The Foxhole Test for Candidates

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In The Career Toolkit: Essential Skills for Success That No One Taught You, I wrote about why I think the airport test is overrated and really shouldn’t be used as a metric for most jobs. A better choice would be the Foxhole Test.

The term foxhole refers to a small hole dug into the earth where typically one or two soldiers position themselves. It provides simple cover from small arms and artillery but is very close to the front line and very dangerous. There’s a famous aphorism, “there are no atheists in foxholes;” it means when you’re that close to the front, knowing you could die literally any second, you turn to whatever comfort you can, i.e., even atheists start to pray to God.

In a similar vein the term “foxhole buddy” is someone who has your back. When two soldiers are in the foxhole, their lives depend on each other. The question at that moment isn’t, “Would you want to spend six hours in an airport with this person?” but rather, “How do you feel trusting this person with your life?”

For most of us in corporate offices, our lives are never on the line. But we do have periods we consider stressful. Sooner or later, you have a very tight deadline and may have to put in long hours trying to get it done. Those of us in tech have sometimes had to deal with server crashes in the middle of the night, sometimes where every minute means lost revenue. A crisis, from a hack to a bad news story to a product recall, can be a very stressful, high risk, unplanned challenge. In all of these situations you’re likely to be working with others to resolve it. Who do you want in the foxhole with you?

I’ve been at some early-stage, under-resourced startups and have had a few inopportune crashes earlier in my career. None of us liked dealing with that fire drill, but the attitudes of the people in the foxholes ranged from those who saw this as part of the excitement of startup life, to those who just rolled up their sleeves to get it done, to one I recall vividly who whined and complained every minute of the way. Instead of focusing on the problem, he kept talking saying “this is bulls***.” None of us wanted to be there, but the constant complaining didn’t help. That’s not the guy I want on my team. I also had a team who wanted to roll out a release right before Thanksgiving. I explicitly asked each person on the team, “If this release has a problem, are you willing to work Thanksgiving Day to fix it?” They all said yes. When we did have a problem, some stepped up, others mysteriously didn’t answer their phones. Guess which people I would hire again.

In Neil Simon’s semi-autobiographical play Biloxi Blues (and later movie of the same title), there’s a scene where the main character Eugene (based on Simon) is at basic training in 1945. His notebook is taken by the troop bully, Wykowski, and read out loud to the platoon. In it we see Eugene’s thoughts on Wykowski. “Wykowski is pure animal,” Eugene writes, going to graphic detail about some habits Eugene looks down upon. But the writing continues, "Despite Wykowski's lack of culture, sensitivity or the pursuit of anything that is minutely intellectual, his greatest strength is his consistency of character and his earnest belief that he belongs on the battlefield. He is clearly the best soldier in the pl . . . [sic] in the platoon, dependable under pressure, and it would not surprise me if Wykowski came out of the war with the Medal of Honor." Eugene wouldn’t want to spend a second at the airport with Wykowski, but he also knows that in the foxhole, Wykowski is the guy you want next to you.

That’s a bit extreme. Who’s in the foxhole with you is critically important in war; it can literally mean life or death. The stakes aren’t so high in the office and most of the time we’re with our co-workers in a less pressured setting. Annoying co-workers (anything from loud humming to not showing, not just annoying work habits) can make the job annoying or even unbearable. But people who you wouldn’t be excited to be at the airport with, or even someone you’d like to minimize contact with, may be ok to work with from time to time if they were a strong co-worker. I’d advise against dinging people for that. More important is who will deliver when the chips are down; that’s the person you want in the foxhole with you, on the battlefield or at work.

How do you measure it? There are three potential approaches. The first is to look at prior events. You can ask the candidate (or their references) how s/he dealt with such situations in the past. Like any such response there’s the potential for spin. Second, you can provide a stressful situation and see how the candidate responds. Finally, you can try to look indirectly for characteristics. Like most interview techniques, none are perfect and all have limitations. The third approach especially is challenging; many psychological assessments I know find people have slightly different behaviors under stress. Anecdotally we all know people who are very nice but under stress, Dr. Jekyll becomes Mr. Hyde. Still, I’d use the Foxhole test over the Airport Test any day.

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