🎯 Who to ask?
- ask candidate to provide relevant reference contacts - don’t be satisfied with work peers or colleagues as you want to have better understanding of different point of views. Ideally you are aiming to have:
- previous direct manager
- founder / exec in the previous businesses
- if manager - hers/his direct reports
- stakeholders
- backchannel - your network of network of the network. You need to be aware that this is unofficial and have to be delicate.
🔢 How many ref contacts/checks?
as many as you can get in the timeline given ( if time limited choose the most important ones) to bounce the questions off, for the sake of data analysis (unstructured text data) I find it irrelevant if chat or phone call but obviously there are voice or even body language (f2f) signals you can analyse.
âť“Questions to ask
1. Context of the Role
A: What did X share with you about this role and why they’re interested?
B: How does X see this opportunity fitting into their long-term goals?
2. Standout Strengths
A: What’s X’s superpower—the one thing they do better than anyone?
B: If you were building a startup, what role would you hire X for first?
3. Onboarding & Productivity
A: What can we do to get X ramped up and executing fast?
B: What conditions help X hit the ground running in a fast-moving environment?
4. Development Areas
A: Where have you seen X struggle or need support?
B: If X were to unlock their next level, what’s the key skill they need to develop?
5. Work Style & Management
A: How does X operate best—independently, in a small team, or with structure?
B: What’s the best way to manage X for maximum impact?
6. Challenges & Differences
A: When did you and X disagree? How did they handle it?
B: What’s the toughest situation X faced, and how did they respond?
7. Best & Worst Fit
A: What kind of startup culture would X thrive in?
B: What kind of environment or leadership style would slow X down?
8. Mitigating Weaknesses
A: We think X might need support in Y. How would you set them up for success?
B: Every top performer has blind spots—what should we watch out for?
🕵🏽 How to do it?
- underline that you are not looking for sugarcoating, maybe even highlight your doubts or what you know from interview process (point 9 in quesitons)
- always ask follow up questions to the answers you → don’t be satisfied with scratching the surface and try to understand deeper context. Ask for more context if needed.
- do notes or even record the ref checks if allowed → AI notetakers can help. The purpose is data analysis ALL together with data from the processes. The ref checks are extra data points and solely shouldn’t have a veto rights. I find contrary points interesting, not ultimate.