Employer Questions
A list of questions to ask potential employers.
Work Style
Ownership
- Does one single person own a unit of work (task, project, product, etc)?
- Can that single person's manager override the decisions made by that person on that unit of work?
Culture
- Do managers regularly meet 1-1 with their reports?
- How are goals communicated throughout the organization?
- How is mentorship approached?
Other teams
- How does this role relate to other teams?
- Do people regularly interact across departments?
Employee Health and Fatigue
Work Hours
- How many days do employees work over the standard working hours?
- What are the standard working hours?
Locations
- Can employees work outside of the office ("work from home")?
- Are there any restrictions on when employees can work outside the office?
- Do employees each have their own office?
- Are there partitions or space between each employee's workspace?
Time Off
- How much time off is given per employee?
- Do different employees get a different amount of time off?
- Is there a minimum amount of time off required/expected of each employee?
- Is sick leave counted as time off?
Parental leave
- Who is eligible for parental leave?
- How much parental leave is given?
- How much parental leave is taken?
On Call
- Are employees expected to be on call?
- If employees are expected to be on call, is a device provided or compensated?
Compensation and Benefits
How is compensation calculated?
- Are pay bands used to determine compensation?
- Is compensation negotiable?
How transparent is your compensation?
- Is all employee compensation public knowledge?
- Is all employee compensation known within the company?
- Is employee compensation shared within the team?
What kind of meals are compensations?
- Is breakfast provided?
- Is lunch provided?
- Is dinner available and provided?
- Is there non-meal time food available?
Organizational Structure
Who do people report to?
- Does every individual have one single manager they report to?
Distributed teams
- How do you approach distributed teams?
- Are managers and reports co-located?
- Are teams co-located?
- How are decisions handed off between time zones and locations?
Tech / Tools
How are devices supported?
- Are personal devices allowed to connect to the company network?
- BYOD? BYOA?
Diversity
How is diversity approached?
- Composition of team you will be joining?
- Does your company have an active diversity policy/program?
- How do you define diversity?
"Org smells"
Finance
- What is the customer churn and/or renewal rate?
- Whether they know the rates is a good indicator, separate from what it is.
- (If a startup) What is your runway? How many employees do you have?
See also
- Julia Evans' Questions I'm asking in interviews
- @dml's list of Compensation and Benefits