“Great vision without great people is irrelevant.” "
— Jim Collins
The wrong hire is costly, time-consuming. The right hire is a godsend. Yet great hires can also be hard to keep! So, how do you quickly determine if someone is a natural fit for the role? And, if they are, how do you know with precision, exactly how to fulfill their unique criteria and keep them engaged?
In this post, we share six questions you can use, in-person, to determine talent fit for the role. Using these questions, you will be able to infer important aspects of their behavior without having worked with them or observed them working before. Instead of a long-winded questionnaire— you can do this within 15 mins!
To kickstart this discussion, we must first describe how the human brain makes decisions by filtering and organizing sensory information, real-time, past-time, and future-time. Then, we must appreciate that there is a connection between the language we use and the behaviors we perform. Let's get started!
I: Sensory Information and Human Decision-Making
The human brain is an association, meaning-making machine. We make meaning every day about everything— for better or worse. For example: imagine a report or a colleague consistently arrives 30 minutes late to work every day for the next month. We can make numerous meanings about their 'late' behavior:
"They aren't committed to the job."
"They're meeting recruiters and want to quit."
"They are committed to the job so much they work extra hours in the evening supporting remote teams."
The meaning we make about our sensory-observations— what we perceive using our five senses: visual (seeing), auditory (hearing), kinesthetic (feeling), olfactory (smelling), gustatory (tasting) — governs our experience of a situation and how we respond. And, these meanings we assign typically happen at the speed of thought.
To unpack the meanings we make, we must consciously take a breath, reflect on our internal thoughts, and analyze them. There is no right or wrong answer. We don’t know the truth until we have a quality interaction with the individual and unpack their motivations and reasoning behind their behavior. So, keep this in mind as you assess people for specific roles.
II: Inferring Behavior from Language
People behave in accordance with their beliefs— they filter the world for what is most important to them and delete anything that doesn’t matter. As such, many people will respond and interpret external sensory information differently— you might call this how they experience the world.
Now, to communicate their experiences and behaviors, human beings use language— verbal and non-verbal— to describe their experiences. As such, their language is revealing how they perceive the world, what information they prioritize, and, subsequently, patterns of behavior— this is incredibly useful information!
Example: ask anybody about their day, and you will get several responses that vary in detail, length, composition, and reference:
“I’ve been enjoying analyzing the market data, in particular, the forces that are driving prices up in particular industries. I’ve been using pricing data to try to understand where the next investing opportunity might be…”
“It’s been great for the team— we have been focusing on high-priority activities and collaborating on Zoom!”
“Did you know that today is the longest day of the year?”
The responses above tell us a bit about how the human behaves. In the following sections, we will provide you specific questions and examples that you can use to decode someone’s core behavioral traits quickly. Once you do, you can determine how appropriate or inappropriate that behavior is for the role you are hiring for.
Note: all behavior is useful in some context. However, they can be limiting in other contexts. It might be appropriate to share your feelings and challenges with a colleague over lunch. However, it might not be so appropriate to do that with new potential customers over the phone. The objective is to ensure the behavior you are looking for is appropriately contextualized for the role, including core responsibilities and activities.
In the following sections, we will share a specific set of 6 questions to infer core behavior, so you can assess if they are aligned with the role you are hiring for. Here are a few guidelines for using the questions:
Ask these questions within the context of someone’s work. Open the discussion with, “I have a few questions I would like you to answer within the context of work.”
Take their literal, verbatim responses. You must pay attention to their literal, verbatim responses. Therefore, asking them in person is best. You don’t want their ‘edited’ responses— you want their reflex responses. Yes, that includes answers that start with, “Umm… let me think about that one…”
III: Motivational Trait 1— Criteria
Question: What’s important to you about your work?
Here is a sample response we can analyze:
“Well… I need clearly defined outcomes, activities, and regular feedback.”
Notice that most responses, especially this one, aren't sensory specific. There is no way to film a movie using their descriptions. For example:
What does “regular feedback” look like?
Who is giving the feedback— direct manager? Peers? Customers?
How specifically is the one delivering feedback? Is it face to face, via email, or Slack?
How regular is regular exactly? Daily? Hourly? Weekly?
Therefore, we need to discern what they mean in more sensory-rich terms— visual (seeing), auditory (hearing), kinesthetic (feeling), olfactory (smelling), and gustatory (tasting). If not, we are left to interpret it only from our point of view, not theirs.
Using the above list of questioning, you can unpack their statement into a richer response such as follows:
First, clearly defined outcomes are outcomes that are measurable (numerical or qualitative), time-stamped, and assigned to specific individuals who know what they have to do to achieve it, what others are doing to contribute to the goal, and how they need to collaborate to achieve it.
