interviewer visibility into your reasoning. This is the #1 most common communication issue in PM interviews.

Key Technique: Continuous Narration

Core principles:

• Explain every thought AS you think it (not after)
• Use signposting phrases: “Let me approach this systematically…”
• Narrate calculations: “So 330M times 80% is roughly 264M…”
• Express uncertainty: “I’m not sure, but my estimate is…”
• Maximum silence: 30 seconds at a time

Bad (Internal - What you’re doing now):

[2 minutes of silence]
"The answer is 132M users"

Good (Narrated - What to do instead):

"Let me estimate US market.
US population is around 330 million.
Not everyone has a smartphone... probably 80% do. That's 264 million.
What percentage would use a meditation app? Maybe 50%?
Actually, 50% feels high. Let me revise to 30%.
So 264M × 30% = roughly 80M potential users."

Why This Works

The interviewer correcting you early is BETTER than discovering your mistake after 3 minutes of silence:

You (Silent):

• [3 minutes silence]
• “The answer is 500M users”
• Interviewer: “How did you get there?”
• You: “I assumed 50% of US uses meditation apps”
• Result: FAIL (bad assumption compounded by silence)

You (Narrated):

• “US population is 330M… what percentage uses meditation apps? Maybe 50%?”
• Interviewer: “50% seems high - maybe 5-10%?”
• You: “Good point! Let me recalculate with 10%…”
• Result: PASS (interviewer corrected early)

Practice Scenario

Your task: “Estimate the number of Uber rides taken per day in San Francisco.”

Instructions:
Type out what you would SAY while solving this problem. Pretend I’m your interviewer and can only hear what you type. Use signposting phrases, show your calculations step-by-step, and express uncertainty when appropriate. Avoid any silence longer than 30 seconds (if you’re stuck, say “I’m trying to figure out…” instead of going quiet).

Go ahead - type your narrated thinking process now.