[26912] in resnet
Re: interview questions for Network/Systems Admin types
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Stacey Kimmel-Smith)
Wed Oct 19 23:16:43 2011
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Message-ID: <4E9F9224.7010005@lehigh.edu>
Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2011 23:14:44 -0400
Reply-To: Resnet Forum <RESNET-L@listserv.nd.edu>
From: Stacey Kimmel-Smith <sek2@lehigh.edu>
To: RESNET-L@listserv.nd.edu
In-Reply-To: <6DDE0F95-E597-43B2-A070-9A2B103EFCC4@duke.edu>
Interviews are so interesting. We do a very thorough job -- our
interviews for fulltime help desk staff are almost a day long -- so we
have plenty of time for open-ended questions. What is interesting about
the questions I posted previously is what they reveal aside from
technical knowledge.
-- how they handle what they don't know. It is amazing how difficult it
is to admit you don't know. In most cases we expect applicants to "miss"
a few, it is no big deal. Many admit it openly. But some applicants look
at you and with unblinking confidence relay an answer that simply has no
basis in fact (e.g., what is IMAP). This is a giant red flag from the
perspective of help desk service. The search committee often jokes that
we need to assure applicants that we can't be snowed because WE KNOW THE
RIGHT ANSWERS.
-- some are defensive or flustered to the point where conversation is
inhibited. Again, this says something about possible help desk performance.
-- for some of the questions, such as a troubleshooting approach, it's
clear that the applicant does not understand the issue or bit of tech
knowledge we're testing, but they describe an approach that gets around
their lack of knowledge to get the answer --that is really kind of
impressive. When they show ability to make use of the knowledge they do
have, and it advances toward a solution, you've gotta admire that. That
bodes well for help desk service, I think...
Stacey
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