Formulating High-Signal Questions for Interviewers (MVIP part 4 of 4)
Learn the 4 high ROI interview prep activities that got 93% of my clients through their first-round interviews at top-tier companies like Google, Airbnb, Microsoft, and Uber.
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In today’s issue, we’ll continue our deep dive into the Minimum Viable Interview Prep (MVIP) system for passing first-round interviews.
In this final post of the series, we’re diving into System #4: Formulating high-signal questions for interviewers, where you’ll learn how to brainstorm, research, and craft questions that offer strong bi-directional signal of interest and fit.
In a crowded job market, it’s difficult to stand out from other candidates.
This is especially true if you’re interviewing for premier roles that attract top 1%, 5%, or 10% talent.
Most people spend all of their time preparing for the questions interviewers will ask them. They only spend a few minutes thinking about what to ask the interviewers.
This is a mistake. The real interview arbitrage opportunity lies in the questions you ask interviewers.
99% of candidates ask generic questions that they grab last-minute from listicles, ie: “Top 10 Questions to ask Interviewers (and knock their socks off!)” I am guilty of contributing to lazy questions for interviewers as well. In my early days as a coach, I created a YouTube video with the “5 Killer Questions to Ask in an Interview.”
I know it’s incredibly tempting to grab these questions and use them as-is. Candidates say, “I’m just going to use them because I’m running tight on time.”
But we all know that you can’t stand out by doing what everyone else is doing.
In any interview, your goal is to leave an indelible impression. You need to get into a league of your own.
Instead of copying and pasting generic questions like “What’s the 30/60/90 plan for this role?” you can use a system to brainstorm, research, and formulate questions.
If you do this well, you’ll:
stand out head and shoulders above all other candidates (in a league of your own)
gain interesting intel from interviewers (to help you decide if you want the role)
position yourself to negotiate a strong offer (be the Top Choice)
Let’s dive in.
Why your Q&A questions matter
Most people think interview prep is all about answering questions...and it is. But it's also about the questions you ask the interviewer.
Asking good questions pays off — every time.
In my ~15-year career, I’ve hired hundreds of people onto my teams, including 38 direct reports at Google, one of the most discerning tech employers in the world.
“It’s harder to get into Google than to get into Harvard.”
I’ve often hired the less qualified candidate who got me thinking over the more qualified candidate who asked me generic, unthoughtful questions.
Why?
Interviewers are people first and foremost. In assessing you for the role, we’re also deciding who we want to work with. We prefer to work with interesting people who get us thinking.
Hiring for Potential. Increasingly, employers hire for potential. They want to find the diamonds in the rough that can help them innovate and grow their businesses. High-signal questions are demonstrate potential.
High-signal questions provide bidirectional signal
I’m a big fan of double-dipping. I teach candidates how to formulate questions that offer two-way signal:
FROM the interviewer (intel to help you decide if you want the role)
TO the interviewer (that you’re engaged, interested, invested, and prepared)
Brainstorm (what you want to learn)
To know what to ask, you must know what you want to learn.
Ask yourself: what do you need to learn to decide if this is the best industry / company / team / role for you?
Below are some prompts for you to consider, but so many of these are going to be personal. You should craft your own list.
Is the industry promising? Is it growing?
Is the company on a good trajectory? growing? profitable? well-capitalized?
Is the culture at the company a good fit for you?
Is the team on a good trajectory? scope, work patterns, relationships
Does this role offer growth opportunities? what do those look like?
What is the manager like? respected? promotes their people? work patterns?
But first, Research.
The foundation of a high-signal question is good research.
You’ll want to research:
the industry
the company
the competitive landscape
the role
(possibly) the team and interviewer
In your research, your goal is to extract key insights. They form the foundation for high-signal questions.
Industry insights to glean:
The top 3 industry trends. In particular, look out for ones that you believe may boost or threaten the company. Some starting points:
up-and-coming regulations or policies
IP protection expirations
new technologies ripening
social, technological, economic, and business trends
Company insights to glean:
bad news (execs leaving, lost customers, bad press, stock dip, layoffs, etc)
good news (new execs, recognition, new partnerships, funding, awards, etc)
employee reviews and opinions
Competitive Landscape insights to glean:
big competitors (market leaders, incumbents)
new competitors (disruptors)
existing competitors making big moves (M&A, private equity, partnerships, new branding, platform expansion)
Role insights to glean:
how previous employees in the role have fared (promotion vs attrition)
how critical is this role to the company? is this function growing?
does this role serve temporary or evergreen needs for the organization (is it a critical core competency?)