Second, I need to see a numerical dashboard daily, that tracks how we are performing from a top-line revenue perspective— dollars, pipeline value, etc. This feedback isn’t from any particular individual but is an automated reporting system that allows me to understand how well we are performing.
Third, I need a weekly 1:1 face-time with my manager to hear feedback on my performance— what I am excelling at and where I need to improve.
Fourth, every quarter, I want written feedback from my colleagues on my performance as a team player. This written feedback is a combination of commentary and scoring on key attributes such as communication, collaboration, and domain knowledge.
Now you can assess your company’s ability to fulfill that (contextualizing):
Can you provide the mixed channel feedback this person needs-- numerical dashboards, weekly in-person meetings, quarterly written peer reviews, etc.?
Does your company have clearly defined outcomes for this individual to help you achieve?
Therefore, is this person’s criteria a match for our company?
If yes, that’s great. You can move onto the next step. You also now know enough about how to ensure you meet these criteria at a minimum to keep the person engaged in your company. Furthermore, you even know what measures to remove if you want to manage them out of your company.
Another example of a response and how to unpack it:
“I need to feel I am contributing to someone’s life.”
Notice how ambiguous this question is. We must dig deeper to unpack it:
How will you know when you have contributed to someone’s life?
Who precisely are these "someones"? Colleagues? Customers? Your boss?
Once you unpack it into more sensory terms, you might discover the following:
“I need to have seen a customer benefit from a product/service that your company provides, and say (verbalize) their approval of it.”
Therefore, if you are a company that has achieved product-market fit and has many customer proof points— the company is likely to be a match for this person. However, if you are in the ‘0 to 1’ phase of testing and iterating your product or service, you are probably not a good fit for this company.
Remember:
Before you ask the question, frame it within the context of work.
Unpack their answers into more sensory-specific information so you understand precisely how to fulfill their criteria. Assume you don't understand their response, and you are genuinely curious to discover what they mean.
IV: Motivational Trait 2— Orientation
Request: “Tell me about your recent day at work…”
Here is a sample response we can analyze:
“I took ten sales calls with potential customers, closed 3 of them, sent them the contracts to sign, and went home.”
The response above is someone who is typically action-oriented or proactive. As such, their sentence structure (or what linguists describe as linguistic typology) is structured as follows:
Subject: Himself/herself.
Verb: taking sales calls, closing, sending contracts.
Object: Potential customers.
The incredible Hulk is a good example of this— “Hulk Smash!!” There is a subject— Hulk. There is a verb— smash. The only thing missing is an object. For Hulk, the object is everything that is physically present within his view.
Some behaviors you can expect:
Acting without too much thinking, such as solving a problem before it has been fully defined and discussed.
Unlikely to read long blog posts like this one— they learn by doing.
Inability to sit at a desk for extended periods.
Fiddling with things while performing activities— bouncing a ball, playing with a Rubik's cube, etc.
As such, this person is great for quick transactional selling that requires more action than thinking or analyzing. However, you might not hire them for a longer cycle, upmarket, B2B relational sales activities that require:
Competitive analysis.
Mapping the ecosystem of stakeholders.
Thinking through their approach to move stakeholders through the sales process.
Discussing their approach with other team members, eliciting their feedback, and getting their buy-in.
Therefore, ask yourself, with regards to the role you are hiring for:
Do you need someone who has more of a bias toward action?
Do you need someone who has more of a bias toward thinking and analysis?
Do you need someone who is a balance between action and thinking?
Another example response to the request:
“That’s an interesting question....(pause).... well, there are a few ways to answer this, and I’m not sure if this answers your question… but here is the day— when I signed in for work, the first thing I saw on my desk was a report on how CIO’s think about how they budget to invest in technology, what stage/maturity vendors they look for, and the pros/cons of using startup technology, knowing that many startups fail even if their products are good. The report also outlined what the business continuity impact is for big companies who lose their startup technology vendors due to things out of their control…”
In the statement above, you will notice the lack of verb-subject-object— most of it is about scenario analysis, thinking, and understanding. They didn’t even answer the question immediately. Instead, the statement starts with an analysis of the question, “there are a few ways to answer this, and I’m not sure…” The only “action” in the statement is “I signed in for work…”
The above is an example of someone who is more reactive and thinking-oriented. They might be more appropriate for the upmarket, B2B, longer-sales cycle companies. Now, most people have a combination of proactive and reactive. You just need to assess what is most important for the role. An example of a combination is:
“I was thinking about what my strengths are and what my weaknesses are. After some self-reflection, I realized I am great at delegating tasks and activities, but I’m not so good at seeing the big picture [[Reactive/Analyzing]]. That day, I spoke to my boss and told him that I needed his input on ‘strategy’ level discussions and scheduled that into the agenda for our weekly 1:1 meetings [[Proactive]].”
