- When done correctly, informational interviews or coffee chats will not only give you
an inside perspective on your dream company, but will also allow you to find out about opportunities that may
not be posted publicly yet. And the single biggest factor that determines how the conversation goes, is the quality of the
questions that you ask since that deeply affects
how your interviewee feels about you. Are they gonna forget
about you the next day, or will they go out of their way and introduce you to their contacts, thereby expanding your network and perhaps even vouch for you, once position does open up. In this video, I'm gonna
share three types of questions you wanna ask in every
informational interview, share two to three examples from each type and a non-negotiable question you, you always want to end with. So let's get started. What most professionals are
looking for when they agreed to have an informational
interview with you, is that they're trying to see whether you have a genuine curiosity, about the industry, about
the company, about the role. And you can show that you do, by asking questions from a
following three categories. Number one, tasks and responsibilities. Number two, career path, and number three, industry knowledge. Taken together questions
from these three categories, show them that you've
given a lot of thought on all aspects of the job and company. Instead, of focusing only
on superficial benefits, like free food, for example. Diving right into two example questions from the tasks and possibilities category. Number one. What aspect of your job do
you find the most rewarding? Contrary to popular belief, the, tell me about your
day-to-day question, isn't a great question to ask, because you might find that a
lot of professionals nowadays may not have a typical day-to-day and they may end up still telling you some vague description of their roles and responsibilities. By prompting them to think about what they find most
rewarding about their work, you help them drill down on
specific situations and examples leading to a more concrete answer. Second question. How is your performance measured? Or put another way, what's your KPI? I love this question because
it gets right to the point. How one might describe his or her job is always gonna be a little
bit subjective and arbitrary, but come performance review time, the metrics that their
manager are reviewing them on, those are always gonna
be in black and white. It's just how companies standardized a performance review process. Their answer will give
you a very realistic feel of the workload and responsibilities, if you're working in a similar position. By the way, I have a Facebook Group where I share exclusively weekly tips. So consider joining if
you haven't already. I'll link it down below. Moving on to examples from
the career path category. Number one. How did you begin your career? This question is great because the answer will give you insight into the decisions that person made purposefully or otherwise to arrive at their current role today. You often find that very rarely are people's career
trajectories, completely linear. There are usually a lot
of twists and turns, and that may give you confidence as you navigate your own path. Second example question. If you think about a recent new hire you enjoyed working with, what are some of their
characteristics that to mind? Again, this question prompts them to think about a specific person and provide concrete examples, making it a much more meaningful question than something like, what advice would you have for someone who's just starting out? Number three. What did you find the most
surprising about the role? To be honest, this is just
a very nice way to ask, what do you not like about the role? For informational
interviews, coffee chats, they're usually very casual. So you can definitely
ask a question like this and expect to hear a pretty
straightforward answer. Finally example questions regarding industry knowledge. Number one. What publications do you
recommend I subscribe to, if I want to stay up to date
on this industry's trends? I feel like this question
is pretty self explanatory and really does demonstrate
a very high level of interest in that target industry you want to be in. But somehow it's very rarely asked. Most colleges and even companies have paid subscriptions available for not only the major news publications, but also industry specific resources like e-marketer if you're in marketing and Bloomberg if you're into finance. And because there's a
lot of content, right? You wanna make sure you're
spending your time wisely and regularly reading
up on relevant content rather than having information overload. Second example question
for industry knowledge. What are some of the current
events or trends in industry that I should be aware of? So this question is interesting, not only because you got
to hear their point of view on current events in a specific industry, but also give you an opportunity to share your industry knowledge, given that you have done some
sort of homework beforehand. So it's like two birds, one stone. You can use what you hear from them in your next actual interview. And you get to impress them with the research you've done in a very natural, non forced way. If you found these
example questions helpful, please give this video a like, and let me know down
in the comments below, which questions you will use
in your next coffee chat. Last but not least, a question that doesn't fall in any of those three categories, because it's a question
you wanna ask at the end of every single informational
interview or coffee chat. And that is, based on what we discussed today, is there anyone else you
think I should talk to? I'm not even exaggerating when I say this question
could be the deciding factor on whether you get closer
to that dream role of yours. From a nerdy statistical standpoint, the more relevant people
you meet in a given field, the higher the chance of
someone being able to help you get to where you wanna be. It's very easy to see
someone land a great role and chalk it up to luck. And I agree, but you can always
increase the surface area of which luck can hit you, by putting yourself out there, by asking to be introduced
to the next person, by having that next coffee chat. By not asking this question, it's like leaving money on the table. The worst thing that can happen is that the interviewee
awkwardly laughs and says, "No, I'm sorry." And that's totally fine. So that wraps up the
three types of questions you should always ask during
informational interviews. Please remember the questions
I provided are just examples. And if you have your own questions, as long as the three
categories are covered, you're good to go. Let me know down in the comments, If you have any questions and subscribe if you haven't already. See you on the next video and
the meantime have a great one.
