Professional & Academic
Interview questions, networking, education, and career development conversations.
Questions to Ask for an Internal Interview
For employees interviewing for another role at their own company: these 20 questions cover whether an outside search is running in parallel, how the job differs from the one you hold, who negotiates your release date, how pay is set for internal moves, and what happens if you do not get it.
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Questions to Ask for an Internship Interview
The practical half of the conversation, for once you know you want the role and need the terms in writing. It covers pay and how it is paid, dates and hours, help with housing or travel, on-site days, equipment, academic credit and who completes your university paperwork. For questions about the work itself, the project set is the better place to look.
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Questions to Ask for College Admissions
For the day you are physically on campus, whether that is an open day, a booked tour or a visit you arranged yourself. These are aimed at tour guides, students you meet in a corridor and whoever in the department will spare ten minutes, and they cover what no website answers: the food, where people study at midnight, how the walk home feels and what the place is like in the rain. Anything involving a figure is better asked of the office in writing, and Questions to Ask College Admissions covers that ground.
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Questions to Ask for Feedback on a Project
Twenty questions for getting useful feedback on a project instead of polite approval. They work for a manager, a client, a reviewer, or a colleague, and they are written to be asked while there is still time to change the work.
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Questions to Ask for Grad School Interview
For the half hour you get alone with the professor you would actually work under, which decides more of a doctorate than the department does. Every question here is about them and their group rather than the program: whether they are taking anyone this year, what is funded and live right now, how often they meet students, how authorship gets decided, and what happened to the last three people to leave the lab. Save the department-level questions for the people whose job it is to answer them.
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Questions to Ask for Internship
Twenty questions to ask in an internship interview. They cover what the work actually is, who supervises you, what previous interns produced, conversion to full-time roles, pay and logistics, and how the decision gets made.
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Good Questions to Ask for Internship Interview
For the first call, usually with a recruiter rather than the team you would join. At that stage nobody can tell you much about the project, so these questions are about the process instead: how many rounds there are, who you would meet, what any test or task covers, the timeline, and what to prepare. Once you reach the team interview, the questions about the project itself are a better use of your time.
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Questions to Ask for Logo Design
Twenty questions to ask a logo designer or studio before you hire them. They cover process and input points, revision limits, file formats and source files, ownership, font licensing, trademark checks, pricing, and what happens after the project ends.
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Questions to Ask for School Interview
Questions for a teacher or school staff candidate to ask the principal and hiring panel: what the load actually is, how discipline and student support work, what new staff get in their first weeks, how you will be evaluated, and what turnover has looked like.
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Questions to Ask for Supervisor Interview
Questions for a candidate to ask the person who would actually be their manager: how often you would meet, which decisions are yours, how feedback and bad news get handled, what happened to your predecessor, and what would most likely make the role fail.
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Questions to Ask General Counsel During Interview
For CEOs, board members, and hiring committees interviewing a candidate for general counsel. These 20 questions test judgment under pressure, outside counsel spend, board reporting, and whether the candidate can say no to the business without being sidelined.
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Questions to Ask Grad School Interview
The list to work through across a whole interview or visit day, whether you are with the director of graduate study, a committee, or whoever read your file. It covers how the offer works, where funding comes from and for how long, the shape of the first year, time to degree, attrition and placement. Narrower lists elsewhere cover the half hour alone with a prospective advisor, the conversations with current students, and taught master's programs.
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Questions to Ask Grad School Programs
Due diligence questions for anyone holding an offer or narrowing a shortlist. These cover what the funding actually pays, how long students really take, what happens when an advising relationship fails, and where recent graduates ended up.
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Questions to Ask Grad Students in a Lab
Questions for a recruitment visit, a rotation, or a coffee with someone already in a lab you are considering. The students know things the principal investigator will not tell you and cannot tell you, and most of it only comes out if you ask a specific question.
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Questions to Ask Graduate Admissions
Questions for the admissions staff or graduate coordinator while you are still assembling an application: who reads it, what the requirements really are, how funding is decided, and what happens if you are waitlisted or turned down.
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Questions to Ask Graduate Program Director
Questions for the faculty member who runs a graduate program, whether you are an applicant, a new student, or someone already stuck. The director owns milestones, annual reviews, teaching allocation, and disputes, so these are the questions only they can answer.
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Questions to Ask Graduate Programs
A standard set of questions to put to every program on your shortlist so the answers can be compared. These focus on the things that differ between institutions rather than within them: who could supervise you, departmental stability, local cost of living, work rights, and honest weaknesses.
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Questions to Ask Graduate School Admissions
Questions for applicants to put to admissions staff, directors of graduate study and faculty, covering funding, advising, time to degree, attrition and where graduates end up.
