The one interview question I always ask

<i>The question is simple: Imagine if you are extended multiple job offers from different companies, and you are trying to decide which one you will accept. Imagine that they way you go about this is that you write down the things that matter to you from most to least and that you use 3-5 things at the top of that list to decide. Those are your decision drivers. What are they?</i><p>My response is simple: Imagine if you have multiple candidates for the same job, and you are trying to decide which one you will hire. Imagine that the way you go about this is that you write down the things that matter to you from most to least and that you use 3-5 things at the top of that list to decide. Those are your decision drivers. What are they?<p>[ASIDE: I really don't mean to be disrespectful to OP; this may be one of the better interview hacks I've seen. But that's just the point: it is a hack. Hack ones and zeros and earn our respect. But hack us and earn our contempt.]

<i>&#62; Be sure to lean on the word “imagine”, as you’ll get more sincere answers as a result. I think imagining things just liberates the candidate from the scripted answers</i><p>Of course smart people you want to hire will never recognize this clever mental trick.<p><i>&#62;it explores a candidate’s motivation and value system.</i><p>Wrong. It explores candidate's ability to guess the answers you want to hear. And you have no way to tell whether candidate is sincere or just trying to please you.<p>Come on, this is a typical BS question, along the lines of "tell me your weaknesses" etc...

I'm not sure why people are so offended by this question. While I've never asked this question as the interviewer, I've been asked similar questions whilst interviewing and felt they always lead down a path that was helpful to both sides.<p>If the things I care about in a job don't jive with the things your company cares about, why would I even want an offer from you? In my specific case, when interviewing in the past, things I've cared strongly about are things like test-driven development, a culture that values code quality as well as shipping products, and having a meaningful stake in the success of the company. If you aren't going to provide these things, or they don't matter to you, I sure as fuck don't want to work for you. If people are strictly upset about the word 'imagine', then that's one thing. Thinking this question is 'overly revealing' or something seems bizarre to me. Don't you want to work somewhere where the things you care about are valued?

The "drivers" change depending on the situation and as such this question is impossible to answer. They themselves are subject to the hierarchy of needs so to speak.<p>For example, if money is my number one driver, yet all positions satisfy that driver by offering more than I want, it ceases to become my main driver, and I move down the list.<p>It's possible - in fact likely - that I receive one or more offers that fulfill all my drivers. At that point, I'm not making the decision based on these items, but might instead create a new driver - say, the chance to work on a space startup over a social media one - and use that to choose between the offers.<p>The answers you receive for this question aren't telling you the things they think you are telling you.<p>In addition to that, <i>imagining</i> anything is going to give you what the candidate <i>thinks</i> they are like, not what they are actually like. If you stick to assessing actions that they have actually done, you'll get a better idea of what they will do in the future, rather than what they think they will do. My experience has told me that - sadly - few people know themselves well at all.

This kind of interview question really pisses me off. It's basically an attempt at amateur psychologizing in the interview process, and since the questioner is generally completely unqualified to seriously analyze the answer, the reaction generally has nothing to do with "corporate culture" but everything to do with the prejudices and preferences of the interviewer. Sometimes those prejudices are trivial ("oh, he cares about external noise and so do I") but often they are windows through which more serious cultural and gender prejudices sneak in.<p>I mean, so if the interviewee says that healthcare is incredibly important because they have a sick child, that doesn't tell you anything at all about how well they'll do at the job (but hiring managers often have strong feelings one way or another about the importance of family). And so what if you manage to trick them into saying they felt unappreciated at their last job: you have no idea what the last job was really like, what information could you possibly gain?<p>It's true that questions like this can be very revealing. They seldom review anything relevant about the interviewee, but they do reveal that the hiring manager is an incompetent jerk.

I really hate this kind of questions. It will make any candidate feel like they're being tricked, and any "wrong answer" (look at the list there of "externalities") will surely be confronted with plenty more follow-up questions. I don't see how this would select the right person for a job. You want to know if they fit in (company culture, your "externalities") and you want to know if they'll be capable of doing the job, that's all. Why should one be required to bare their soul, check any privacy at the door and jump through hoops for a job?

