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Administrative assistants assist managers with tasks such as scheduling, communications, document production, travel, and clerical tasks. During interviews, hiring managers ask questions about hard skills, soft skills, past experience, and work style. Common skills include word processing, spreadsheet programs, and light accounting. Soft skills include organization and interpersonal communication. Managers and their assistants must have complementary work styles. Candidates must also answer questions about personal motivations and work style preferences.
Administrative assistants typically assist managers, directors, vice presidents, and c-level personnel with tasks such as scheduling, communications, document production, travel, and clerical tasks. They can also help an entire department with these types of tasks. During an interview, the hiring manager will often ask questions centered around the candidate’s hard skills, soft skills, past experience, and personal work style.
Common administrative assistant skills include word processing and spreadsheet programs, light accounting skills, and some writing skills. Certain positions may require additional specific skills. For example, an administrative assistant to a dean of education may need to be familiar with academic publishing rules, and an assistant to the executive director of a hospital may need to be familiar with basic medical terminology. Administrative assistant interview questions are often designed to find out the interviewee’s proficiency in these areas. The candidate may also be asked what types of computer programs they have worked with or how many years of experience they have in a particular skill area.
Hiring managers will also ask administrative assistant interview questions that explore the candidate’s soft skills. This includes areas such as organization and interpersonal communication. For example, a departmental administrative assistant may need to manage the schedules of several people with different roles and different work styles. In this case, the hiring manager might inquire about the candidate’s ability to get the necessary information from super- and sub-communicators with a minimum of friction in the workplace.
Many administrative assistant interview questions focus on experience because the past offers proof of the candidate’s skills. These questions can address hard or soft skill areas. For example, a high-ranking research and development officer will need an administrative assistant who can trust classified or confidential information, so he can ask the candidate to detail past experience with similar information. An administrative assistant for a newly formed position or department may need to create a workable filing system from scratch so that the hiring manager can ask the candidate to acknowledge a time when they performed a similar task.
Managers and their administrative assistants often work closely together to achieve a common goal; therefore, it is critical that their work styles are complementary. A manager who is known to be poorly organized will often look for an administrative assistant who is extremely organized and unafraid to keep him on task. A manager who tends to be temperamental or have less than perfect communication skills often selects an administrative assistant who is unaffected by his mood and is able to “soften the feathers” of people he may antagonize. A manager who travels a lot will need an assistant who can function effectively with very little direct supervision.
Candidates must answer administrative assistant interview questions that address personal motivations and work style preferences as well. This is so important that it will often be the deciding factor between equally qualified candidates. A candidate with a complementary work style may even be chosen by one with more experience or education.
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