Help - I have to interview someone!

bridetobe920

Hi ladies -

I have just been told that I will be involved in interviewing candidates for my replacement while on maternity leave.

The first person comes in tomorrow morning (7:45am!), and I am just now hearing about it.   Awesome.

I am in an administrative role, and have never interviewed anyone in my life.  I plan to google and get some tips from DH (as he has interviewed several people recently), but does anyone here have any tips for things I should say/ask?

I am only slightly freaking out....

KathrynMD

Are you going to be making the decision?  I wouldn't worry about this too much - I think they are inviting you mostly as a courtesy so that you can "meet" the person you might have to train and work closely with.  You don't have to ask any "hard" questions - just make conversation w/ them, ask details about their previous jobs - look at the resume and see what pops out to you and then do a "tell me about your position at ____"

Pookster1020

Just think about the skills you really need for your job and ask them about those.  I always ask how they handle difficult situations (irate clients in my field) and ask them to give me an example of a time something happened and how they handled it.

I always ask about previous experience and specifically ask about something on their resume - they should know their own resume.

 

Netty_3

They probably think you'd have good questions since you know exactly what the job entails.  I would start thinking of regular things you do and the tools you use to do them...and maybe come up with questions based on that.  Unless they want you there to answer the interviewees questions.

Mustardseed2007

Yeah no need to freak out. They want to make sure the candidate knows how to do what you do. So if there is software you use all the time (ex. Word, excel, specialty databases, certain webbased programs) you need to make sure they know how to use those. If tehre are certain things you do all the time, ask if they know how to do that.

If you do a lot of personal stuff for your boss, make sure they know that and ask if they have an issue with that. They will probably say no, but the point is you are telling them what you do so they know what to expect.

SPIJaimie

Netty_3:

They probably think you'd have good questions since you know exactly what the job entails.  I would start thinking of regular things you do and the tools you use to do them...and maybe come up with questions based on that.  Unless they want you there to answer the interviewees questions.

This. I think they want you there for the real life example of the position if that makes sense. I would not worry too much, remember you won't be there when that person is working anyways!

PS If you give someone long enough, their crazy will come out and the questions will not matter one bit.