The other day, I tweeted: “Interviewing someone tomorrow. What’s your favourite interview question? Heard some great ones before, but thought I would throw the question out again.”

Twitter is a great resource for questions like this, and fairly quickly I got back several ideas, along with a request to summarise them:

• What is the biggest mistake you have made… and how did you recover / learn from it? Whingeing_Pom
• What are you most passionate about? WorkInColour
• What changes would you introduce in your current position that would make you stay there? dwinter
• Ask them to tell me a story for each core value JHenning
• What are the mistakes you see most people making in this situation etc? KenBurgin
• Reference question: Would you employ this person again? Why/why not?  dwinter

Previously when I have asked this question, I have received:

• At some stage in the interview ask them what they think of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Although the person who suggested the question, as well as myself, are big Buffy fans, they said, the answer doesn’t matter, what matters is whether they say what they think regardless of your opinion or try to work out what answer they should be saying. I have never asked this question, mainly because I couldn’t do it with a straight face, but it does raise an interesting point. Interviewees can research your website and you (if they know who the interviewer will be) and work out the answers you want to most questions – is that what you want? If they answer what you want, but it isn’t true for them, then that will come out when they start to work with you, and it will cause problems. Often it will impact the whole team, and you have to adapt the team to their style, educate them and change their cultural approach, or find a replacement.  All of which can cost the business quite a lot.
• Ask them to describe their favourite boss. I have asked this one, and it has been very useful. Once someone said I can’t describe my favourite boss, but I can describe someone I really didn’t like as a boss and why. That worked equally as well. After having a team for several years, with some quite open staff giving feedback on my management style, I am quite aware of what I do well, what I need to improve, and what I naturally do and probably won’t change. If someone describes a workplace that isn’t Tribe Research then they are not going to be happy working for me.

This time, I didn’t ask any of these questions directly, although the conversation did ‘circle around’ some of them. They were a great refresher on thinking about what I wanted on the team and whether the candidate would be that.

I recently read a fascinating article in the February 2008 Edition of the Harvard Business Review (p28). Here is my cliff notes version…

The article explains how the gamer disposition is exactly what you want in your workforce because of 5 attributes that make your employees flexible, resourceful, improvisational, eager for a quest, believers in meritocracy, and foes of bureaucracy. The 5 attributes of a gamer disposition they have identified are:

1. Bottom-line orientated

Their goal is not to be rewarded but to improve. The game worlds have a symmetrical assessment (leaders are assessed as players are) and reviews are only meaningful for enhancing individual and group performance.

2. Understand the power of diversity

Each player is by definition incomplete given that teamwork is the key to achievement and the strongest teams have a diverse mix of talents and abilities. Therefore advancement criteria is “How much have I helped the group?” not “How good am I?”.

3. Thrive on change

Gamers create, thrive on and seek out change rather than simply managing it.

4. See learning as fun

Gaming is assembling and combining tools and resources. Reward is converting new knowledge into action. For gamers current successes are resources for solving future problems.

5. Marinate on the “edge”

Even when common solutions are known, the gamer demands a better more original response to the problem. A desire to seek and explore the edges in order to discover some new insight or useful information deepens one’s understanding of the game.

My thoughts: I was so fascinated by this article because we have been saying that research is a journey (or an expedition) where you “marinate on the ‘edge’” and learning is the objective. I often hear two things when people find out that I have a market research company: 1. Oh, you are one of those boring people. 2. Are you one of those companies that ring at 7pm asking me about my favourite brand of chips or pasta.

My answer to both is no. I would like to think that myself and the research we do isn’t boring as we select clients that have oganisations that are for the benefit of society, taking a gaming approach to each. I know this is a subjective definition, but it is a good starting point that I would like to think I hold to. Also, we do research on our tribes. Therefore we only contact you for research if our clients have your contact details or you can opt in to do the research rather than be intruded on to ask to participate on a product that you may or may not know about.

Can you recognise any potential benefits from taking a gaming approach within your organisation?

In January this year, I invited 3 business owners I knew, but didn’t know each other, with non-competing businesses, and different skills, to be part of a mastermind group – we now call it Great Minds Group (which is much easier for email communication because you can abbreviate to GMG!).

I thought I would share the process with you for a few reasons:

1. It has been immensely beneficial for Tribe Research
2. Lots of people have personally asked me about it
3. There have been LinkedIn questions about Mastermind groups, indicating their appeal and curiosity about them.
4. We are presenting a day at Small Business Month indicating the success of our group.

At the first meeting everyone gave an overview of their business and how they came to starting it. I researched Mastermind groups on the internet and provided a summary.

The group then decided:

• Meet monthly for 2 hours in the city
• Each meeting would focus on 2 businesses (an hour for each)
• The issue to be dealt with at the meeting to be emailed the week prior to the meeting so it can be considered
• To operate with an understanding of confidentiality, not a signed agreement
• Any member can be asked to leave if there is a conflict and people are free to leave themselves (neither has happened yet)

Our first meeting wasn’t awkward, everyone was excited by the opportunity and accepted the consensus of the majority. Another business owner has been invited and they were happy with the decisions already made.

For me, our Great Minds Group is useful for getting other business owners views and ideas. It is a support crew that I regularly catch up with, share success with, and don’t feel the same isolation that you can feel when it isn’t all going according to plan.

My Advisory Board that meets every 6 weeks, and has been for just over a year, can then be used for strategic and financial issues – where the ideas from the Great Minds Group are discussed and strategic direction is developed.

I would love to hear your views about mastermind groups…

In a previous post I mentioned a departing staff member recently suggested we started a group for previous staff who haven’t been fired and don’t work for competitors, to stay in touch.

Her reasoning was that because I involve staff in the business development of Tribe Research and they love working for the company, they weren’t leaving because they didn’t like it, they just wanted different experiences. Therefore they’re likely to be interested in staying in touch and making small contributions to the business where possible. Also, they’re in a great position to provide independent and informed feedback on the business. When it comes to new products, previous staff may even become raving fans if they are kept up to date on what is going on and have the opportunity to stay in touch with each other.

This is how TRX was born. A group of previous employees who keep in touch through a newsletter and social events. So far we’ve sent an email newsletter to all previous and current staff who qualify to be a TRX member and we’ve received positive feedback from the members – they seem particularly grateful for the opportunity to stay in touch with each other. We’re also planning our inaugural annual event for TRX members to be held later in the year.

I will let you know about the progress of TRX in case you’re interested in establishing your own club for previous staff.