A CEO and former Bain consultant shares his favorite job interview question

pulse

May 24, 2017 3:57 PM

Gather CEO and former Bain & Company consultant Nicholas Miller says that he likes to ask every job candidate an important question about their résumé.

Nicholas Miller put a lot of thought into quitting his senior associate job at Bain & Company in 2012 to launch his software company Gather.

He tells Business Insider that, while his stint at Bain was "by far the best job coming out of college" he could have had and a great learning experience, he and his Bain coworker and Gather co-founder Alex Lassiter knew that, in 10 years, they didn't want to become partners or a management consultants.

"Ultimately, we felt like it was the right time in our careers and our lives to make the jump and give it a shot," he says.

Miller places a great deal of importance in the motivation, drive, and intentions behind a person's career move — it's why he always asks potential hires why they moved from one role to the next during job interviews.

Miller says he's looking for a few things when he asks this: "Why was that the right time? What were they looking to accomplish? And then did they accomplish that at their next job?

By hearing from candidates why they feel now is the right time to look for a new opportunity, Miller says "you can kind of parse people's motivations, but you can also get a good understanding about whether someone's really intentional about their career."

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