People (or, my Lego figures)

Hiring the right leaders for a growing company

An interview style that tests mental agility and leadership skills

Growing a startup business is messy. Much like a teenager’s voice changing, people and teams must adjust to certain truths shifting. To add complexity, things do not abruptly change and you can just deal with it — change is the core process that you are part of when leading teams in a scaling-up company.

Companies shape their culture differently. However, after being part of four growing start-up companies with different cultures, I find two personality traits that keep coming back as crucial for succeeding in these environments, especially in leadership roles:

1. The ability to deal with uncertainty.
2. The agility to adapt to change.

Interviewing for agility

It is hard to test for these traits in conventional job interviews. They are part of one’s character, regardless of professional background. For years, my interviewing technique was to conduct a “proper” hiring manager interview, and try to be very attentive to the answers to get a feeling of how this person will actually behave when things get messy. That makes the process rely mainly on perception, meaning I was not testing for these qualities in a measurable and repeatable manner.

A few months ago, when interviewing for a Director of Product Management position, I experienced a different interview style. It was not a “proper interview” by any means. As the candidate, I loved it. I felt connected to the interviewer and the company, and I got a good picture of what the job will be like. When it was my turn to hire a team lead, I put this interview style to the test.

I broke the interview into its components, reverse-engineered it to understand what my interviewer was trying to achieve, and put it to practice. The results were binary: I could very easily spot candidates who would thrive in a scaling-up environment, and dismiss candidates who were excellent, but seemed to need a more structured and mature company to perform at their best.

This interview style tests for leadership skills by testing mental agility. Let me show you how.

Interview structure

Part one: Small talk

As with any other pleasant interview style, I start with small talk to break the ice. I try to bring up something that caught my attention in their profile, like a city they lived in, where they went to school, or anything else that is assuring the candidate that I actually spent time reading their CV (so, not talking about the weather).

Part two: Introducing myself, and introducing the candidate to the interview

When I sense the candidate is talking freely and is not super-tense, it’s time for a more formal introduction. I introduce myself briefly, and then frame the stages of the interview, so the candidate knows what to expect in the time we will spend together:

• I’ll tell you about the role and the challenges we are currently facing,
• I want to hear about you, and
• we will have time for questions at the end.

At this stage, it’s important to state clearly that:

1. I’ve read their CV and there is no need for them to walk me through it at any point in this interview, and
2. if they have any questions, they can go ahead and ask, and they do not need to wait until the end.

Part three: Telling the candidate about the role and its challenges

This is where the magic happens. Instead of asking the candidate to present themselves and talk through their CV, I introduce the candidate to the role, and talk openly about the challenges that are expected in this role. I open up not only about interesting problems to solve, but also touch on the muddy stuff — lacking processes, unclear KPIs, messy collaboration, team frustration… whatever it is that deep in my heart I hope the person in this role will help me solve.

This method takes advantage of the fact that I already know a lot about the candidate: aside from their CV, a recruiter spoke with them, and a technical interview was already conducted or will be the next step. There is no need to go over what is corroborated in a different step of the process. This interview is not about the past — it’s about the future.

Once the role’s scope and its challenges are clear to the candidate (bonus points if they start asking questions as I describe it), the main question of the interview comes:

Now that you have a good idea of the challenges you will be facing in this role, and based on your experience, how can you help me solve this problem?”

This question achieves three important goals:

1. Signal that I value their skill and expertise. Instead of ‘interviewing against’, one in front of each other, I ‘interview with’: we solve a problem together and get to know how the other thinks.

2. See how they react when things shift. Good candidates usually come prepared with answers for questions like, ‘tell me about a time when…’, or ‘give me an example of…’. This is basically the same question asked differently, taking a leap from narrating the learnings of the past, to applying the learnings to the future.

3. Invite them to ask questions. As their interview plan just blew up and what they prepared is not what I’m asking, they would probably want to understand better what is that I’m looking for in their answer. And there is a lot to learn from the questions that come next.

Part four: Let the candidate show off

This is where candidates clearly divide into two groups, and is where this interview technique tests for mental agility:

• Group 1: they try to come back to their plan and sell me the pitch they have prepared. They basically present themselves and start to go over their CV, trying to keep control. I generally stop them politely and say, “we don’t need to go over your CV today, I’m interested in learning how your experience applies to the challenges of this role”. Sometimes that works and they move to the second group, and sometimes this feels so disruptive that they cannot come back from it.
• Group 2: they start to think. They look up with their eyes, searching in their memory for times where they were faced with similar challenges. They ask questions to understand the challenge and what solving it would achieve. On the spot, they can apply concepts they learned to the problem they are presented with. I often hear a new point of view, which sparks my curiosity for their way of thinking. When this happens, we are both in problem solving mode.

From this point on, I can develop a deeper conversation about the main challenges that this candidate will face in their role. I can imagine solving problems together with them and the team, and they will probably get a grasp of what it would be like to work together. Yes, I’m also prepared with some prompting questions in case we get stuck, but in my experience — when this kind of conversation flows, the candidate is a very strong fit not only for the role, but for the company and the stage we are at. I can also gauge their actual interest in the position by how much they buy-in to solving this problem with me.

Part five: Time for the candidate’s questions

Assuming the interview went well, the candidate probably asked many questions about the role, the team, and the challenges ahead. But just as with conventional interviews, I leave time for them to ask questions they prepared. This way, I gain further understanding of what is important to them, and they finish the interview with their questions answered.

A word of caution

This interview style is conversational and focuses on solving a problem together, which presents challenges on its own. These are some of my learnings:

• The interview starts with you talking quite a lot. And talking about ourselves when the other person has no choice but to listen can be tempting. Don’t fall into temptation. Plan and time your introduction. Parts one, two, and three combined should not take more than 15% of the interview time.
• The prompting question can easily expose people who are not into solving problems together, but who prefer telling everyone what to do and how to do it. This can look charming because it might make you feel like the candidate has the right experience to solve all your problems. Remember that such a candidate does not exist. Learn to differentiate between candidates who are curious and solve the problem with you, from candidates who dismiss the problem and offer a radically different way of doing things because that is what they are used to.
• You will be sharing more information about the company and its current challenges than in traditional interviews. Use it for roles where it matters, and sharing more plays to your advantage.

Summary

Interviewing “with” is different in nature from interviewing “against”. By discussing the actual challenges ahead, you can both get a good idea of what it will be like to solve these problems together. You both look into the future together, instead of replaying the past.

Your scaling startup is super-cool, I know. But there are a bunch of other super-cool startups out there, who are competing with you to hire top talent. By leading the candidate to look into the future with you, you are not only learning about their agility and ability to adapt, but also planting a very real idea of what their future in your company will look like.