CANDIDATE DUE DILIGENCE
Role due diligence
Use reverse questions for mutual due diligence: clarify real work, responsibility conditions, and organizational support before deciding on a role or promotion.
For · External candidates and people preparing for an internal promotion conversation.
External role
What problem would you most want me to solve in the first three to six months, and what outcomes would show that I am succeeding?
- What this clarifies
- Clarify near-term goals and evidence of success.
- How it informs your choice
- Assess whether goals are concrete, influenceable, and consistent with the role description.
- Follow-up
- Could you share a current example the team is working on?
What work has occupied the team most often this quarter, and what has been the hardest?
- What this clarifies
- Understand day-to-day work and its real challenges.
- How it informs your choice
- Compare the actual work with your interests, skills, and expectations.
What decisions can this role make independently, and which require other roles to participate?
- What this clarifies
- Clarify authority and collaboration boundaries.
- How it informs your choice
- Check whether accountability, authority, and expected outcomes align.
Which teams or systems does this role depend on most, and how are resource or priority conflicts usually handled?
- What this clarifies
- Understand delivery dependencies and how conflicts are handled.
- How it informs your choice
- Identify critical conditions outside the candidate’s influence.
How are expectations usually calibrated after someone joins, and how often does the manager provide feedback?
- What this clarifies
- Understand management support and early course correction.
- How it informs your choice
- Assess whether you can identify misalignment early and get support.
Could you share a recent example of disagreement on the team and how a decision was reached?
- What this clarifies
- Learn how the team handles disagreement and makes decisions.
- How it informs your choice
- Use concrete behavior to understand collaboration instead of relying on vague culture-fit labels.
What are the team’s most important business assumptions or risks, and what signals would cause them to be reassessed?
- What this clarifies
- Understand business direction and uncertainty.
- How it informs your choice
- Decide whether you understand and can work within these conditions.
What are the actual expectations for on-call work, releases, urgent response, or cross-time-zone collaboration?
- What this clarifies
- Verify work patterns and ongoing constraints.
- How it informs your choice
- Compare the conditions with your schedule and sustainable work boundaries.
Promotion conversations
Compared with my current stage, what is the core change in responsibility, and which responsibilities must already be sustained?
- What this clarifies
- Clarify the change in responsibility expected for promotion.
- How it informs your choice
- Check whether the target scope is clear rather than relying on level labels.
Which outcomes and behaviors will the review examine, over what time period, and how is sustained performance assessed?
- What this clarifies
- Confirm the evidence set, time window, and expectations for sustained performance.
- How it informs your choice
- Plan verifiable evidence across the review period.
Who participates in the review, and how are responsibility scopes calibrated across teams, projects, and career tracks?
- What this clarifies
- Understand decision ownership and calibration.
- How it informs your choice
- Assess whether the process has clear owners and explainable comparisons.
Based on the evidence so far, what is the most important gap, and what real work would help fill it?
- What this clarifies
- Translate feedback into an observable gap and real work.
- How it informs your choice
- Check whether the next step is actionable and verifiable.
What authority, resources, or coaching would be needed for this scope, and who would provide them by when?
- What this clarifies
- Clarify organizational commitments and support ownership.
- How it informs your choice
- Check whether expanded responsibility comes with the needed conditions.
How does the review consider inconsistent results, missed expectations, or contrary evidence, and what context could change their interpretation?
- What this clarifies
- Understand how the review handles mixed evidence and alternative explanations.
- How it informs your choice
- Support a fact-based discussion of risk and improvement rather than hiding contrary evidence.
When is the review decision usually made? If the evidence is not yet sufficient, when and against what evidence will progress be revisited?
- What this clarifies
- Confirm timing and a follow-up review mechanism.
- How it informs your choice
- Check that the path has clear checkpoints rather than indefinite expanded responsibility.
Which responsibilities will be added or handed off after promotion, and how will a successful transition be assessed?
- What this clarifies
- Understand how responsibilities change after promotion.
- How it informs your choice
- Assess whether the new scope has clear boundaries and a transition plan.