You have the interview invitation and, with luck, a list of names. Twenty minutes of focused research on those people will tell you what each of them is likely to care about, which of your examples to lead with, and what to ask at the end. Two hours of unfocused scrolling will tell you where they went on holiday, which helps with none of those and can make you look intrusive.
This guide sets out a short, professional method for researching your interviewers before an interview: how to get their names, where to look, what to note, what to leave alone, and how to use what you find without it showing.
What you are trying to learn
Keep three questions in front of you. Anything that does not help answer one of them can be skipped.
- What is this person’s job, and how does the role you applied for affect it? A hiring manager will judge whether you can take work off their desk. A future peer will judge whether you are easy to work with. An HR interviewer will look at fit, motivation and practicalities.
- What have they worked on recently? A project launch, a published article, a conference talk or a new team they built gives you context for their questions and material for yours.
- What background do you share, if any? The same profession, a former employer, a technical specialism. Shared ground is useful only if it is professional and relevant.
Step 1: Get the names and roles
Many invitations list only a time and a meeting link. It is normal to ask. A short reply to the recruiter or coordinator is enough:
Illustrative wording: “Thank you for confirming Tuesday at 10:00. Could you let me know who I will be meeting, and their roles, so I can prepare properly?”
If the recruiter cannot share names, ask for roles instead (“the hiring manager and a member of the finance team”). That is still enough to plan. If you only learn the names on the day, the role-based preparation below still works.
Step 2: Check the sources in order of reliability
Start with what the organisation publishes, then what the person publishes, and only then what others say about them.
| Source | What it is good for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Company leadership or team pages | Official job title, reporting line, short professional biography | Pages that have not been updated after a reorganisation |
| Professional networking profile | Career history, time in current role, skills, recent posts on work topics | Self-description; titles can be inflated or out of date |
| Company news, press releases, annual reports | Projects the person led or spoke about | Quotes written by communications teams |
| Conference talks, podcasts, webinars | How they think and what they prioritise, in their own words | Older talks may reflect a previous role |
| Articles, publications and research records | Specialist interests, especially for academic, medical, legal and technical interviewers | Co-authored work may not reflect their personal view |
| Your own network | How the team works day to day | Second-hand opinion; treat as a hint, not a fact |
For academic and research interviewers, a publication record is often the most informative source. Many researchers maintain an ORCID record, which, as Oxford Brookes University’s library explains, can bring together publications, funding awards and datasets alongside work history and professional roles.
Before you start, look at your own privacy settings on any professional network you use, so you know what the person may see about your visit. Viewing a profile before an interview is normal and many interviewers expect it. Sending a connection request before the interview is a different matter; wait until afterwards, if at all.
In the UAE and other multilingual workplaces, names are often transliterated in more than one way (for example, Mohammed, Muhammad and Mohamed). If a search returns nothing, try the variants and the company name together.
Step 3: Build a one-line card for each person
Do not walk in with a dossier. For each interviewer, write one card with four lines at most:
- Role: what they do and how your job connects to theirs.
- Recent: one current project, talk or announcement.
- Likely focus: what they will probably test you on.
- One question: something only this person can answer well.
An illustrative card for a hiring manager in a logistics firm might read: “Head of warehouse operations, five years in post. Led the move to a new warehouse management system this year. Will test accuracy and handling change. Ask: what has the new system changed about how the team’s performance is measured?”
Step 4: Adjust your preparation to each type of interviewer
Recruiter or HR partner
They usually cover motivation, notice period, salary expectations, visa or relocation logistics and the hiring timeline. Research tells you whether they are an in-house recruiter (who knows the team) or from an agency (who may know the market better). Ask them about the process and next steps.
Hiring manager
This is the person whose problems you would be solving. Their background shows what “good” looks like to them. A manager who came up through finance will expect numbers; one who came from customer service will listen for how you treat clients. Choose the examples you lead with accordingly.