The best interview question I ever got asked was, "What's your favorite algorithm?" I was completely and utterly taken aback: I'd never been asked such a thing before, and had no answer whatsoever.<p>So I reached back into my past hobby work, and pulled out "lottery scheduling". A 30-40 minute conversation on the description, performance, trade-offs, implementation trade-offs, features and misfeatures of lottery scheduling ensued.<p>This worked more brilliantly as a way to interview than anything else I'd ever been through, because it gave <i>me</i> and <i>my experience</i> a place to shine. Most interviews really don't. They are idiot-test after idiot-test, designed to wash out bad hackers, but in the process producing a crop of Most Assuredly Not Idiots who may not actually be <i>good</i>, while accidentally washing out some really <i>good</i> hackers who, for example (first-hand experience), wrote a recursive function instead of a while-loop and a Stack&#60;T&#62;.<p>If you want good, give good a chance to shine. If you want not-bad, keep stacking on the idiot tests.

I would expect that the answers to this question are highly susceptible to the availability heuristic, and would change massively based on priming. Talk about office environment for 30 seconds, then ask this question; talk about motivation for 30 seconds, then ask this question; for the same person, I'd be willing to bet you'd get <i>completely</i> different answers, the first on your "external" things, the second on your "internal" things.<p>So I don't think it is as useful for placing someone within a coordinate system as you think. It's too easily led astray, and won't have a lot of consistency over time. Your interpretation of the answer will have much of the qualities of a Rorschach test - but on yourself, not the candidate. You can read into it whatever you like.<p>I'd find it somewhat offensive for a simple reason: because it presumes to psychoanalyze me, to try and figure out what makes me tick. Being a person with an ego, I like to think I'm slightly more subtle than that. So the thought of this question coming up in an interview makes me curl my lip in contempt. I doubt I'd consider an offer from someone who tried this technique.

I would immediately thank the interviewer(s) for his or her time, offer to shake hands and leave.<p>My reasoning is that if they want to manipulate me in an interview, chances are they would spend too much time manipulating me in my work. I respond far better to direct, honest questions. Ask me honestly and I reward that with the truth. I would tell them this if they asked. They would have their answer, and I would have demonstrated its truth.<p>Is that a manipulation in its self?

For many people, an honest answer to this question has to include partner/family considerations, which aren't at all appropriate for an interviewer to be asking about.<p>I'd only ever ask this question by first making clear that I only want to know what you're looking for in a workplace or career goals.<p>If I got asked this, I'd tell them that the things on the top of my list aren't things I'm willing to discuss with them, at least until I've established a friendship with them , and then tell them what I'm looking for in a workplace, team, and product.

One of the pieces of advice that is drilled into anyone that is looking to improve their interview skills is to _never_ criticize previous employers. This question practically begs for that. As a result, a hiring manager is practically guaranteed to get awkward stilted answers from candidates who are trying desperately to frame their response in a way that doesn't criticize the previous employer.<p>It is all a head-game, sadly.<p>Candidates never really know if their dealing with someone who expects smooth, calculated responses or if they're dealing with someone who expects brutal uncomfortable truth.

This is like asking a poker player to show you his cards before you bet. Sorry but no thanks.

In general you are much better off just asking what you want to know. "What kinds of things have you enjoyed about your previous jobs? What kinds of things have annoyed you about them?"<p>One important take-away from his question, as he mentioned in the article, is how influenced the person is by events that are difficult for him/her, or anybody else, to control. In general, the more you tie your satisfaction to things within your control the happier you are likely to be.<p>But the problem with trying to ascertain such things by making up "fake" scenario questions is you can't control how your question is being interpreted. And when you don't know what question is being answered, you are randomly interpreting the response. And that means the question is, literally, a waste of time. Again, you are better off asking a direct question.<p>His question would probably work, however, if the candidate actually does have such a list for determining which offer to take. If this is the case, the candidate should hopefully recognize that s/he is (or could be) in a <i>negotiation</i> and treat his/her answers appropriately.

