Questions to avoid hiring a bad developer
Below are 3 questions crafted to give a glimpse at the experience of the developer you're interviewing. Senior developers with projects under their belts should compelling responses, calibrated for your project.
For maximum effect, this line of questions should come after your initial project interview and after you receive your project proposal from the developer.
Question 1
What are the primary risks you see associated with this project, and how do you plan to address them?
This question requires the developer to thoroughly understand the project. Many times the greatest threats are not technical. Often they are related to the personnel, timing, and budget. Building the wrong solution under-budget, in record time, is still a patent failure. Pay close attention to the answer to get a good idea for how holistically this developer thinks.
Question 2
What guarantees will you offer to ensure the success of this project?
This question ensures the developer has considered the unique ways they can guarantee the success of your project. Ideally they will have a combination of standard "money-back" guarantees along with some project-specific guarantees for your project. This also lets you know if they're been paying close attention to the risks as outlined above.
Question 3
What does the structure and cadence of communication look like for this project?
This question will reveal if the developer has ever encountered a "silent death" during a project. This happens at the very end of the project, during the hand-off, and indicates a failure to fully see the project across the line.
BONUS
You can use the response of Question 3 to follow up with their plan for the hand-off. If your developer includes a detailed hand-off plan, you can be sure this isn't their first rodeo.
These questions, on their own, will not prevent you from making a poor hiring decision. However, they can either prompt additional questions or reveal gaps in the planning that should be addressed before accepting a project proposal.