Hey guys I need an interview tip here.

I applied to this payment processing company as an android dev. I completed almost all of the stages, they gave very positive feedback and tomorrow is the last stage (30min talk with their CTO from USA, who's been in his company for 18 years).

They told me that he wont ask many questions and he will just try to scan me and figure out the vibe. Mind that the main company is in USA and company where I'm applying is in Europe. So I guess this is a final test to see how good I'm in english in terms of speaking? Jokes on them I worked in 3 startups in Europe and I can speak better than most of my peers who never left my country lol.

What kind of questions should I ask HIM? I am able to leave a good impression, but I would also appreciate any tips on how to deal with this better. Apparently I will need to communicate with this guy from time to time in the future, as he is the head of our project.

P.S. Also I noticed that his company website is redirecting to a subdomain of his website. Redirection with www. or http works perfectly, but fails with https. For example https://hisdomain.com fails to redirect to https://web.hisdomain.com due to some certificate problem.

Should I mentioned and show him that I spotted this problem, will he think that Im too cocky?

Ask if he wants to invest in bitcoin

In no particular order

What is your developer turnover rate?

Can you tell me the reasons why last 5 developers left your company?

If he can't tell you and/or isn't willing, that's a big red flag for a CTO. Being willing to provide good and bad candor is important.

If he offers the info, especially the bad, follow up with what steps has he/she taken to improve the situation? That will make him own (or attempt to deflect) the responsibility for how the department is ran. If they start dancing around "Um..well...uh...it's HR's responsibility for employee happiness", that's another red flag.

An answer of "We've done nothing" isn't necessarily a red flag, its honesty. May not like that answer, but I'd respect someone who tells it like it is.

@PaperTrail this. You need to know what kind of shit you're getting into.

@zemaitis Can't wait for some quality rants from you mate

@PaperTrail Situation is that in Europe (where Im applying) he has 4 teams working on his project. CTO is working in overseas in USA. Probably responsible for higher level stuff and I dont think he needs to care about how every dev feels in his company overseas.

If I wanted to ask retention questions or why some people are leaving I would ask HR or my direct teamleader.

I dont think its a good move to bombard CTO with low level questions (about retention, hiring and firing junior devs and so on) when hes obviously responsible for big picture stuff.

Instead I plan to ask bigger picture stuff such as about his products, plans for scaling, strategy and challenges. This meeting is just for vibe check, not an interrogation.

@zemaitis > "not an interrogation"

It's not an interrogation, its a genuine interest in how they handle challenges. Its the type of conversations that leaders have with other leaders.

Any CTO that is worth anything knows intimately the details of the teams working under them. They don't know need to know cat names or who is dating who. They want to know culture, trends, desires from a '1,000 foot view'. Leaders want to know how their leadership is affecting not only your professional life, but also your personal life. 'Am I making them a better person?' kind of thing. That's a difference between a leader and a boss.

My experience with VPs are they tend to be ego-maniacs. They *love* talking about themselves and their team's accomplishments. Getting them the opportunity to show off their leadership, you're demonstrating you value them as a leader. It's gold, gold, gold...he will remember you when leadership opportunities become available.