If an interviewer asked me this then sat back grinning all over themselves like they'd just knocked it out of the park with this ingenious keyhole to my soul, it'd definitely make my decisions on whether or not I wanted to work there easier. Still lol'ing at using the word "imagine" to knock someone off script.

My favorite interviewing question is: <i>When was the last time you used your skills/ability outside of a work context to make your life easier?</i><p>I feel like it's important to have people who think practically about the kinds of problems they feel like solving and whether they actually make an attempt to solve them. There's nothing wrong with leaving work at the office but we tend to look people who are extremely passionate about technology in general, not just people who use it as a paycheck.

I created an account just to reply to this because I found so many errors in its logic. First, the question is not simple: it's convoluted (and there's a typo). An question that would have actually been simple is, "what are your top 3-5 decision drivers for accepting an offer from a company/between multiple companies?"<p>Second, leaning on the word "imagine" does nothing to "liberate" your candidate from scripted answers; it's a common way of introducing a hypothetical and could be replaced by any number of stock phrases. If you put too much stock in that phrase for the question-design, you're thinking shallowly, and doing a disservice to yourself, the interviewee, and language itself. The ironic is that in posting the question, especially if it circulates widely, you're guaranteed to eventually get scripted answers. Third, what you focus on as externalities vs. interalities seem interrelated, e.g., "I want to do X" is the same as saying "I want to work for a company that allows me to do X".<p>I understand the desire for interviewers to get past scripted answers and find easier ways to select the right people for the job, but questions like this aren't silver bullets. I also find it funny that people in software would be so against interviewees having scripted answers; it impresses me that people can quickly come up with quick answers to difficult questions, not because<p>Not wanting to end with all criticisms, I do think the last point about a question like this revealing things about the current/prior employment. If you get people talking about things they like or dislike, unless they give you patently stock crap, they're drawing off recent or salient experience.

<i>You can’t script imagining, so it forces them away from the script and toward considering the question from scratch.</i><p>You can't script <i>imaginging</i>, but you can script your answer to this question...<p>I think it's a reasonable question. I might try it. One I've started asking recently that's interesting is "tell me about some interesting programming books/articles you've read recently." If they have ready answers, it indicates that they're really engaged in the field. If they come up blank, it's not a good sign, though admittedly, they may be in a lull or have other priorities, so the question can't be viewed in isolation.<p>I think all of these questions can be gamed to some extent, if a candidate really does a lot of research/preparation. Of course. that someone is willing to put in the time to research/prepare for interviews is probably a good sign. But just because I've learned to say "I love solving problems!" doesn't mean I'm great at solving problems.<p>Hence, when interviewing I prefer to focus on technical problems.

See, my first thought on reading the question is that this guy was fishing for answers to the sorts of questions he's not legally allowed to ask—relationship status, family plans, and so on. This is reinforced (at least to me, unless I'm misreading) by the comment that "If I know what matters to them, I can right away tell if the same things matter to me (the hiring manager) and the organization at large."<p>So, aside from being manipulative, which lots of interview questions are, this one also struck me as unethical and borderline illegal.

Can interviewees ask you the same question? I'd imagine money would be at the very top. If it isn't, my salary requirements just increased.

