The really important job interview questions enginers should ask (but don't)

https://posthog.com/blog/what-to-ask-in-interviews

Disclaimer: These questions are direct, but a company that reacts badly to them may not be a good place to work. There are also a lot of questions here - think of them as themes, and you don’t need to ask them all. Prioritize based on what you hear through the process.

Does the company have product-market fit?

This is the single most important thing a company can do to survive and grow.

• “Do you ever question if you have product-market fit?”
• “When did you reach product-market fit? How did you know?”
• “What do you need to do to get to product-market fit?”
• “What’s your revenue? What was it a year ago?”
• “How many daily active users do you have?”

Avoid:

• Founders who aren’t spending a ton of time talking and selling to users pre-product-market fit – it’s a flag to attempt to outsource/delegate this
• Companies where you don’t understand the product or its benefits – if it can’t be explained to you, others will struggle
• Solutions looking for a problem

How much runway does the company have? Does their spending look within reason?

• “Are you default alive?”
• “What’s your runway?”
• “What assumptions are you making to calculate this?”
• “What are your fundraising plans?”

If a company doesn’t have product-market fit, spending should be minimal so there’s as much time as possible to find it. Spending a lot and having a big team just makes it harder to change direction rapidly.

Avoid:

• Companies that don’t know if they’re default alive or don’t care about it, given the current climate – this may change in an easier fundraising environment for early stage, capital-intense business models
• Companies that you don’t believe could get to default alive because they don’t have enough time or are too slow to get things done
• Companies that assume wild increases in revenue to survive, within a short timeframe
• Companies that are fundraising as they’ll otherwise run out of money, but haven’t closed the round

What’s the culture like?

• “What are the company values, and why? Can you give me some specific ways you’ve followed them?”
• “Who decides what to build?”
• “What does a typical workday look?”
• “What are the things or behaviors that would cause a person in this role to fail?”

How strong is the team?

• “Can you tell me about the team I’d be working with most closely?”
• “How do you compensate the team?”
• “How do you attract and retain really strong hires?”
• “Do you share board slides with the team?”

If you want to learn in this role ask yourself: do you believe this company is able to attract people who are as good as or better than you?

You are trying to understand if they view engineering as a cost center (aka a higher chance you’ll be miserable there!) or not. Thoughtful answers to how to hire and pay people indicate this is prioritized. Sharing more information rather than less shows trust and partnership with employees.

What’s in store in the future? (the founders’ motivation)

• “What motivates you?”
• “What are you most proud of so far?”
• “Do you plan to sell the company?”

You can’t guarantee that plans won’t change, but this gives you some indication of what is in store and it helps you understand the founders’ motivation better.

• “What’s the company strategy and why?”

You are looking for a simple answer - otherwise the company and the product will end up a bit of a mess. At PostHog, we define strategy as simply “Nail X”, where X is the thing we need to nail. We’re currently focused on Nail Self Serve.

• “How do you and the other founders avoid falling out?”

One of the most common ways for an early stage company to die is that the founders break up. Hopefully they’ve put some proactive thought into their relationship.

• “What keeps you up at night?”

This will reveal perhaps what the hardest challenge will be, and where you could add the most value if you joined.