The Questions You Ask in Interviews Matter!

I have had the unfortunate news of having to tell people recently that the questions you ask at the end of an interview hold a tremendous amount of value. 

To a degree, I can understand why.

If you have 5 good candidates, all who gave really great examples, demonstrations and STAR based achievements showing they can all do the role, using the questions they ask as a way to decide is reasonable.

Inevitably, as the time starts to wind down, the interviewer will eventually put down their pad, or look up at you and turn the tables: “What questions can I answer for you?”

I can’t stress enough the answer to this should NEVER be “I don’t have any”.

No matter how thorough the interview and your research, this signals to an interviewer that you lack any curiosity or desire to learn anything more about the team, role, responsibilities, or expectations.

Even if you can’t think of a great question, use a canned one. It’s better than nothing.

But here are some types of questions you should try to avoid as they are considered low value questions:

Prognostication Questions: Any question that is asking the interviewer to predict the future is low value. In many cases these questions are going to be met with a somewhat generic response because there is simply no way for sure to provide meaningful answers:

Me Questions: Similar to prognostication questions, it is common advice that people recommend you ask “me” based questions. 

The problem, however, is how the question lands.

The interviewer just spent 30-45 minutes talking about you.

Asking these questions is a little like being on a date, talking about yourself for 45 minutes and then saying to your date: “Ok, enough about me – let’s talk about you! What do you think about me?”

This is not to suggest that these topics and themes aren’t important, and you should feel free to ask, just not at the last few minutes when the timing is so critical. 

Similar to the prognostication questions, you are just going to get a very canned response as there is no real ability to provide you with meaningful information.

Canned Questions: Questions like these are always on the LinkedIn and Buzzfeed “top 10 questions to ask at the end of an interview” article and they can certainly help you in a pinch, but imagine that every interviewer has had these questions from every single candidate that is interviewed:

• Tell me about your experiences here with the company?
• How is the company culture?
• Why do you stay with the company?
• How does the company determine promotions?
• How is the company setting itself for success in this competitive market?
• Where is the company looking to grow over the next 5 years

Again, it’s not these questions are “bad” or make you look bad, you just miss an opportunity to really stand out because you are just going to get a canned answer that won’t provide you with any meaningful details, nor impress the interviewer.

Instead, find interviews that are endemic to the interview that demonstrates curiosity, confidence, rapport or familiarity.