Hiring people with the right attitude and aptitude is even more crucial in a small company than in a large one. You can’t afford mistakes. But it’s hard to be confident you’ve got the best person, especially if you’re not an experienced interviewer.
I never interview alone. I am collaborative by nature so I like a second opinion even when the final decision is mine. But you also pick up more subtle cues when you can observe for a while and someone else is asking questions.
One interview in particular was very revealing. I was clear in the introductions that the hiring decision was mine as Managing Director. But the (male) owner of the company was interviewing alongside me. We never worked out whether it was sexism or a mistaken understanding of power dynamics. But the candidate consistently angled his body away from me and faced my colleague to answer questions, even when I was asking them. It became quite obvious that this person would not fit well with our culture and he didn’t get the job. Thankfully, few candidates display attitudes this extreme, but I would never have seen it if I had interviewed alone.
Interviewing for attitude
You will rarely find someone who meets all the criteria in your job specification. Decide in advance what really matters and what you cannot survive without.
For me, character attributes are even more important than prior experience, so think how to draw those out by your questions. When I interview for a technical role, I am fundamentally looking for someone who:
- Has a can-do attitude and will be flexible as their job evolves
- Thinks for themselves but also works well in a team
- Likes high quality, and naturally looks for ways to improve things
- Is focused on what the customer or user needs, ahead of what they’d really like to write
- Has an eye on commercial reality (eg thinking about the cost-benefit of refactoring code)
- Is enthusiastic about their job, even when it’s (a) boring or (b) stressful
- Isn’t worried by new things, but checks first to see if an existing solution will be more efficient.
So I need to design questions that give people a chance to show off these characteristics. I phrase them in a way that gets people talking and push for more details if I get a one sentence reply. The answers should tell me how wide their knowledge is and also help me gauge how they will approach different situations.
One caveat: make sure you’re not favouring ‘mini-me’ candidates. You may have a natural affinity with people whose background and outlook is similar to your own. But if your team all look and sound too much like you, you won’t get the breadth and diversity of ideas that leads to better company outcomes.
When I don’t have experience myself
When I’m looking for a senior role in a technology I understand, I can ask probing technical questions myself. But when I need to hire someone for a role where I’m not a subject specialist, I will bring in someone else who is. They can be a junior team member, as long as they will not be nervous in the interview (and can keep secrets). I help them prepare a set of questions and talk through potential good answers, so we both know what to expect.
In the interview itself, my colleague only attends for the technical section of the interview. I introduce them to the candidate and explain why they are there. Then I observe how the candidate interacts with my colleague as well as listening to the answers. I learn a lot from how they react to having someone junior in the room. Who do they address their answers to? Do they amend their language to help me understand them clearly or stay in technical jargon?
After the set of interviews, I ask my colleague’s opinion on each candidate. I make clear that their views are important but will not be the only deciding factor, as the technical section was only one part of the interview process. They are more likely to be honest if they do not feel entirely responsible for your hiring choices.
When the candidate has no experience
Where a role needs an experienced person, you can probe competence by asking for examples. But if you’re looking for a graduate or apprentice to take on a junior technical role, this is the hardest part. How can you tell if they will be any good? Aptitude has to predict future performance, so how can you assess it?
Many people like to see evidence of a computing degree, but I have found this too limiting. The best graduate data analyst I have hired did a marine biology degree. Instead, I have found the most important attributes to be enthusiasm, a love of problem-solving and a desire to learn.
If someone wants a career in IT, I expect their hobbies to reflect their passion. I am wary of those who are doing a computing degree but spend all their spare time playing games. I would much prefer someone employed in a supermarket who writes games for fun, or who thinks you can make Excel do amazing things, or who produces a podcast. Or someone who kept working on their final year project to add extras just because they could. Anything really with a creative, technical bent.
It may take a few questions to tease this out because people worry about appearing geeky, but once you show interest some candidates really open up and let you see the passion that fires them. That’s what will get them out of bed on a Monday in the middle of winter during a tough project, so it matters.
Testing for aptitude
I also look for an aptitude for logical thinking and problem solving. In the past I have written my own aptitude test for graduate candidates. This started with simple letter or number sequences to ease them in gently, eg
What’s next in this series: A – E – I – M – ?
Then some visual puzzles, eg blocks of 9 patterned squares with one missing. Pattern matching and visual reasoning often help in problem solving, which is a key skill.
Then I tested attention to detail by asking people to spot the differences between two nearly identical lists of names and addresses. In our company, we worked with a lot of address data and there were always problems with data quality, so this was a useful indicator.
I tested written communication and customer friendliness with a sample support ticket and asked the candidate to write an email to the pretend customer. This was tricky because the error was the customer’s fault, and I wanted to see how they dealt with it.
Finally, I included a simple SQL test. SQL is widely known, but I didn’t assume prior knowledge. And because it was all paper-based, I didn’t penalise for small syntax errors. Instead I put a simple guide and examples on one page, then asked a set of questions to test how well they could apply what they had just learned.
Testing in practice
It was actually a fun test to create, and I trialled it on a few people in the team. Then my own children had a go (young teenagers but already showing signs of being technically-minded). Others in the office asked to have a go, and in the end everyone in the company tried it out – with a clear expectation that it was the test on trial and not them! As a differentiator of aptitude it worked really well. All the developers, support team and project managers said it was too easy. The sales team and the office manager said it was difficult.
When candidates arrived for interview, I gave them the test to complete first, then we discussed it. For those who struggled, we used it to explore whether they would really enjoy the job and thrive at it. For those who did well, it gave a confidence boost that helped them relax a bit, and opened discussion about what would be expected of them and how they might fit.
Sites like Assessment Day now offer a whole range of free examples as well as selling resources, so you don’t even have to write your own test unless you want to.
Taking it further
If you are expanding your team for the first time, think about who is best placed to do the interviews. Plan ahead to get the best out of candidates, especially for roles you don’t fully understand and those at the start of their career path.
And if you would like some help preparing for interviewing or on the day, I have many years experience hiring for a wide range of roles:
- Senior management through to graduate apprentices
- Development and other technical IT roles through to sales management
- UK nationals, offshore resources, and other non-native English speakers looking to work in the UK
Get in touch to see how I can help raise your confidence in finding the best talent for your growing team.