Waze cofounder explains the 2 questions he asks a job candidate's reference

Waze cofounder Uri Levine recommends speaking with a job applicant's references if you're still on the fence and asking these simple questions.

• What should you do if you're on the fence about a job candidate?
• Speak with their references of course, says Waze cofounder Uri Levine.
• Here are the simple questions he asks an applicant's reference to determine whether or not to hire them.

Speaking with a job candidate's references can help you decide whether or not they're a good fit for the job. But what exactly do you ask them?

Uri Levine, cofounder of traffic and navigation app Waze, has a few questions he always falls back on. He discussed his process in an episode of Lenny's Podcast released Sunday.

"Even in the hiring process most of us are going to interview candidates and then decide that they like or dislike the candidate, but they don't know," Levine said. "Then speak with someone that does know. Speak with the reference."

Levine keeps the questions simple when talking with applicant references.

"Would you hire him or her?" he asks them. "If they tell me yes, then I would ask them, 'Why didn't you?'"

In some cases, the hiring decision is clearer, as he recalled.

"Someone asked me for a reference on someone that I really enjoyed working with, I really think highly of them," he said. "And he asked me if they can schedule a call for half an hour and I said, 'Look I'm traveling, I don't really have time. But if you want an email in one word, take the guy.' And then he was trying to outsmart and ask me back, 'Can I have that in two words?' And I said, 'Yeah, take the guy fast.' When you know, you know. That's it."

Levine also discussed other hiring tips from his recent book, "Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution: A Handbook for Entrepreneurs."

He follows a "30-day test," for example, in which he puts a note on his calendar for 30 days after he's hired someone to ask himself if, knowing what he knows now about them, he'd still bring them onboard. If not, it's probably best to let them go, in Levine's opinion.

Levine did not immediately respond to a request for comment.