V: Motivational Trait 3 — Direction
Request: Take your criteria (answer from Motivational Trait 1).Question: What will having that [insert criteria] do for you?
For example, let’s run the question on this response from Motivational Trait 1:
“Well… I need clearly defined outcomes, activities, and regular feedback.”
You can ask the question in this manner:
“What will having clearly defined outcomes, activities, and regular feedback [[use their verbatim response]] do for you?”
For example, they might answer with the following:
“Well, I feel I will be getting better every day, I get to develop more expertise in my field, and I also know that others recognize my performance too!”
The person who answers with the statement above is more directionally toward. What does that mean? That means they are motivated by:
Goal achievement.
Attainment.
Inclusion.
Improvement.
Increase.
Gain.
Individuals who are toward are motivated by outcomes of what they want to have versus outcomes they don’t want to have. For example, a strong leader should have some capacity for toward-orientation so they can paint a promising future and build morale and conviction on outcomes that others wouldn’t even dream of. However, you wouldn’t want this person to take care of compliance or legal matters.
Another person might answer the question in the following manner:
“That way, I don’t miss out on opportunities, I won’t be doing things that don’t contribute value to the team and company, and I know exactly what mistakes to avoid in the future…”
The person who answers with the above statement is directionally away, not toward. What does that mean? That means they are motivated by:
Prevention.
Fixing problems.
Risk-aversion.
Avoiding issues before they become real.
Exclusion.
Individuals who are away are motivated to do what they do to avoid negative outcomes or consequences. For example, if you asked your money manager to grow a portion of your income steadily, you would want them to have some away, so they invest while protecting your downside in mind. Good money managers balance reward (toward) with risk (away).
Now, most people are a balance of toward and away. The purpose of this exercise is to look at the job description and ask yourself:
Does this role require attention to positive outcomes or attention to avoiding negative outcomes?
Does this role require a higher level of optimism, or does this role require a level of pessimism to perform well?
Does this role require more attention to risks, or does it require more attention to opportunities?
Does this role require an ability to spot what isn’t working well, or an ability to spot what can be working well?
Does this role require an ability to deduce what can be done, or a stronger ability to deduce what can’t (or shouldn’t) be done?
VI: Motivational Trait 4 — Reasoning
Question: Why did you choose your current (last) job?
Someone might respond as follows:
“The pay is good, it is within 10miles of my house, and it allows me to do what I’m good at.”
This person’s response lists three criteria:
Pay is good.
Within 10 miles of home.
Allows her to do what she is good at.
People who respond to the question with criteria-based responses have options-based reasoning. That means, they have criteria for what they want out of a job, and it either matches what they want, doesn’t match what they want, or, ‘can’ match what they want.
How do options-based people behave? The most important thing to recognize in the workplace is that they are not good at following processes and procedures— they like to keep their ‘options’ open. They like to design their own steps to achieve what they want rather than following other steps. And, after they have designed their steps, they won't follow them again!
In extreme cases, you could say their motto is, “Process is for sissies!” However, they are also great creative-problem solvers because they can approach activities and problems in many different ways. They are never stuck in the habit of what has ‘always worked.’ They will open new doors and pathways others would not have considered. So, when assessing someone for the job, ask yourself:
How important is it that I need someone to stick to a process?
How important is it that I need someone to be able to design a process for others to follow?
How important is it that I need someone to be unmarried to any one way of doing things?
Another way people respond to the reasoning question is as follows:
“Well, it’s interesting, you say that. It was the summer of 2019 and I just got fired and I was speaking to my boyfriend on the phone. Really, I was just using him as a sounding board to figure out my next steps. But because I wasn’t short on cash, we decided to take some time off together to go traveling. When we went to book our flights online, I came across this interesting company that had an AI matching algorithm to give couples the best deal— I was like, “OMG! This is such an amazing product that makes life so easy!! I wonder if they are hiring?” So I looked at the careers section of their website, and to my amazement, a roommate from college was leading their talent efforts, so I contacted her, and here I am today!”
This person is what is referred to as having procedures-based reasoning. They respond to the question with stories versus criteria. Most people can do a combination of story and criteria. However, notice, if you are an options-based person, you would not have finished reading the above paragraph— you would have dozed off! However, if you are more procedures-based, you would have found the story-based response intriguing.
How do procedures-based people behave? The most important thing to recognize in the workplace is that they like to know what the process is for doing their work, and they like sticking to it. However, they are discomforted if that process keeps changing at a frequent cadence, week-to-week, for example. They like to follow ‘proven’ or ‘prescribed’ processes to achieve what they want. If you give them the 5-step process for processing payments, they will follow it— if you give an options-based person the 5-step process for processing payments, they will immediately respond with “5-steps?? Ugh! There must be a faster, easier way to do this!”
