Values-Based Situational Interviewing
Turn your company values into questions no one can fake.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 87%
Hormozi favors situational, conversation-based interviewing over hard testing because most practical tests just repeat interview-style questions anyway. Her method: take each core company value, imagine situations in which someone would exhibit it, then break those into specific questions. For competitive greatness she asks what motivates you; for sincere candor she asks about the last hard conversation you had. She reads the candidate's reaction, not just their words. For skills, she asks candidates to recall specific results they drove and exactly how they did it, and looks to actually learn something from the interview.
Origin
As a CEO who felt she needed enough knowledge of every department to detect bullshit, Hormozi built a repeatable way to convert her companies' values into interview questions that surface authenticity.
Core principles
- 01You're buying people's brains, so evaluate through conversation, not rote tests.
- 02Translate each core value into a situation and then into a question.
- 03Judge the reaction as much as the answer.
- 04For skills, ask for specific results the person drove, not daily activities.
How to run it
- 1
List your core values
Start from the values the company actually holds, such as competitive greatness and sincere candor.
- 2
Map each value to a revealing situation
For each value, identify situations in which a person would naturally exhibit it.
- 3
Convert situations into questions
Break each situation into direct questions — e.g. 'why do you come to work every day?' for competitive greatness, or 'tell me about the last hard conversation you had' for sincere candor.
Pro tip Watch the reaction and body language, not just the verbal answer — most people can't fake recalling a recent hard conversation.
- 4
Probe skills through results
Ask the candidate to describe a specific result similar to what you need, how much they moved the metric, and exactly how they did it.
Pro tip Aim to learn something from the candidate in the interview — the best hires can teach you something.
Watch out Vague or activity-based answers with no measurable result signal a weak candidate.
In the wild
Hormozi asks candidates to describe the last hard conversation they had and how it went. She notes most people can't recall one, whereas someone who lives the value can instantly cite a conversation from yesterday.
→ A single question reliably separates people who practice candor from those who don't.
Hiring a director of customer success to reduce churn, she asks 'tell me about a time you reduced churn, how much did you reduce it by, and how did you go about it?'
→ The specificity of the answer reveals whether the candidate can actually drive the needed result.
Common mistakes
Relying on generic hard tests
Most practical tests use the same question format as an interview anyway, so they add friction without better signal.
Accepting activity descriptions as proof of skill
Candidates describing daily actions rather than measurable results they drove haven't proven they can produce the outcome you need.
Is it for you?
Best for
Founders who want to screen for culture and competence through conversation.
Not ideal for
Roles where objective skills testing (e.g. a coding test) is genuinely more predictive.
From the transcript
“what are situations in which somebody would exhibit the values that we have... And then I will take those apart and I will break them…”
“tell me the last hard conversation you had and tell me how it went. And I swear, most of the time nobody can think.”
“tell me about a time that you reduced churn. How much did you reduce it by and how did you go about”
From the episode
Leila Hormozi: $100,000,000 Leadership, How to Build High-Performance Teams People Never Want to Leave
Leila Hormozi