How to ask about company culture in an interview.
When helping clients prepare for interviews, we often hear questions like this:
Is it appropriate to ask about an organization’s culture during an interview?
What are good questions to find out what an organization’s culture is like?
When is a good time to ask these kinds of culture questions?
As the candidate, it’s helpful to have data to assess if the organization is going to be the right fit for you and in general, we think incorporating a question or two about culture during the interview process is great.
However, culture can mean so many things to people, so as you might imagine, the approach to asking these types of questions should be both thoughtful and strategic. For these reasons, we hate the generic ‘What’s your culture like?’ question. It could have a million interpretations and chances are employers will be ready with a few things that are positive. Employers might think you want to know if folks eat lunch together when maybe you want to understand if it’s a ‘CYA’ (cover your ass) kind of culture. We recommend developing targeted questions to really uncover what the culture is like so you can get the data you need to make a well-informed decision.
Here are some ways to address workplace culture that can be really helpful to ask during the initial first or second-round interview:
What do you think works really well about the organization's culture currently? Where is there room for improvement?
What are 3-4 adjectives that describe the organization's culture and this team’s culture?
The job description noted how “fast-paced” this job/organization is. Can you tell me more about what ‘fast-paced’ means here? Maybe with an example that demonstrates it?
To help convey that you’re thinking about the employer first and that you’re engaged at a higher strategic thinking level, you might consider asking questions like these:
What problems or pain points is the team currently facing that you’d be joining?
What are the vision and goals of the team in the near future? How is that contributing to the broader vision and goals of the organization?
From reading the job description and from what you’ve shared, I have my own thoughts about what success might look like in this role in the first few months, but I’d love to get your perspective - what do you see success looking like for the first 60-90 days?
As you get farther into the interview process, here are some questions that can help you understand the dynamics of the team and organization:
If you could change two things about the culture currently, what would they be?
How is this team viewed by other teams in the company? What departments or teams are seen as really “cool” or innovative?
What does social interaction look like for this team and for the broader organization?
Do people hang out outside of work, or keep their work and personal lives separate?
For companies that have a hybrid set-up, you might ask what percentage of the team (on average) comes into the office each week and how many days are they in the office for?
And for organizations that have unlimited paid time off (PTO), you may want to understand the organizational cultural norms around taking time off work. You might say something like, “While I understand that this organization has unlimited paid time off, I’m sure there are some norms for different teams around how much and when they take time off. Could you share with me what those norms are for the organization and for this team?”
Asking for specific examples is important, as is asking for a few data points so that you can know if there’s just one canned response, or if the employer truly has several examples to choose from.
Your future manager also plays a key role in setting the team’s culture. To help you uncover a potential manager’s style, here are a few questions you can ask to help conceptualize what it would be like to work for them:
As a manager, how often do you meet with your direct reports? Who is responsible for the agenda for those meetings?
How do you run your 1:1 meetings? Are there distinctions between meetings that are for day-to-day check in’s on work, versus bigger conversations around performance and development? How often do each of those happen?
When do we get together as a full team and what do those gatherings look like?
If you had to describe your management style in three adjectives, what would they be?
And if you’re interviewing for a senior level role, we also especially recommend these questions:
Can you tell me about the retention rate at the firm overall and of senior level staff?
What do you wish you had known about the CEO or leadership before starting?
Every senior or C-suite team has their own dynamics. How would you describe this team’s? What works well? What could work better?
Most of all, asking these thoughtful and deeper questions is sure to impress your potential employer with how you approach your work and the detail you invest in how you think about the company that you’re considering becoming a part of.
Lastly, an organization's onboarding process can reveal so much about the company culture. Understanding examples of growth for others in the organization can help you determine potential pathways for your own development. Here are some ways to dig into this culture-centric topic:
What does onboarding look like at this company and on your team?
Based on past experience, where have folks struggled most in the first six months of their onboarding?
Can you tell me about two people here who have grown in their roles in a significant way? Perhaps a few people who started off in a certain job, and are now in a different role, or whose job has evolved and grown?
Can you tell me about the tenure of staff on this team - who has been on the team the longest and why do you think that is? Who are the new additions to the team and how recently have they joined?
There are tons of other questions you could ask to get under what the company or job is really going to be like. Get creative! If you know what you’re looking for (with specifics!) you can ask if those elements and characteristics are present in that environment. The best way to find out which organizational culture is best for you is to get more interviews, meet more people, and really dig in after you get a job offer.
Have more questions on this topic or want to work on interview prep together? Drop our team a note and reach out here.