The Question Bank
The Question Bank.
Every question we bring into the room, organised by what it is trying to get at. A hundred of them, and growing. Suggest one of your own.
The one we always come back to
Can we see what makes someone extraordinary?
Beginnings and becoming
Who they were before they were who they are.
- When did you first realise you were going to take this seriously?
- Who saw it in you before you saw it in yourself?
- What was the version of you that nobody would recognise now?
- What were you obsessed with as a kid that nobody around you understood?
- Was there a moment you can point to where you stopped pretending and started actually trying?
- What is the earliest piece of feedback that genuinely changed how you worked?
- If you could send one sentence back to the version of yourself five years ago, what would you say?
- What did you have to unlearn?
- What is something about your background that explains more about you than your CV does?
- Who in your family would you say you have ended up most like, and would they be flattered or annoyed by that?
How they actually work
The day-to-day, the texture, the rituals nobody asks about.
- Walk me through the first hour of an actual working day. Not your ideal one, your real one.
- What does your work look like when nobody is watching?
- What is the part of the job you love that nobody else seems to find interesting?
- What is the part of the job you would happily never do again?
- Where do you do your best thinking, and what is it about that place?
- How do you know when something you are working on is actually good?
- What is your relationship with deadlines? Honestly.
- When you are stuck, what is the thing that almost always gets you unstuck?
- What is something you do that an outsider would think is weird or pointless, but that you swear by?
- Is there a tool, object, or piece of kit that you cannot work without?
- Do you keep a list, a notebook, a system? Show us.
- How much of what you do is instinct, and how much is process?
Decisions, taste, and instinct
How they pick, and what they rule out instantly.
- Walk me through a decision you made that other people thought was wrong at the time.
- What is the difference, for you, between a good idea and a great one?
- When you say no to something, what are you usually saying no to?
- What do you find yourself ruling out almost immediately, and why?
- Whose taste do you trust most, and what have you learned from them?
- What is a piece of conventional wisdom in your field that you think is just wrong?
- What is something you used to believe strongly that you have changed your mind about?
- When you disagree with someone smart, how do you know whether to trust them or yourself?
- Is there a decision you regret? Walk me through it.
- How do you tell the difference between an instinct worth following and a fear worth ignoring?
- What is a small choice you make often that you think reveals a lot about you?
Pressure, doubt, and difficulty
What cuts underneath the performance.
- What is the hardest week of your career, and what did it actually feel like to live through?
- What kind of pressure do you handle well, and what kind quietly destroys you?
- How do you talk to yourself when it is going badly?
- What do you do with doubt? Run from it, sit with it, argue with it, ignore it?
- When was the last time you genuinely thought you might be in over your head?
- What is something you have been wrong about publicly, and how did you process it?
- Is there a fear that follows you around even now?
- Do you compare yourself to other people in your field? Is it useful or corrosive?
- What is the gap, if there is one, between how confident you look and how confident you feel?
- What is something you wish more people understood about how this work actually feels?
The work itself
The making itself.
- What part of the craft are you still trying to get better at?
- What is something you have made that you are quietly the proudest of, even if it is not the best-known thing?
- What is the version of this work that you would do for free?
- What is a thing in your field that everyone copies that you find genuinely tired?
- What is happening in your field right now that excites you, and what is happening that worries you?
- Is there a piece of work you almost ditched that ended up being the best thing you have done?
- What does "finished" actually mean to you?
- When you are working on something hard, what does the bad version look like, and how do you know to throw it out?
- Is there an idea you have been carrying around for years that you have not made yet?
- If you could only keep one thing you have ever made, what would it be?
People, mentors, and the company they keep
Almost nobody gets there alone.
- Who do you call when something is genuinely going wrong?
- Who told you something hard that you needed to hear, and how did you take it?
- What kind of person makes you better just by being in the room?
- What is a piece of advice you got that you ignored, and were right to ignore?
- Who do you read or watch or follow that most people in your field have never heard of?
- Has anyone ever taught you something without saying anything?
- Is there someone you used to look up to who you would now disagree with? What changed?
- What kind of teammate are you actually like, on a bad day?
- Who owes you nothing but you owe them everything?
Ambition, money, fame, and the cost
The questions most interviews skirt around.
- What does ambition look like for you now, compared to what it looked like five years ago?
- What did you give up to get here, and would you give it up again?
- What is your relationship with money, and has it changed?
- What does success look like to you that you have not achieved yet?
- What is the most uncomfortable thing about being recognised in the way that you are?
- Is there a version of "making it" you used to want that you are glad you never got?
- What does rest mean to you? Are you good at it?
- How do you tell the difference between drive and self-punishment?
- What would have to be true for you to walk away from all of this tomorrow?
Inner life and contradictions
The things people do not say out loud unless somebody asks.
- What is something you believe deeply that you suspect is unpopular?
- What is a contradiction in you that you have made peace with?
- What is something you are quietly insecure about that an outsider would never guess?
- What is a question you ask yourself a lot?
- What is a question you avoid asking yourself?
- When was the last time you changed your mind about something that mattered?
- What is the most surprising thing about the way your life has actually turned out?
- What part of you feels least understood?
- What is the smallest, weirdest, most specific thing that brings you genuine joy?
- Is there a version of yourself you are still trying to grow into?
- What is something true about you that would not make it into a profile written about you?
Curiosity and what they pay attention to
What they notice, and the shape of how they think.
- What are you most curious about right now that has nothing to do with your work?
- What is a question you genuinely do not know the answer to and would love to?
- What do you read, watch, or listen to that other people in your field would find strange?
- What do you notice that other people seem to miss?
- Is there a field completely unrelated to yours that you find quietly fascinating?
- What is something you would want to learn if time and reputation were not factors?
- Whose mind do you most want to spend an hour inside, living or dead?
- What is a piece of media (a film, a song, a book, an article) you keep coming back to and cannot fully explain why?
Closers
Slower, bigger, harder to fake.
- If you could make sure one piece of what you do outlasts you, what would it be?
- What do you hope someone says about you in twenty years that nobody is saying yet?
- What is the part of your life right now you suspect you will miss most when you look back?
- What advice are you tired of giving?
- What advice would you only give to a very specific kind of person?
- Is there something you wish someone had asked you in an interview that nobody ever has?
- If we did this same conversation in five years, what is the question you hope you have a different answer to?
- What is something you would like to be true about you that is not yet?
- If we boiled today down to one moment we should remember from being with you, which one would you want it to be?
- Did this feel like a real conversation? What would have made it more so?
Add to the bank
Suggest a question.
A question you wish someone would ask. We read every one and add the best by hand.
Thank you. We read every suggestion, and add the best by hand.