- What motivates them. Is it growth? Learning? Autonomy?
- How they spend their free time. This gives you a glimpse at the candidate’s personal “why.” If they aren’t growing in their free time, they probably aren’t looking to grow with you.
- How they solve problems. Does it mesh with your culture?
- The kind of work culture they came from. It’s probably the culture they want to avoid.
- How they interact with clients. Ask about a story of working with a client.
- Kolbe Test: A personality test based on instinct. Reviewing the results, you learn about your conative abilities. In other words, how they act in specific situations. This is one test that’s becoming more common to use in the interview process.
- StrengthsFinder Test: An aptitude test in which you and your candidate learn their top five strengths. As a firm owner, you can compare these to the rest of your team to see if they would be a good fit.
- Cross-train them in various positions as a bonus so they don’t get bored and can broaden their skillset.
- Provide paid training to the candidate and even tickets to conferences they would enjoy.
- Give them autonomy on certain one-off projects they can pick.
- Pay for a professional development or educational program they can participate in. For example, a 12-week leadership course.
- Provide a slight bump in bonuses for retirement and for performance.