5 Interview Questions to Find Out if Someone is a Good Manager
Hi friend,
Whether it’s your first job or your tenth job, a great manager makes a world of difference in how you feel going to work every day. A great manager can also have a big impact on your long term career trajectory by supporting your professional development goals, advocating for your advancement, and providing mentorship. The question is- how do you tell if someone is a good manager during an interview?
Here are five questions you can ask during an interview with a potential future manager, and what to look for in their response:
Question: Tell me about the professional aspirations and goals of each person who reports to you.
Red Flag: They have no idea.
What to look for:
Do they have an answer for each person? Most people? Anyone?
What is the timeframe of the aspirations or goals? Is everything focused on the next quarter or next year? Does the manager mention anything long term, even beyond someone’s employment at the current company, such as starting a business, going back to school, or transitioning to a different career?
Do they understand why each person’s motivations for their professional goals?
Question: Give me some examples of the things you’ve done in the past quarter to support the professional goals of people who report to you.
Red Flag: They haven’t done anything.
What to look for:
How many things come to mind, and for how many of their direct reports?
Are the actions one-dimensional (i.e. everything was an article or conference?), or does the manager look for a variety of ways to support their team?
Does the manager mention individual preferences and indicate that they support people differently according to what works best for them?
Question: Tell me about the last time one of your direct reports shared difficult feedback with you. What was the feedback? How did the conversation go, and what did you do in response?
Red Flag: No one has ever shared negative feedback with them/they claim nothing comes to mind.
What to look for:
What is the feedback in regards to? It may be an area of weakness that showed in other areas of the interview.
Do they express understanding for how the other person felt, or what caused them to arrive at the conclusion they did, even if they disagreed with the feedback? Do they acknowledge that it can be hard for direct reports to share negative feedback with their manager?
Did they take concrete steps to resolve the situation and check back in with the person who provided feedback?
Question: Tell me about your biggest regret or mistake as a manager? What do you think you should have done differently?
Red Flag: The example is insignificant or they place responsibility for a different outcome on others.
What to look for:
How honest and vulnerable are they in discussing their mistake? Are they defensive or uncomfortable?
What are they most sorry for (i.e. not hitting performance goals? the impact on the team? how someone felt?)? That will tell you something important about their values.
Is it clear they have spent significant time reflecting on what went wrong? Do they clearly articulate what they should have done differently or what they learned?
Question: Give me a few examples of times someone who reported to you wasn’t succeeding. How did you handle it?
Red Flags: They place all responsibility/blame on others, they do too much (straight to firing people) or too little (not saying anything and hoping it goes away), or they can’t think of examples.
What to look for:
Do they look for warning signs that someone is struggling and intervene well before the point of failure? Do they differentiate between “not succeeding” and “failing”?
How well do they understand the context and factors that caused someone to struggle? Do those things impact their approach to resolving the situation and the support offered?
Do they discuss what they could have done differently or better to prevent someone from struggling, and/or do they shoulder responsibility for helping someone get back to success (i.e. spending more time teaching someone or taking on some of their reports’ tasks while they focus on a big project)?
Everyone needs different things from their manager, and this isn’t an exhaustive list— but it’s a great start. No manager is perfect, but if you get stellar answers for each of these questions, take the job offer!
Happy Monday!
Karissa