Guidelines for high-signal questions
You want to design questions that get at the signal you need while making it clear that you’ve done your research (bi-directional signal).
Some general rules of thumb for the questions you ask the interviewer:
Avoid leading questions. If you signal what you want the answer to be, interviewers will be tempted to tell you what you want to hear.
❌ “I’m trying to understand if the culture is supportive of early career PMs. What are some ways that PMs are supported at this company?”
✅ “What resources are available for early career PMs?”
Look out for tone. Avoid questions that put the interviewer on the defensive (these questions often start with “Why” and question past actions).
❌ “What should I think about the recent negative press?”
✅ “What is one area where you think the leadership team could have done better?”
Get clever about how you ask about touchy subjects. There’s always a way to get high signal without poking a bruise (or getting a canned HR-approved response).
❌ “Why did the company lose its largest customer?”
✅ “What does the company do to retain key customers?”
Memorable by design. Ask in original ways. Keep interviewers on their toes, and they will remember your unique take and how it made them think and feel.
❌ “What do you love about this company?”
✅ “If you weren’t working here, what would you be doing?”
Now, formulate your questions.
Start with what you need to learn (the signal FROM the interviewer), then check the guidelines above. In 1-3 revisions, hone your question for intent, tone, and originality.
Expect to spend about 2-3 minutes honing each question. And know that you will get faster at this with practice.
An extensive example: 81 minutes of research and question formulation
I’ll show you specifically how I:
do targeted research (exactly where to search and how)
extract key insights (methodically)
formulate high-signal questions (that get your interviewer thinking)
…using an example job at an example company.
Company: Samsara (https://www.samsara.com/)
Job: Data Engineer, Customer Success Operations
How to research the industry
Based on the job description, it looks like this company does IoT for physical operations. I need to learn more about this industry.
First, Get your feet wet with a high-level industry overview
A quick Google search for “IOT physical operations” reveals a few recent (four months ago) and credible (IBM) hits.
I read both of these credible articles and gathered the following key themes:
other names for this industry: Industrial IoT, Connected Operations
some think this industry is nascent but poised for major growth
“We’re in the first phase of Digital Transformation when people are just starting to connect their piece of the supply chain.”
People liken IoT in physical operations to a 4th Industrial Revolution.
IBM breaks the components of IOT in physical operations into:
Cognitive processes & operations
Smarter resources & optimization
Intelligent assets & equipment
Digitized, optimized manufacturing processes
Now, with more keywords and a burgeoning foundation, I take the research one step further.
Then, learn what thought leaders predict for the industry
Most industry thought leaders (especially venture capitalists) publish annual forward predictions for the industries they fund. These predictions are a wealth of reliable, well-researched information.
A starting point: search LinkedIn and Twitter. (PS: You can also find specific investors who invest in the space by looking up the board members of the target company.)
Searched “iot predictions industrial.” The first two posts:
Insights
Companies with computer vision and AI strengths will be best positioned.
Within those winners, those who are using it for yield, ops efficiency, or safety will find product-market fit fastest.
Those who harness edge computing will become market leaders.
Formulate questions from insights
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
I read that computer vision and AI are becoming foundational expectations for IoT products. How is Samsara developing technical leadership in computer vision and AI for IoT?
I noticed that one of Samsara’s products is for fleet safety. It’s encouraging because I read a prediction that industrial IoT’s initial impact will focus on operational efficiency and safety. What do you think it would take to make physical operations 10x safer?
How is Samsara adapting its hardware to enable decentralized computation? Can you share more about how the hardware roadmap pushes the envelope on edge computing at the endpoint?
Search your term
Select “Posts”
In “All Filters” select Top Match. (I also filtered by past month because it’s January. Note that thought leaders generally post these predictions in December and January, looking ahead to the following year).
Here’s what I gathered from the first post on the list:
Insights
Tailwinds: companies that can gather high-quality data from disparate sources and visualize it well (hello, dashboards!) will be better positioned to gain and retain customers.
Headwinds: hardware supply chain issues, compute capacity, computer-vision privacy regulations, and field device reliability.
Formulate questions from insights
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
I read Industry 4.0 predictions that called out the need to ingest data from many disparate sources. How do you see the future product automating data consumption?