Future peer or team member
Peers want to know whether you will share the load. Their profiles reveal the tools and methods the team uses. Prepare a question about how work is divided or reviewed.
Senior leader
Directors and executives rarely ask detailed technical questions. Read what they have said publicly about strategy, growth or priorities, and be ready to connect your role to one of those priorities in a sentence.
Technical or specialist assessor
Look for their specialism: a certification body they belong to, a field they publish in, a system they have implemented. Expect depth there. If their speciality overlaps a gap in your experience, prepare an honest account of how you would close it.
Step 5: Remember what research cannot change
Knowing the interviewer will not tell you the questions in a well-run process. In a highly structured interview, as the US Office of Personnel Management describes it, every applicant gets the same pre-defined questions and answers are scored against set benchmarks. In that format, flattering an interviewer’s known interests earns nothing on the score sheet.
What research does change is your choice of examples and your questions. If you know one panellist leads compliance, an example about catching an error before an audit is likely to register more strongly with them than one about speed.
Step 6: Use it lightly in the room
The aim is for your preparation to show in the relevance of your answers, not in references to the interviewer’s biography.
- Do refer to public, work-related material when it is natural, for example (illustrative): “I read the announcement about the new Abu Dhabi site. Will this role support it?”
- Do address the person who asked each question, then include the rest of the panel. A CareerOneStop article on panel interviews recommends making eye contact with the questioner first and then looking around at the other panel members as you answer.
- Don’t mention personal details: family, religion, health, home, holidays or anything from personal social media. Even if it was public, raising it can feel like surveillance.
- Don’t recite their career history back to them. “I see you spent eight years at your previous company” adds nothing.
- Don’t assume. Titles change and profiles are out of date. Phrase anything you found as a question rather than a statement.
Where to draw the line
| Fair to research | Leave alone |
|---|---|
| Job title, team and reporting line | Family members and relationships |
| Career history on professional profiles | Home location or personal contact details |
| Work talks, articles and posts on professional topics | Personal social media accounts |
| Company announcements they are named in | Religious, political or health information |
| Shared professional associations or former employers | Paid people-search or data broker sites |
A simple test: would you be comfortable if the interviewer asked, “How did you know that?” If the honest answer is “from your company’s website” or “from your talk at the conference”, you are on safe ground.
If you can find nothing
Plenty of capable professionals have almost no public footprint. Do not treat that as a problem. Prepare from the role instead: what does a head of procurement in a company of this size usually worry about? Then ask them directly in the interview: “What would make the first six months in this role a success from your side?”
After the interview
Your cards are useful for the follow-up. Thank each interviewer individually; the CareerOneStop article suggests a brief, personal note to each person. Mention one specific point you discussed with that person, so the notes are not identical. A clean email signature with your phone number and profile link makes it easy for them to reply.
Keep the cards after the process ends. If you meet the same people at a later interview or in a new job, you will already know who they are. While you are preparing, the resume and interview questions hub collects answers to related preparation questions.
Frequently asked questions
Is it strange to look up an interviewer before the interview?
No. Looking at professional profiles and company pages is normal preparation, and many interviewers expect it. It becomes strange when it moves into personal accounts or details unrelated to work.
Should I tell the interviewer I looked them up?
There is no need to announce it. Let it show through relevant questions about their work. If they ask, say plainly that you read their profile or a talk they gave.
Should I send a connection request before the interview?
It is safer to wait. A request before the interview can look like pressure. After the interview, a request with a short note of thanks is usually fine.
How long should researching interviewers take?
About ten to fifteen minutes per person is usually enough. Spend the rest of your preparation time on your own examples, which matter more.
What if the panel changes on the day?
It happens often. Note the new person’s name and role at the start, address them as you would anyone else, and use the role-based approach in Step 4.
Sources
- Structured Interviews, US Office of Personnel Management
- The panel interview: 6 tips for before, during, and after, CareerOneStop blog
- What is ORCID?, Oxford Brookes University Library