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Questions to Ask Graduate Schools
Questions for open days, admitted student visits and phone calls with a director of graduate studies, covering funding guarantees, advising, milestones, placement and the parts of an offer letter that are not in the offer letter.
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Questions to Ask Graduate Students
Questions for prospective applicants, visitors and new colleagues to ask current graduate students about workload, funding, advising and what the program is like from inside it.
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Group Interview Questions to Ask
Twenty questions to ask when you are the candidate facing a panel, or sitting alongside other candidates. They cover what the first 90 days involves, why the role is open, how work reaches the team, where handoffs break down, how mistakes get raised, the busiest month of the year, and what happens next in the process.
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Questions to Ask Guest Speaker
Written for whoever has to run the session. These are the chair's questions: the opener that gets hands in the air, the follow-ups that turn a smooth answer into a specific one, the move that hands the floor back to the room, and a closer that ends things on time. If you are in the audience rather than at the front, the sets on Questions to Ask a Guest Speaker and Good Questions to Ask Guest Speakers are aimed at you.
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Questions to Ask Guest Speakers in Class
Questions students can ask a visitor to their classroom, phrased the way a student would actually say them, with notes for the teacher on preparing the class and moderating.
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Questions to Ask Headhunters
For candidates on a call with an external recruiter or executive search consultant. These 20 questions establish who pays them, whether the search is real, who else is in the process, and what they will do with your details.
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Questions to Ask Healthcare Professionals
Questions for someone already working in healthcare, whether you are weighing the field, choosing between roles, or trying to understand the job from the inside. They cover training and its cost, the shape of a shift, the paperwork, and the emotional side of the work.
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Questions to Ask Hedge Fund Managers
Questions for a meeting with a hedge fund manager, whether you are running diligence as a prospective investor or sitting down with one professionally. They cover strategy and edge, drawdowns, leverage, fees, liquidity terms, and key-person risk.
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Questions to Ask Hiring Manager for Internal Position
Questions for interviewing with a hiring manager for a role inside your current company. They cover how the job differs from yours, how success gets measured, the pay band, whether external candidates are in play, and how a handover would work.
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Questions to Ask Hiring Manager Software Engineer
Questions to put to the hiring manager when you are interviewing as a software engineer. They cover how code reaches production, review and CI, on-call load, how architecture decisions get made, promotion, and why people have left the team.
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Questions to Ask HOA
For owners and renters who want to know how their homeowners association actually operates: who to contact, what dues cover, how repairs and approvals move, how violations and appeals work, and how the budget, reserves and elections are decided.
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How Many Questions to Ask in a 30 Minute Interview
In a 30 minute interview you will usually get five to eight minutes at the end, which is two to four questions with follow-ups. This page gives twenty questions ranked so the ones worth spending that time on come first, plus a short guide on how many to prepare, when to ask them and what to do when the interviewer runs over. Written for candidates in a first-round or screening call.
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How Many Questions to Ask in a 30 Minute Interview
If you are running a 30 minute interview, plan five or six substantive questions and nothing more: at roughly three minutes each with follow-ups you have used twenty minutes, which leaves time to open properly and to answer the candidate's questions. This page gives twenty questions for a short screen with a suggested time budget, ordered as the call itself runs. Written for hiring managers and recruiters.
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How to Ask for Interview Questions in Advance
Twenty things to ask before an interview, from the requests almost any recruiter will grant to the ones that need careful wording. Most employers will not hand over their questions, but they will usually tell you the format, the assessment criteria, the panel and the themes, and a growing number share questions or a case study in advance if asked. Includes how to route the request if you need the questions as a disability adjustment.
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Good Questions to Ask HR
Questions for HR about how things actually work in practice: how time off is approved, when pay changes land, what leave and health cover exist, how promotions get decided, and who to go to when something is wrong.
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Questions to Ask HR During Phone Interview
For a longer phone interview with someone from HR or the people team, rather than a quick screening call. These questions test the usual claims about culture against evidence: how performance and pay are reviewed, how promotion actually happens, tenure and attrition, what leave people really take, and what comes next in the process.
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Questions to Ask HR During Phone Screen
For the first call with a recruiter or HR screener, the twenty to thirty minute conversation that decides whether you meet the hiring manager. These questions cover why the role is open, the must-haves, the salary range, the interview process and timeline, the reporting line, and how to prepare for the next round.
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Best Questions to Ask HR in an Interview
HR can answer things a hiring manager often cannot. These questions cover benefits and pay bands, leave and remote policy, review cycles, onboarding, team structure, and how the rest of the interview process runs.
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