Data visualization is kept popping up in my research about next-gen IoT tools for physical operations. How do you see data visualization evolving as data streams become more standardized and as visualization tools become more intuitive and automated?
How do you see privacy regulations evolving in the field of vision device data capture, and how would you imagine Samsara navigating the changes?
Ta-da!
In <15 minutes, I did research about the company and generated 6 questions for my interviewers.
How to research the company
We all want to join the best company that will have us. We’ll assume that the definition of a good company includes:
enough runway or profitability to enable growth
scope and interesting projects that enable learning and growth
a culture that supports our goals (personal and professional)
Two things to research:
recent company news
employee feedback on the company.
First, find the news the company is sharing (the good news)
There are two places you should look for company news:
the corporate website’s “news” section
(if they are public) Yahoo finance
The company’s news page is usually pretty easy to find on the website. Here you’ll find positive news about new customers, partnerships, executive hires, and more.
There’s a wealth of information in these press releases!
Some insights and news I gleaned in 15 seconds:
Growing fast. On Deloitte’s Fastest 500 growing companies list.
Expanding globally. They just opened an office in Poland.
New Chief People Officer. A deeper focus on employee experience?
Becoming a system of record. 200th customer integration. Becoming a true platform!
Formulate questions from insights
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
I read about the expansion into Poland. Can you share with me a bit more about how the company enables cross-geo collaboration?
I saw the news about the 200th customer integration, that’s awesome. As a data engineer, I’m curious about what those integrations look like on our side. Would you be able to walk me through one, and share how I might be involved in future integrations?
I saw the news about the new Chief People Officer. What changes do you hope they will bring to the employee experience?
Congratulations on being in the Deloitte fastest 500 growing companies! What kinds of unique challenges are you seeing for the data engineering team, as the company is growing so rapidly?
Next, let’s see if there’s any other news we should be aware of (bad or neutral news).
Go to Yahoo finance
search stock ticker (in this case: IOT)
scroll through the news
Things to look for:
investor sentiment changes
lost customers
cash issues
bailing executives (exiting or selling lots of stock — SEC forms)
Insights: Samsara looks to be a pretty solid company right now. I don’t see anything bad except a mention of high cash burn (but the article talks about why it’s not a concern), and the analyst ratings are all high. No lost customers.
Formulating questions for the interviewers
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
I read an analyst opinion about higher-than-typical operational costs at Samsara. Could you share more about how the company balances growth and spending?
I read a few analyst opinions about Samsara, and they seem quite bullish. What do you think Samsara is doing that makes analysts so excited about the company?
Let’s get some employee feedback on the company.
There are many places you can look for employee reviews. The three places I find most useful are:
Glassdoor (oldie but a goodie)
then, depending on the company and role, either:
Blind (for eng, product, R&D roles in big tech or tech startups)
or
Fishbowl (for consulting, law firms, other large non-tech startups)
Glassdoor
Insights from reviews
recent reviews are absolutely glowing, esp for new employees and ex-US.
Some negative reviews from sales AEs about sales culture.
Some concerns about work-life balance.
Blind (Samsara is a tech company, so it’s better to look here vs Fishbowl)
Insights from reviews
some concerns about the management team being a “mixed bag”
concerns about career growth opportunities within the company.
interview process could be bumpy
Formulating questions for the interviewers
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
I read some amazing reviews from new team members in particular. What do you think makes onboarding at Samsara so delightful?
Sales is such a critical part of growing a company, and account executives are on the front lines. What can you share with me about how AEs are supported in the company?
Can you describe for me the typical day you would expect for someone in this role? What are some of the challenges you’d expect me to encounter, in particular?
Ta-da! In 26 minutes, I researched the company and generated 9 questions for my interviewers.
How to research the competitive landscape
If you have a choice to join the winning team or the losing team, most people would choose to join the winning team. Same goes for companies.
You need to understand where this company fits into the competitive landscape, across all categories where they compete.
There are a lot of competitive analysis sites, each targeting a different type of product or size of company.
I find G2 (g2.com) useful for quick starter searches on larger SaaS companies.
I also use the SEMrush website ranker as a starting point to find competitors.
ProductHunt can be hit or miss, but good for smaller products.
I also like to type “<name of company> vs” into Google and see what pops up. Most of these are actual competitors.
