Questions about present and previous companies

To get the interview started ask the following type of question about their present or most recent employer:

I don’t know your company that well / at all so can you tell me what they do?

Who are their main customers?

What is their turnover?

How many staff are there?

Who are their main competitors?

What other services do they provide?

All of these questions will help you understand the company and will also give you an insight into how involved the candidate is. In junior roles they may not know some of the answers and this may not be important, but as roles increase in seniority then you will expect them to have this information to hand. Some people work in isolation and do not have a natural curiosity to find things out. This may work well in some companies but in others people need to be naturally curious and therefore have an overall understanding of the company and how their role fits within it.

What is the company culture like?

Do you enjoy that type of environment?

Which other type of environments have you worked in and which did you prefer?

These questions will help you establish if this candidate is likely to fit into your company culture.

Interviews are primarily to help you select a candidate but they can have other advantages. Use your interviews as a way of finding out what other companies are doing, especially if they are competitors. It may inspire you to look at a different way of working in your business or other potential customers you could approach. Keep a note of any senior managers that your interviewee mentions as you may want to headhunt them in the future.

Questions establishing level of seniority

Now you have an understanding of their company you will be better equipped to understand their role. You now need to quantify it and find out where they sit in the organisation. Some people have very grand titles but are still several rungs away from the main decision makers.

Who do you report to?

This question on its own will tell you what job title their boss has, but without the next two questions it may be meaningless as you will not know how many other layers of management there are above them.

Who does your manager report to?

You may want to follow this with:

And who do they report to?

or even ask:

Can you give me an overview of the company structure so that I have a full understanding of what level you are at?

If your candidate reports to, for example, a General Manager, it is easy to assume that there is only one General Manager who oversees the running of the whole company and reports to the directors, but in some companies this can be the title for a head of department, of which there are many. Check where they are in the company.

How many people report to your manager?

This should indicate how much independence his or her team members have.

If the candidate refers by name to their manager, or whoever they are discussing, then use it when asking them questions rather than referring to ‘your manager’, to help personalise the interview.

Does anyone report to you directly / indirectly?

It is worth asking about indirect reports as some of these relationships can be the most difficult to manage. Also some businesses work on a matrix system where there are very few direct reports but many indirect ones.

How many are there in your team?

The size of their team, either direct reports or fellow team members, gives you an idea of the scope of the group they are in.

What do the rest of your team members do?

Again this can apply to direct reports in their team or the other team members, and will help identify how key their role is within the business.

How many other people do the same job as you?

If you are one of 50 clerks in a general admin office you will have little chance to show initiative, influence decisions and so on. Whereas, if you are the only clerk in a small company working for various managers this could be very different.

These questions will help you get a measure of their actual level of seniority – are they just one of many doing a role or are they the only one fulfilling an important function?

If you are interviewing for a man-management role you will need to ask more questions about their management experience and style. At this stage you are going through the basics and these areas will be covered later in the interview.

Questions to establish how they are managed

How is your work overseen or checked?

Some work can be easily checked and monitored but in other cases it may be very difficult to do and the employee may be able to continue doing a poor job without it being detected. Consider how their answer may or may not enable them to thrive in your environment.

Do you enjoy working in that way?

Just because they work in a particular environment doesn’t mean they like it or want to stay in it, so check out their thoughts. Most people like to be monitored in some way so that they know they are doing a good job, but not everyone relishes being pressurised for results. There is not a right or wrong answer to these types of questions as people are just different and you need to be able to assess if this particular person will work well in your set-up.

How is your work generated?

To help you decide if they will ‘fit’ your company you may need to know if they are given work or if they have to generate it themselves.

How often do you meet with your manager?

What format does this take? Is this formal or informal?

Are you expected to produce written reports?

How do you resolve problems? What issues would you refer to your manager?

If a candidate is already used to working in a similar environment to yours then their initial learning curve will be less than someone from a different type of company.

Some of these questions are aimed at more junior candidates, but remember that even Managing Directors are accountable and therefore ‘managed’ by someone so you will need to change some of the wording or re-phrase the questions. For example:

What dictates how you plan your time?

How often do you report into your chairman?

Questions about specific duties and responsibilities

You should now understand the company set-up and where the interviewee’s role fits. Now you need to find out which are the important elements of their job and whether this will match your requirements, so try asking:

Can you talk me through a typical day / week / month?

This will help you get an understanding of their job even if it is one you have never come across before.

So what percentage of your time do you spend on each task?

This determines which part of their job they have the most experience in. CVs can be misleading and can read as if the main focus of a job is one thing when in fact they only spend five minutes a day doing it. The answer will also help you establish the main part of the job and will help determine if it is the level of experience you need.

How do you deal with a particular task?

There may be a specific area that you also need covered and it will be important to establish how they are used to dealing with it.

Which of your tasks takes priority?

This will help assess how much experience they have in a given task.

Never assume, even if you have previously done the same job or worked in the same company as a candidate you are interviewing, that you don’t need to ask as many or even any questions about it. The company WILL have changed since you left and the roles certainly will. By assuming you know something you can miss a key part of the candidate’s skills or assume they will have fulfilled certain functions which they have not covered.

Who allocates your time?

Shows whether they work unsupervised and plan their own day, or work to a more closely monitored regime.

Which other departments do you liaise with?

Liaison may not be part of their job at all but you may need it in your company.

How do you communicate with other departments?

Identifies what communication skills they have to utilise.

Which do you prefer?

People generally prefer doing things they are good at so this question should give you an indication of where their strengths lie.

How do you communicate with other groups, for example customers?

This is another question to elaborate on their communication skills.

If they have not mentioned during this discourse something that you thought they would have done or something you were hoping they had covered, then ask them specifically about this.

Part of our role involves being the first point of contact for complaints. Who deals with this in your company?

This may well prove to be the biggest part of this person’s role, and so obvious to them that they didn’t mention it. If you are not sure, always ask: otherwise you could discount a really good candidate simply because you didn’t know.

• Work through their CV, starting with the most recent or present role.
• Concentrate on the jobs most relevant to the experience you need.
• Get a good understanding of their present and past companies.
• Find out where they ‘sit’ within the organisation.
• Get to grips with their duties and responsibilities.
• Identify how the majority of their time is spent.