After more than 100 resumes 20 interviews (including a few grueling ones) we've narrowed down our candidates to 5 standouts. This diverse group will be asked to write a blog entry over the weekend and submit them to us on Monday morning at which point we'll let you vote on which blog entry you like best. The entries will be anonymized but they're all on a similar topic (though I expect to see great creativity from the participants).

Next Monday there will be one blog entry that links to the five and asks you SEOmoz's readers to vote on the entry you like best. Although this won't determine entirely who we hire it will be one of the items we'll consider as we finish up our second-interview process next week and decide on a candidate.

Community input may seem like an odd hiring tactic but I think it fits perfectly with SEOmoz's goals and ideals. And in the same vein I'd like to solicit community input on the questions you think we should ask our candidates in their more in-depth second interviews. Feel free to enter them into the comments below and we'll include as many as we can. Keep in mind that we've already asked a lot of early-stage questions so we're seeking queries that will be require deep thought and be revealing.

Thanks so much for your feedback and help - I hope that together we can find someone who becomes not only a part of SEOmoz but a part of the search community.