70+ questions to make sure your next role meets your needs

Photo by Vojtech Okenka: https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-holding-apple-magic-mouse-392018/

Job interviews can be stressful. No one wakes up in the morning thinking, “I can’t wait to go to a job interview today”. However, as a candidate, they provide you with the opportunity to effectively convey that you are the right fit for the role. Unfortunately, this often leads many candidates to adjust their responses based on what they believe the interview team wants to hear.

As a candidate, the interview process is your time to assess whether the team, the company, and the overall work environment align well with your needs. I invite you to feel empowered as you dive into the interview process.

Listed below are questions I’ve gathered over the years during my own job transitions. Feel free to incorporate those that resonate with your personal values as you continue to explore what’s next.

HR/Benefits

• Can you tell me about the interview process?
• Can you tell me about the benefits the company offers?
• What’s the process for reviewing and evaluating employees?
• What percent of bonuses have been paid out in the past?
• What’s the average employee retention?

Company Outlook

• Where do you see the company in the next 3–5 years?
• What’s the biggest existential threat to the business? What keeps you up at night?
• What area of business would you say the company is behind on, given its stage?
• Depends on company stage: What is your exit strategy?
• What are some key financial metrics that the company optimizes for?
• What are the most recent examples of things the company has tried and failed at?
• What is the role of investors and advisors?
• Can you tell me about the background of the founders? Is this their first venture?
• Do the cofounders understand the economics of the business?

Company Culture

• How would you describe the culture of the company?
• How does the company acknowledge individual and team accomplishments?
• How does the company celebrate success?
• What’s the company’s management philosophy?
• Which companies does the leadership team admire and hope to emulate? Why?
• What common attributes have you found among people who join and are successful versus those who aren’t?

Hiring Manager/ Potential Boss

• Tell me about your management philosophy
• How would your direct reports describe your management style?
• How do you provide feedback?

Team Dynamics

• How large is the team? How is it set up?
• How would you describe the team culture?
• How long has the current team been in place?
• What is the biggest challenge the team has faced in the past year?

Department Specific Questions

Product

• Can you describe the product org and how it’s changed over time? Where is it headed in terms of scale, hiring goals, etc?
• How would you describe the product culture?
• How does the product collaborate with other teams?
• What’s the hardest thing about doing product here?
• When was thelast time you talked to your customers?
• What’s the last thing that was shipped?
• What inputs do you use to make product decisions?
• How’s products relationship with other departments? How does information flow between the teams? Are there regular meetings?
• Do you use your own product?
• What KPIs are used to measure the success of the product and product team?
• Who determines KPIs? How often are they updated?
• What’s your product planning experience look like?
• How much do you invest in pure innovation vs. feature parity with competitors?
• How do you deal with core experiences that take place outside of the software?
• What do you use to track product metrics?

UX

• How does UX collaborate with other teams?
• What’s your design process?
• How do you test prototypes?
• What’s your vision for UX?
• What does UX planning look like?
• What’s the biggest challenge facing the UX team right now?
• Do you have design systems?
• What design software do you use?
• Who makes the final decision whether to ship a design or not?
• How many design projects are usually going simultaneously?

Engineering

• Can you explain the existing product development process? What’s working well? What could be improved?
• What is your tech stack? Languages?
• How much time is spent on tech debt vs. other things?
• What is your experience working with UX/product?
• What’s the most challenging part of your job? Favorite part?
• How does the product vision relate to the goals of the company?
• What’s the relationship between product and devs like?
• Do devs sit in on user interviews?

Product Marketing/Sales

• Tell me about your vision for sales/marketing
• Tell me about your sales strategy
• Who are your main buyer personas? How do they differ from product personas?
• Who are the key buyers that you talk to inside orgs?
• What are the biggest challenges about doing sales/marketing?
• What are common objections you hear from prospects?
• What’s the most challenging part of your job? Favorite part of the job?
• What is your experience working with UX/product?

Data Science/Analytics

• What is your vision for data science at [X]?
• What are the biggest challenges you face doing data science at [X]?
• What is your experience working with UX/Product?
• Is this a data product?
• What’s your approach to building data products?

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