Three crucial questions for Management candidates to make during the interview

Phuoc (Pop) Trinh
Jul 24, 2017 · 4 min read
[Photo: David Marcu via Unsplash]

As an on-boarding Manager, one of important tasks is to identify critical problems which you are going to deal with once you get on the boat. So don't wait until starting date, shoot it out as soon as you can have a chance to ask the Hiring Manager.

But how? Instead of asking way-too-general questions such as Why do you need me in? or How might I help when I join?, clear out the situation whose potential issues you might encounter by consulting with 2 questions:

1. Does my on-boarding job make others lost?

Sooner or later you will realize this fact: Harmony is the key to build effective teams. So you can regard it a disaster if your joining is possibly breaking the harmonious team by taking the job of another member. Let's stop and think of it for a second. That would be a disaster for you to figure out you are forcing someone else to leave because of your joining. It, along with rumors around, would ruin your impression and make yourself much more difficult to build the trust around the rest.

Harmony is the critical factor behind any high-performing teams

There are many reasons why employers want to hire a higher Manager. Here are typical ones:

  • It could be finding a coach for existing Managers who are not performing very well.
  • It could be conflict between Managers
  • The current Manager has no rapport from team members. This is against the common refrain ‘People Leave Managers, Not Companies’ but it is true sometimes.

Whatever the case is, you would be put into miserable situation that should take a great deal of effort to figure out a solution while you are supposed to focus on other priorities for new hiring too. So you should have careful consideration if this is the case.

Other similar questions: What is the history of this position? If it’s a new position, why was it created now? If it’s an existing position, where did the previous occupant of this role go?

2. What would you say is the biggest obstacle in your way right now?

One of most important skills of a manager is problem solving. Either you are put into convenient place with all supports around or miserable situation, your main job is to prioritize the problem and then figure out the way to fix it. So hanging on an interview and asking for this, you will likely get the highest level of the problem. If you have any similar experiences, share it out in partial way: address to the results, not the progress/how because the way you solved it out might be not matching with new culture at the company you are applying in. This can be a starting point for open discussion about ideas and proposing solution for it. And good news is that this can be a very first task for you so you have an amount of time to prepare for it.

On-boarding means solving problems together

3. What if I’d like to have a next meet-up with the team I mostly work with in daily basis?

As a new manager, you will inevitably have to figure out what problems the team are facing everyday and joining with them to fix it. Meanwhile, as a rule of thumb, identifying right problem is way more difficult than designing solution. Therefore the earlier you come to acknowledge all potential problems, the higher chance for you to foresee what you have to do and of course how much challenging for the road ahead. I normally spend first 2 weeks to collect them up.

In his book, ‘How NASA Builds Teams’, Dr. Charlie Pellerin told a story of the Hubble telescope. Although the launch was successful, it soon became apparent that there was a serious flaw in the mirror. Sometime later, the failure review board told Congress that the flawed mirror was down to a leadership problem. It transpired that the contractors had not forwarded the results of numerous tests which might have identified the failings. When asked why not, they reported that they were tired of the beatings. NASA had become so hostile to its contractors that they stopped reporting any technical problems.

Meeting with the team will tell you what the real obstacles (probably different from what Managers see) are in their perspectives and remember, you join to help them to solve these problems. So making them comfortable to speak up the problems as early as possible is one of critical tasks of the management person.


There! I wish you, as a management candidate, will collect enough insight input for final decision.
Hope you enjoy the reading!


Author is Sr. Manager in Software industry for over 10 years. He shared this after series of interviews he took whose positions are ranging from Manager to C-level within one year.

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