I'm going to drastically oversimplify, but there are two types of interviewees, and two types of interviewers, but only one of the four matches leads to a deadly clash as expressed by many other users here in their disdain for the question.<p>Interviewees: There are people who Need a Job Now and interviewing all over and will likely say yes to almost any opportunity, and there are people who are casually looking around seeing what else is out there, they are in no hurry and they can easily afford to say no. The first type needs money to live, they view themselves as a wage slave; the second type could just as well go start a startup but instead choose to rent out their brain for someone else's use (and they view themselves as this way, renting a service).<p>Interviewers: The first type, they do a competence test and they do a culture/personality test. This can be accomplished in an informal luncheon or the like. The second type, they pull questions like these, trying to extract as much information from the candidate's personal life as possible--perhaps even asking for a Facebook password--or they put the candidate through coding hoops that don't really test talent but memorization and retention of Java-school-undergrad-level material that's just a single Google away. (Though personally I wouldn't mind being asked to implement the binary search correctly in a statically-sized-int language, especially since even in Java the official version was wrong for quite some time due to integer overflow. But this is just a piece of trivia I enjoy, I don't know if I would ask it unless the job required a good familiarity with architecture and language detail...)<p>The job-hunters will fit fine with either interviewer. They'll talk at length about their own mothers if they think it will help them get the job offer. The casual brain-renting candidates only match with the casual interviewer, however, and will happily walk away from the nosy interviewers. It's nice to see that principle at work in this community, even if there are some that oppose; we need more people in general, not just hackers, willing to say no to jobs even at the start of the interview stage when they sense something they don't like on principle.

No way on earth I answer that question as asked, cos quite frankly , how I decide on which job offer to accept is none of your business. More than likely, I would answer with "Are you asking me to list the things I find attractive about this job?"

Ethics aside, isn't telling what the interviewer wants to hear the optimal strategy for a rational candidate? I mean, if your goal is to get the job, why would you be honest with this type of question when it might put you at a disadvantage?

I wouldn't have a problem with that question and I'd answer: Team, scope for promotion/exploring other roles within the company in the future and commutability - in that order. Don't know what that says about me (or my interviewing technique) but that's how I'd automatically respond (because it's true).

It is wise to ask foundational, self-reflective questions in an interview. At the very least it gives insight into the interviewer's level of self-awareness, or at least whether or not they are comfortable introspecting. And, based on the book "Pragmatic Thinking &#38; Learning" by Andy Hunt it seems that introspection is an essential skill to anyone who has "learned how to learn".<p>Knowing who you are and what drives you is a very difficult question for most people. Most of us don't take the time to seriously ask the question of what drives us. And yet, once we find those drivers, why not be honest about that insight? What do we have to lose? Isn't this the kind of information we should be shouting from the rooftops, to find like-minded people and to express ourselves most fully?<p>That said, I would choose to ignore the rather obvious attempt to make me reveal details about past employers and answer the question as if it was about purely about my principles and motivations.<p>For the record, I want to use technology to combat the ever-growing tyranny of complexity, which is the source of an extraordinary volume of what I term petty injustice. I don't believe in the efficacy of central authority, so my work must empower individuals to take action for themselves - to select simpler contracts for example. It is my belief that fighting for a principle I believe in is the most crucial aspect of selecting a team. That said, competent work-mates and managers, a viable technology platform and good compensation are also important, if only from a simple, practical standpoint.

I would be interested to see how other Hacker News readers would answer this question. Feel free to post an answer as a reply to this comment.

Disclaimer: We write distributed systems software.<p>The question I always ask of programmers is this:<p>You have n=10 computers in a cluster. Every one of them is connected to every other (but not to itself), using bidirectional TCP connections. How many TCP connections total in the cluster?<p>If they can't figure it out, I change it to n=4, then n=3 and ask them to work their way up from there.

It's a great question...for a performance review where there is rapport between the employee and employer.<p>In an interview, anything one says can be used against you. Those who engage in amateur psychobabble are most likely to do so.<p>To put it another way, it's sincere once salary and benefits have been negotiated.

If you are a job hunter, you should know the answer to this because you've already thought about it.<p>I usually start a job hunt with a spreadsheet so I can track progress and also scoring along my key metrics. When I get asked questions similar to this, I reveal that I have thought about this deeply and discuss my criteria and how I operationalize things like "good coworkers". So far, the reaction to this revelation has been quite telling about the person on the other side of the table; I have gotten everything from disbelief to disgust to admiration. The marginal cost of being organized (and combatting things like recency bias or charisma) is minuscule compared to the marginal gain.

