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Company Interview Questions

Thinking Like a VC

  1. How many shares are outstanding and what's the current valuation?
    • What percentage of total shares you'll own
    • How much will those shares be worth?
  2. What is a high/medium/low outcome for the company? What are the likelihoods for each?
    • Everyone has a different definition of success
  3. What's the annualized value of my equity in the event of a high/medium/low outcome?
    • Hearing a founder articulate this can help reveal new info
  4. Would you sell? If so, when?
  5. How much capital will this company need to build? When's the next round?
  6. How much of the company do the founders still own?

Growth and Priorities

  1. What's the biggest existential threat to this business? What are the things that keep you up at night?
  2. What are the most recent examples of things the company has tried and failed at?
  3. What are some key financial metrics that the company optimizes for?
  4. What are the top three customers that you've won, and the top three customers you've lost?
  5. Which companies does leadership admire and hope to emulate? Why?
  6. What area of the business would you say this company is behind on?

Culture and Values

  1. What's something that would only happen here but not at other organizations?
  2. How have you changed during your time here?
  3. When you've done your best work here, what about the culture has enabled you to do that?
  4. Has the company ever made a decision that prioritized its values over revenue?

Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion

  1. What initiatives has the company launched to improve diversity and inclusion?
  2. What is the title of the most senior underrepresented person at the company?
  3. What would 1:1s be like with my manager? What topics would we discuss?
  4. How do you personally learn how to be more inclusive? What's an example where these learnings changed the way you do your job?

Employee Experience

  1. What common attributes have you found among successful employees vs those that aren't successful?
  2. What are the top reasons people have left the company on their own volition?
  3. What is something the company changed at the request of its employees that didn't originate from an exec?

Founder Fit

  1. Tell me about the founding team's background and why you're tackling this problem.
  2. If I asked investors what they're worried about, what would they say?
  3. Who is on your speed dial for when things aren't going well with the business? Why them?

Manager Feedback

  1. What's the hardest piece of feedback you've received? Hardest given?
  2. What relative weight do you put on the way people work vs the work product they generate?
  3. How would your team describe you?
  4. How do you cultivate and foster individual contributor growth on the team?
  5. What could I have done better during the interview process?

Role and Responsibilities

  1. If after 12 months I've failed, where did we go wrong?
  2. What will separate someone who is good at this job from someone who is really stellar?
  3. Think back on a great experience you had with the last person who had this role. Why was it so great?
  4. WHat will my first 30, 60, and 90 days look like? Do you have an idea of the first problems you want me to help solve?
  5. How do you see this position evolving as the company grows?

Team Impact and Dynamics

  1. Talk me through a project that initially went off the rails that you're really proud of.
  2. Could you tell me about a time when a co-worker went out of their way to do something nice for a teammate?
  3. How does the team deal with two urgent projects with conflicting deadlines?
  4. Who owns the goals/decisions about what work needs to be done? What influence do I have towards the goals set?
  5. How could the team I'm joining be more impactful/deliver more value to the business?
  6. How long did the decision-making take with the most recent big decision?

Interview