In this case, you want someone who is a financial controller to be able to follow a process for things like:
Credit checking of paying clients.
Payment processing.
Debt-collection.
Consistent reporting of key metrics.
However, if you want someone who can work alongside the CEO to ensure that all financial instruments available (equity financing, debt financing, credit lines, etc.) are being utilized to maintain incentive-alignment across all stakeholders— employees with shares, existing investors, potential investors—- you might want someone who can think of ‘unique’ ways to approach the problem.
So, regarding the role you are hiring for, ask yourself:
How important is it that I need someone to stick to a process?
How important is it that I need someone to be able to design a process for others to follow?
How important is it that I need someone to be faithful to one way of doing things?
VII: Motivational Trait 5 — Knowing
Question: How do you know when you have done a good job?
This trait is important for understanding how a person takes feedback. For example, one response could be:
“I know because I know.”
This person has an internal reference. That means, if they feel they have done a good job based on their internal criteria, nobody can tell them otherwise. These people are rare. However, they do show up. Their behavior is useful, especially if the job requires venturing into new territory in which there is no precedence for success. To navigate that uncertainty for extended periods of time, an internally referenced person is able to measure their effectiveness based on an internally generated signal.
To give feedback to an internally referenced person, you can either precede or conclude each feedback statement with:
“I’m going to share my observations with you because I think it is important I do, and you will know what to do with the information.”
“That’s all I had to say— you are the best person to decide what to do with it.”
However, most of us are externally referenced. For example, an externally referenced person would respond to the question as follows:
“I know because my boss will either speak to me in-person or send me an email telling me I did a good job.”
Or:
“I know because I get a lot of positive emails from clients.”
Externally-referenced people typically need regular, external signals about their performance and behavior to know if they are on-track or off-track. If they are not provided these signals regularly, they can often become confused, anxious, and unable to reach conviction about their contributions.
An external reference is important, especially in contexts where success is measured by how other people respond to your behaviors—for example, developing a product with the user in mind. Or another example would be developing the talk tracks for account executives. In both instances, you must have attention to how customers respond to your actions.
VIII: Work-Style
Does someone perform their critical functions better by collaborating with people, or by working more independently? Pay attention to how they talk about a day at their work by asking them the question:
How was your day at work?
For example, one response could be:
“I’ve been enjoying analyzing the market data, in particular, the forces that are driving prices up in particular industries— I’ve been using this to try to understand where the next investing opportunity might be…”
This particular individual (independent worker) uses the pronoun “I” extensively, which suggests they are more of an individual performer. This does not mean he or she does not value people, nor does it mean they can’t work well in teams.
However, it means for the critical functions they perform. It is best they do it in a closed environment, such as their workspace. This is in comparison to say an architecture studio with an open-office plan.
For example, graphic designers, coders, and creative fiction writers are good examples of independent workers. But the title isn’t what is important— understanding their work-style is.
The other response to the question could be:
“It’s been great for the team— we have been focusing on high-priority activities and collaborating on Zoom! “
This particular individual uses collective pronouns “We” and “Team” — they are more cooperative in their approach to work. That means they optimize in the presence of others and can perform their functions in group settings, working on the same Google document with three other people, planning their workflow together, etc. These people optimize by bringing others and themselves together.
So, when hiring for a particular role, ask yourself:
Does our work culture demand a more collaborative approach or a strong independent worker?
Can we accommodate for an independent worker?
Can we accommodate someone who optimizes by working in the presence of others?
Does this role require more focused, independent, and targeted productivity?
In Summary
First, to communicate experiences and behaviors, human beings use language— verbal and non-verbal— to describe them. As such, their language reveals a lot about how they perceive the world, what information they prioritize, and, subsequently, patterns of behavior— this is incredibly useful information! By asking specifically crafted questions and paying attention to their language, we can deduce some of their core behavioral traits!
Second, the human brain is an association, meaning-making machine. We make meaning every day about everything we can confirm with our five senses— for better or worse. When assessing others’ responses and behaviors, it is useful to be aware of the meaning we are making about their behavior, and be willing to confirm or disprove our hypothesis. This helps reduce personal bias in the assessment.
When using the questions, we shared when screening candidates ask yourself these questions:
What does someone need to be engaged at work, and to stay engaged?
Do they need to have a stronger bias towards action or analysis and thinking?
Where on the scale of goal-oriented and problem-aversion do they need to be?
Do you need someone who can stick to a process, or, someone who is constantly trying to do things in new ways and designing new processes?
Do you need someone who can see the big vision, the bigger picture, and many moving parts? Or, do you need someone who has stronger attention to detail and sequencing?