How to interview someone who doesn’t do anything (with their hands) – a manager

In previous articles (here, here and here) I have covered the topic of interviews quite thoroughly (at least I would like to hope so). We found out that a person needs to be asked about what he actually did with his hands. But here’s the problem – the leader does not do anything himself; the leader’s main tool for solving the tasks assigned to him is organizing his subordinates, establishing processes and communications. But how do you interview a person who doesn’t do anything with his hands? This is what we will talk about today.

My name is Sultanov, and I am a team lead (heavy sigh). I try to ask the right questions to future colleagues. Sometimes it even works out. And I also have channel, where you can discuss this and other articles. Subscribe, it's interesting.

Previously, we decided how to hire line employees. In short, it’s worth checking what they did with their hands, what they read about, what they just heard about, and what are they lying about that they just put it on the resume so that HR doesn’t immediately throw it in the trash. This doesn't work with a manager.

Probably the only more or less reliable way to find out how effective a leader is is to ask his colleagues. This, of course, is also dangerous, because personal assessment of work efficiency often differs from the objective one, but it is at least somewhat reliable. But what to do in those very frequent situations when such information cannot be obtained?

You already know my approach – first you need to think. Over what the leader does in his daily work, over his routine. And, generalizing the leadership work of absolutely any level, we will eventually come up with the following – the manager develops goals and objectives within his area of ​​​​responsibility, brings them to his subordinates, controls the quality of tasks and the timing of achieving goals, collects metrics and indicators, evaluates them, Based on the assessment, makes management decisions and prepares reports for senior management. And now we have a whole list of things to talk about with a potential colleague.

First, you should talk about the area of ​​responsibility in which the candidate has already worked. What was included and what was not? Describe the area of ​​responsibility for the position for which he is being interviewed, find inconsistencies and clarify whether the candidate is ready to take on additional responsibilities in your position. An astute reader will immediately notice that the candidate will simply agree to all the obligations, since he really wants to get into the position. Here you should be open with the candidate and explain that there will be sanctions for failure to fulfill obligations. We all want to complete the assigned tasks, receive fame, honor and bonuses, and not miss deadlines and quit in disgrace? Usually people understand this.

Often it is at this stage of the interview that the need to create a team from scratch comes up; here you should ask the candidate how he plans to organize the implementation of tasks and the achievement of goals? What structural units will he allocate to the team, and how will it fit into the budget? You need to clearly understand that theorizing is useless, you need to tie your questions to your own practical work, otherwise it begins to suspiciously resemble solving algorithmic problems on a piece of paper.

When the area of ​​responsibility has been determined, the team either exists or has been roughly sketched out, goals, objectives, and deadlines should be determined. This is a very subtle point that requires a lot of experience from the interviewer, and on which you can cut off all the bullshit, because determining deadlines requires considerable practical management experience. For example, you have one analyst, one front-end developer, two back-end developers and a tester, how many tasks will they solve in six months? How long will it take to complete the project? How much code does one average developer write in a two-week sprint? Or, if the manager’s level is higher, how long will it take, given the known structure of the department (outlined in the previous paragraph), to achieve the goals set? Very interesting questions, aren't they? And, most importantly, purely practical ones, they will have to be solved at work.

Next we should talk about the issues of task distribution, deadline control and quality of execution. How will the candidate act? When what if deadlines start to slip and quality starts to deteriorate? How will a candidate even understand that his department is not meeting deadlines and has suffered in terms of quality? What decisions will he make?

Well, in the end, you should ask how the candidate reported to management at his previous place of work. This is the least important part, since each organization has its own reporting, it is often automated, so in principle it is not particularly important.

Please note that there is nothing here about communication with the customer and subordinates, because asking about such things is completely useless. Communication skills can only be tested through practice.

Share your experience in the comments, it is always interesting and provokes discussions in which the truth is born. Good luck with your hiring, and