Gee, I'd value an employer who values definitional clarity about the work, and who is uninterested in psychological manipulation. The managers should be very very smart. Also it should be possible to build on what you know over time (somewhat like compound interest), instead of dissipating and scattering your focus on unrelated projects and duties that undermine growth. If there is concern about "silos" then there should not be a management silo that can decide to restructure departments and reassign positions without advance warning. And the statement by Joseph Stiglitz that "change has no inherent value" ought to be internalized.

I have no problem with answering a question like this nor do I really understand why people are so upset over it. When I'm at an interview I try to be genuine and honest.. I'm not going to worry about fitting my answers to what you want them to be in an ideal employee.<p>I'm also not looking to debate/argue over whether or not it's a good question. But here would be my response:<p>1. The quality of the other employees<p>2. The quality AND purpose of the products being built<p>3. The quality of management<p>4. Required hours.. Do you want me to work 70 hours a week? If so, thanks but no thanks. I'm a team player and willing to pull extra hours when the occasion arises, but I have other hobbies that I like to indulge in.<p>5. Salary

I would put money near the top for ethical reasons [1] and then feel the need to justify it awkwardly. How much I make is very important to me because it determines how much I can give to effective charities [2]. But this doesn't mean I'll be a bad employee who's "only in it for the money".<p>[1] <a href="http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/make-money.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/make-money.html</a><p>[2] <a href="http://givewell.org/charities/top-charities" rel="nofollow">http://givewell.org/charities/top-charities</a>

A better question that I always ask, before any other questions in the interview: "Why do you want to work here?" Then I reject any answer that's not somewhat unique to our business. "You could do that anywhere, is there anything specific to this place?" Then I probe the final answer to make sure it's not BS.<p>Bad answers: I've heard you make a lot of money here, I want to work on software development, I like Java. Better: I have friends who've told me about it and it sounds like the kind of place I want to work. The best answer: I understand a lot about how your business works and it is a win-win for me to be here for the following reasons... despite the following minuses...<p>I was playing Resistance this weekend for the first time. Essentially Resistance is Mafia with rules, blue vs. red. One of the first things I did was ask people, "are you a spy?" Like a melodramatic detective. I think there is an instinct to try this first, and win the game on the basis of a twitching lip or "say no, nod yes" sort of reaction.<p>This may work on easily startled people. Same with slamming your hand on the table in a security clearance interview.<p>A smarter candidate will figure out you're playing games, which defeats the purpose. I think you also want to consider the reaction of the candidate after the interview. Suppose they answer honestly, then figure out what you did to them.<p>There's a big difference between trying to learn a prospective employee's motivations the old fashioned way and trying to trick it out of them. Especially when a highly motivated employee can be lowballed in a salary negotiation.

We all know the reality of the situation. This idea that the word "imagine" somehow frames the question in a different light is nonsense.<p>My first response would be "Ok, so you're asking me what my job priorities are" and go from there. Let's bring things back to reality, and be honest about what each other is doing.<p>Also, the question is a classic rehearsal question and its use may be limited. There may be a lack of honesty and even with an honest answer a person's priorities are subject to change.

During an interview both sides should be asking questions in an attempt to explore whether the position is a good fit for the prospective employee. If as an interviewee I'm free to ask any question I want I <i>will</i> get to the questions that help me explore the nature of the company &#38; position. <i>That's the whole point of the interview process</i><p>Asking me to prioritize my decision making process into 3-5 neat little bullet points ranges from annoying and insulting. In asking the question the interviewer sounds like this:<p>Interviewer: "I'm assuming you haven't thought through your requirements for being an employee of my company. I could engage you in conversation like a normal human being to find out what you want. But I'm too lazy for that. Please summarize what you want in a convenient format that I can easily understand."<p>Interviewee: "This guy doesn't like to think. He values simple answers over process &#38; conversation. I might have one 'bullet point' that requires a dozen questions to figure out. I might have a dozen bullet points that could be answered with two questions. Instead of talking to me he wants me to tell him what I want to hear. I'm outta here!"<p>.... see?

