The 8 Best Interview Questions For Small Business Owners

Between securing funding, creating a business plan, balancing your books and overcoming common challenges, building a great franchise business takes a lot of work. But to keep it running — and keep it successful — you’ll need to build a great team.

But with so many job seekers out there, how can you determine the right hires for your franchise? The key is to ask the right questions during the interview process.

Asking generic questions, such as “can you tell me about yourself,” or “what is your greatest weakness” will get you generic responses.

Instead, you’ll want to delve deeper to get a better understanding of each candidate’s skills, accomplishments, attitude and behavior.

Here are some of the best interview questions for small business owners that can elicit the right kinds of answers:

What Do You Know About Our Company?

You want someone who is genuinely interested — and excited — about joining your organization, so sure the interviewee has taken the time to research your business.

Can You Tell Me About A Time When You Disagreed With Your Boss And How You Resolved The Situation?

It’s inevitable: employees and employers will disagree from time to time. However, it is important that the candidate conveys that they respect their superiors and that they can resolve issues in a professional and productive manner.

Insist on details and take note if the answers are overly negative or deflecting. If he or she says that they never disagree with their superiors, then they are probably not telling the truth, which is a big red flag.

What Specific Initiatives Of Yours Did Your Previous Employer Implement?

Great employees don’t just come to work; they come to make a difference in the company. Try to find out how comfortable your candidate is with introducing innovations and following through on their ideas.

What Are Some Things Your Current Company Could Do To Be More Successful?

This is a great question to ask in order to determine how a candidate thinks — big picture or minor details; constructively or emotionally; as part of a team or as an individual employee.

Describe How You Would (Implement A New Procedure, Speak With An Angry Customer, Adapt to a New Computer Program, Etc.)?

If there is a task that the person will need to perform or a technical skill that they need to possess while working for your franchise, ask them about it. Get as specific — to your industry and your business — as you can in order to ensure that the candidate has what it takes to succeed.

What Are Some Things That You Do Not Enjoy Doing And Would Prefer Not To Do In A New Job?

Instead of asking for a weakness, which will probably elicit a prepared and evasive answer, ask the applicant straight out what they don’t like to do. If they dislike a major function of the role, then it is probably not a good match, as you want your employees to be satisfied in their jobs.

How Would Your Previous Managers Describe You?

Listen closely and take careful notes, because you will want to compare it to the information that you receive via our last question.

Can You Provide References From Your Previous Managers?

Conducting reference checks is a critical part of the hiring process; unfortunately many employers fail to ask for them.

Don’t make that mistake!

Insist on at least three references and take the time to call each one, as that is the best way to make sure that the candidate was truthful and honest in their interviews.

We’ve Got Questions — And Answers, Too!

At Bin There Dump That, we help our franchisees ace the interview process by providing sample questions and best practices; but the help we provide doesn’t end there. We provide ongoing support to give you the answers and advice you need, when you need it, no matter the topic.

If you’ve got questions for us, we welcome the chance to answer them. Contact us today to get started.