By : Dennis Nishi

Hiring Managers Want Job Seekers to Ask, Not Just Answer, Questions

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By his second interview for a director position at Turtle Wax, a car-care product company based in Willowbrook, Ill., Shawn Batka felt that he’d been able to check all of the boxes for the job.

He impressed the interviewer with his supply-chain management experience and examples of how he’d streamlined operations and cut costs at past jobs.

But he felt that he needed to do more to clinch the job. So following the advice of the recruiter that had headhunted him, he mentioned his own personal interest in cars and started asking questions that were based on his own regular usage of several Turtle Wax products.

“They asked me if I was a passionate user or a casual user. And the way I answered the questions and what I asked in return, it really helped me to connect with them by showing that I could speak intelligently about the product,” says Mr. Batka, who was invited for a third interview and hired in May as director of strategic supply. He has since hired employees who have expressed the same enthusiasm for the company’s products that he did.

Job seekers tend to spend all of their time preparing answers, but the questions that they ask can be as revealing to hiring managers who may see questions as a measure of candidate engagement and interest. Inversely, interviewing the future boss is also a good way to find out if the job and company are a good fit.

Don’t wait until the end of the interview to ask about the job and what the employer is looking for in a candidate, says Darlington, Wis.-based career expert Penelope Trunk. “If you ask them at the end of the interview, it’s too late. You already pitched yourself to the company without knowing what they want.” Being more proactive with questions also allows you to weave them into the natural flow of the interview conversation.

One of the most important but overlooked questions to ask is about what communication style is used in the office, since this will show how well you can work with your boss and co-workers, says Melissa Sconyers, a San Francisco-based recruiter who specializes in startups. “Everybody will be different. Personally, I prefer all feedback be through email. Mostly, so that I can digest anything that is negative before I respond. That’s because I’m an introvert, so putting me on the spot with a face-to-face conversation can be pretty negative experience.”

Ask questions that show that you have a genuine personal interest in the company and its products. Most job candidates don’t or may try to fake it, says Mr. Batka, who can tell when job candidates are disingenuous. “If someone went to stores that carried our products and asked about the way products are merchandised or asked about a wax they use on their car, that could be the differentiator between two candidates with similar job experience. Especially if the one of the candidates tried to pad what he knew,” he says. But don’t go too off topic with chitchat since you don’t want to hijack the interview.

Suss out the boss by asking about what his or her employees like best about working for them and what they like the least. Even guarded responses can reveal how managers perceive their relationship with employees and give you a sense of his or her disposition. “Usually, in a good answer, the latter is the same as the former. For instance, it’s a fast-paced environment, which is attractive to some people and off-putting to others,” says Ms. Sconyers. A bad answer would be having a bad temper. You can later ask for a walk through the office to see how employees actually act around the boss and vice versa.

Don’t leave any doubt about your qualifications, says Tim Honn, president of Fortis Recruiting Solutions in Lisle, Ill., who recommends that all job hunters ask “do you have any concerns about my ability to do this job? If you do, I’d like to address them right now.” This gives you a chance to bolster any perceived weaknesses, he says. Follow that up with “what’s the next step in the process?” to show that you’re confident enough with your answers that you expect to move forward.

Don’t bring up salary and benefits and don’t waste the interviewer’s time with basic questions that you can find on the company website like “what does the company do?” You want to show that you’re interested enough to have done your due diligence, says Mr. Batka, who recalls a particular job candidate that he interviewed while working as a senior manager at PepsiCo in Chicago.

“On top of asking questions that showed he wasn’t familiar with other brands under PepsiCo like Frito-Lay, he’d also brought in a bottle of Dasani water into the interview, which is a Coke product,” Mr. Batka says. “He didn’t get the job.”

What do you think? Is this something you can benefit from or do you have a few tricks up your sleeve that are just as powerful? Make your voice heard by leaving a comment below. Don’t forget to hit the share button if you know others who will find this post useful.

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