Reference check questions

'What questions to ask for your references?'. This is a common question that companies ask themselves while doing reference checks. The quality of your questions determines if you will have relevant insights from the answers provided.

Why conduct reference checks?

We identified three main reasons

• Verify the candidate’s previous role, position, working period, and reason for leaving.
• Clarify the candidate and referee relationship.
• Gather insights on previous performance. And learn about the candidate’s work ethic, working style, communication skills, and how they work in a team.

Reference check questions to verify the candidate’s previous role and employment

• Position the candidate occupied.
• Working period.
• Reason for leaving.

Backy Check asks those questions to the candidate, and we ask them to validate the answers to their referees.

Questions that clarify the candidate and referee relationship

• Relationship to the candidate.
• Reporting line.
• When they worked together and in what capacity.

Backy Check asks these questions by default. However, you can always customise your questionnaires.

Additional questions you can include:

• How long did you work with each other?

Questions that gather insights on the previous performance

• What would you say are the candidate’s strongest attributes?
• Can you talk about the candidate’s strengths?
• What are the areas where the candidate has the most growth opportunities?

Additional questions you can include:

• How would you rate their work?
• What were their daily duties?
• What were their main responsibilities?
• Were they dependable?
• Did they get to work on time?
• Did they complete the tasks and assignments given to them?
• Did they take direction well?
• How did they support coworkers?
• What are their strong points?
• What are their weak points?
• How did they get along with other people?
• Do they have good communication and listening skills?
• Were there any behaviors that affected job performance?
• Would you rehire? yes or no  If no why not?
• Did they require a lot of supervision or work well independently?
• How did the candidate handle work-related stress?
• Do you think the candidate can do the job we spoke about?
• Describe the candidate’s ability to make sound and timely decisions.
• Would you like to add anything else?
• Do you remember a way on how this candidate handled a situation like...?

Skills questions

You should also add some specific questions regarding the skills needed for the position. For example, if the job is for a web development position, you may want to ask the referees to rate 1 to 5 specific skills such as Python, SQL, or HTML.

Questions to not ask in a reference check

Yes, there are some questions you should avoid.

Long-winded questions

Referees are generally busy, and they don’t have much time to try to understand your questions before answering. Also, you want to speed up your hiring process and make sure the answers are accurate and reliable.

It’s important to ensure that your questions are short, sweet, and relevant.

Backy Check facilitates and speeds up this process by having 3 types of possible answers.

• Free text
• Stars for rating
• Check to box

Predictive questions

You should avoid asking the referees how the candidate will perform in the new role. Questions would offer a historical glimpse into the candidate’s past performance.

Close-ended questions

You should not ask close-ended questions, where the referee is pushed to answer vaguely.

An example of a close-ended question is “Daniel got along with his coworkers, correct?”. Instead, a better question could be “How did Daniel interact with his teammates?”.

Relationship, marital, and family status

You should not ask close-ended questions, where the referee is pushed to answer vaguely.

You should avoid asking questions regarding the applicant’s relationship, marital, or family status. For example, “Does the applicant have any children?”.

What you can ask instead is “Does the applicant has solid work attendance?”.

Religious affiliation

You should not ask about the applicant’s religious affiliation including their church, religious leaders, and religious holiday. You should avoid also, to inquire about whether an applicant can work during religious holidays.

Instead, you could ask about the applicant’s normal work availability and whether there might be possible conflicts with the hours required by the job.

Political affiliation

Same as for religious affiliation we recommend not asking about political affiliation to your candidates.

30 best reference check questions

Here we compiled the best practice reference check questions mentioned above.

Candidate’s previous role and employment

1. Position the candidate occupied.
2. Working period.
3. Reason for leaving.
4. Relationship to the candidate.
5. Reporting line.
6. When they worked together and in what capacity.
7. How long did you work with each other?

Candidate’s performance insights

1. What would you say are the candidate’s strongest attributes? 
2. Can you talk about the candidate’s strengths?
3. What are the areas where the candidate has the most growth opportunities?
4. How would you rate their work? Backy Check has a 1 to 5 easy rating type of question.
5. What were their daily duties?
6. What were their main responsibilities?
7. Were they dependable?
8. Did they get to work on time?
9. Did they complete the tasks and assignments given to them?
10. Did they take direction well?
11. How did they support coworkers?
12. What are their strong points?
13. What are their weak points?
14. How did they get along with other people?
15. Do they have good communication and listening skills?
16. Were there any behaviors that affected job performance?
17. Would you rehire? yes or no  If no why not?
18. Did they require a lot of supervision or work well independently?
19. How did the candidate handle work-related stress?
20. Do you think the candidate can do the job we spoke about?
21. Describe the candidate’s ability to make sound and timely decisions. 
22. Would you like to add anything else?
23. Do you remember a way on how this candidate handled a situation like...?

We will continue to update the Hub; if you have any question or suggestion, please contact us!

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