G2 has a neat “G2 score grid” that visualizes companies by customer satisfaction and market share (mileage may vary on data integrity, but it seems to improve every year).
What I look for on these sites:
who is the biggest player, and how are they winning?
who is the newest player, and how are they a threat?
who is the current competitor who is making the biggest moves?
Insights
In fleet management, Verizon Connect appears to have the largest market share. They are winning by being older and entrenched in the operations of larger fleets.
Motive is the current competitor making the biggest moves (name change, doubling down on owner-operators, customer support top-notch).
Samsara actually appears to be the newest player (2015), with Motive and others starting in 2012 or earlier. So perhaps it’s the disruptor? Looks like fast growth but perhaps leaving some of its earliest customers behind?
Formulating questions for the interviewers
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
With Verizon holding a strong position in the market, can you share with me how our company strategy will help us differentiate and win the market?
It looks to me like we’re the new kid on the block in most markets where we compete. What are the key strategic maneuvers we need to make to win in the market?
With KeepTruckin’s conversion to Motive and expanding product offering, how do you see their changes impacting our strategy or market positioning?
It looks like Samsara has a strong and growing market presence. How is the company balancing the need to grow against the need to delight current customers?
I saw that Samsara has been moving from small business to mid-market, and now enterprise. What have those transitions been like internally, and how would my role support that transition?
Ta-da! In ~23 minutes, I researched the competitive landscape and generated 5 thoughtful questions for my interviewers.
How to research the role
Two simple steps here:
read the job description thoroughly. Look for things that stand out (that you want to ask about)
look on LinkedIn for people who’ve had this role before, or who are in the function.
Insights from the job description (see screenshot above)
mentions solving data issues in production. Curious for an example?
mentions resalable datasets. Who are we selling to?
LinkedIn search for people in the role
Search the role title in quotes
Select “people”
For current company, select “Samsara”
Where did they come from, and where did they go? Did they get promoted? On what timeline?
I found a mix of people, falling into three main patterns:
Insights
Internal promotions. Business analyst → Data engineer
A few early data engineers left the company. Why? Was there not enough support for them?
A lot of new hires. I found 3-4 people with <5 months of tenure in data engineering roles. They must be investing in this function across the company.
Formulating questions for the interviewers
Now, convert your insights into questions that demonstrate your research, show you’re engaged, and get the interviewer thinking (without inducing defensiveness).
Examples:
Can you share with me how this function has been envisioned, and how you see it evolving to meet the needs of the business over time?
It looks like there have been some internal promotions from this role. Can you share with me what those individuals did to drive next-level impact in the organization?
I noticed that there were a few early team members in this role who moved on. How are people in this role supported through resources, management, and prioritization?
In your opinion, what makes the difference between a great data engineer and an exceptional one at Samsara?
There have been a lot of people hired into data engineering roles at Samsara in the last 6 months. It’s exciting to join at a time when the function is growing. How do the data engineers across different functions interact? How do you wish they interacted?
The role mentions resalable datasets, and I have experience repackaging data for sale back to the customer. I am curious about the customers for the datasets at Samsara.
Ta-da! In ~17 minutes, I did research about the competitive landscape and generated 6 thoughtful questions for my interviewers.
🎉 That’s a wrap!
In total, this research and question formulation process took me 81 minutes. It make take you longer, especially the first time (and without inspiration and prompts from the workbook 😉).
It’s worth it. You will better formulate questions in general — not only in interviews, but in other parts of life.
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🎉 You now know all 4 systems for Minimum Viable Interview Prep:
You’re well on your way to efficient, no-burnout interview prep!
I hope that this Minimum Viable Interview Prep series helps you gain focus, avoid burnout, increase your chances of passing your next first-round interview, and move on to the next stage of the hiring process. Good luck! 🍀
Note: If you're interested in this MVIP approach, I created a self-paced course (First Round Ready) and companion interview prep workbooks to streamline your job search and save you time.
The workbook for formulating high-signal questions for interviewers is here. It contains 6 high-signal question research categories and >31 prompts to get you started, plus 10+ mad-lib style pre-formulated questions and 23 pre-made high-signal questions to use in an emergency.
Check out coacherika.co for free resources, resume help, and coaching options, including my very popular TUYJS Workshop. Follow me on Substack, YouTube, and LinkedIn to stay in touch. Subscribe to this newsletter to receive a steady stream of tech career advice and experimentation ideas 💛