This is one of those questions where the answers are only relevant and understandable to the candidate themselves and even the act of answering reveals only the work-life experience of the candidate.<p>For the above reasons, it naturally favors older or extremely confident candidates. If this is used as a primary positive filter for employment, then it is possible to discard a lot of talent, especially young talent.<p>In addition, the value ambiguity and personal depth of this question could confuse or incite negative emotions for many people, including even those with extensive work-life experience. Even if this question were used purely as a filler in order to attempt to relax the candidate, it would most likely achieve the opposite response.<p>Therefore, if I were a hiring manager, I would never use such a broad question since you could achieve the same with a series of technical questions, resume-focussed questions, specific value questions, or a cup of coffee/tea/hot chocolate/water...<p>To illustrate my point, my answer would be:<p>1. Growth.<p>2. Association.<p>3. Skill set.<p>4. Balance.<p>5. Compensation.

My answer would be: that's not how I would choose as it would box me into only using a limited number of parameters. Each offer must be viewed and compared as a whole, where multiple smaller benefits may outweigh a larger one so cannot be eliminated from the comparison.

What do you do with the answer to this question once you have it? If I were on hiring committee and got this in an interview report I'd be annoyed. I cannot think of any plausible answer that would make me more or less inclined to hire the candidate.<p>In fact, let's make that a challenge. Can anyone here think of an answer to this question that a candidate might plausibly give which would effect your hiring decision?

Employees Just Want to be appreciated, and the best way to measure appreciation is with money.<p>Any answer you get to that question won't negate the simple reality in the statement above. Just to reiterate because it is too important to forget!<p>Your Employees (and all people) Just want to be APPRECIATED! and the money you pay them is the best way to measure how much you appreciate them!!!

"That's a great question! I wish more companies cared about this sort of stuff. To save us both some time, while I'm writing these down, why don't you write down the 5 most important metrics you are going to weigh if you are deciding between multiple candidates. When we're done we'll just swap papers, OK?"

I would answer "goodbye" and then leave.

I think the best interview question to ask is "<i>what question do you think I should ask?"</i><p>That tells a lot about a candidate, and it gives him/her a chance to talk about what they're good at. It also shows some respect, which is a good thing since it's hard to find and hire good people.

While I am sure that the author believes that this question drives his decision, the research indicates that most employers make a decision within five minutes - and the main driver of that decision is the extent to which the candidate is like the interviewer.

I would respond with the third thing being money obviously matters no matter what. That way in the negotiation you can ask for more while citing the question

Sorry, who is this guy, and what proof does he have that this is a system worth using or even writing about? Seems like linkbait to me.

The question tells us a great deal about the interviewer, though. He's insecure, pompous, pedantic. Still want to work here?

&#62;The wording of the question is important, so follow it closely.<p>'Imagine that they way you go<p>Do I get extra credit?

This is a bullshit question. If I heard it, I would immediately know that that place will not pay well.<p>I'd ask the interviewer to answer his own question. He would say something like "smart team, interesting project, ability to work on side projects". And this would be pure bullshit. Why? Because if someone offers him a billion dollars per year, he will take it under any conditions. And so would I.

Holy shit, what is the drama with this question?<p>An employer is trying to figure out the motivations of the worker. How is this wrong? How is setting up a scenario manipulative? Why is everyone so hostile to this?

I kind of like the question, only because I like stuff that isn't run of the mill.<p>I'd also note that, if the question is about 'imagining' certain scenarios, then can the answer really be that honest to start with?<p>I.e., it's easy to think that i'd do X or X in Y circumstance, but if you ask hypotheticals, you'll never get a qualitative answer. I'm sure this scenario actually happens often, but imagining can mean you're imagining an interview with NASA as an astronaut and with McDonald's as a burger flipper.