Take the 5 most common issues you have with supporting your users and build some questions regarding those scenarios. Look for specifics, use terminology to gauge his familiarity and knowledge. Never ask questions that are simply yes/no answers.
1. End users calls us and cannot access Internet, page comes up cannot be displayed. Roleplay with me troubleshooting this issue. a. I look for questions about what page are you trying to goto? Identify if it's a internal company site, general internet page, spyware popup, etc. b. Is the network card disabled - Hugely common c. How are you connecting, wireless, hard wired? d. Can they walk an end user through pinging to verify connectivity? e. Do they know about VPN software? f. Can they walk a user through a wifi connection problem? g. Do they have good communication skills through all of this? Do they get frustrated? Do they do a lot of huh? Hmm? I da know? 2. Black screen pops up saying cannot boot. What are your troubleshooting steps? a. Check for CD, or USB drive hooked up causing boot issue. b. Do they know enough to walk a user through identifying BIOS errors for HDD to prevent shipping back working machines with faulty peripherals? 3. Roleplay a really mad end user and see how he handles it? This is fun... 4. Give a piece of paper with a list of common protocols, have him define what they are and their port numbers. You see where I am going with the leading of the questions?? Good luck. Greg From: Gavin Wilby [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, April 20, 2008 8:10 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Interviewing a home user engineer. Hello All, I have just had this sprung on me this morning that tomorrow afternoon I am interviewing a new guy for a position in our company. The role is going to specifcally be for home user support - and basic 1st line network support. Thing is, I have never conducted an interview before! What sort of things should I be asking the guy and in what manner? Im only interested in the technical side of things, my boss will be handling everything else. Heres a short list that I have pulled out of thin air ;) * What experience do you have of operating systems? Are you happy with Windows 9x, NT, XP and above. OSX? Installation and troubleshooting. * Are you familier with the various Office suites? * Can you troubleshoot various hardware configurations and issues? * Can you setup and configure printers, faxes and MFD's. Give me an example. * Can you set up WIFI connections - how would you set them up (security, access etc) * Can you explain things to a home user in a manner that they will understand (example). * Can you be patient and tolerant to a home user with little or no technical ablity? * What level of training have you had - what would you like to achive? (MCP, CompTIA, further education? AS I say, I have just pulled these out of thin air - so would value any advice. Gavin. ~ Upgrade to Next Generation Antispam/Antivirus with Ninja! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbelt-software.com/SunbeltMessagingNinja.cfm> ~
