Administration Officer Interview Preparation Guide

Here is your chance to run through all of your experience. Be concise and if you have done multiple roles, mention something specific for each one. Show that you have a lot of experience and are flexible.

This is similar to the strengths/weaknesses questions - what you like least must be turned into a positive trait. Say that you enjoy the challenge of meeting deadlines and of working in a team environment. For what you like least, say that you do not like it when you see disorganised work and a poorly managed diary; you feel the need to help organise and manage the workload.

Multitasking is a necessary part of an administration job, so say that you enjoy multitasking and the challenge of ensuring that multiple functions and jobs are completed accurately and on time is part of what motivates you in your work.

Being positive is important because often a person's attitude to their work can come across in their writing and presentation. Administrators sometimes provide the first impression a customer has of a business, so a positive and professional outlook is needed at all times.

Meeting people and speaking to customers is often a vital part of being an administrator. Say that you enjoy talking to people and that interaction with other people is often what makes the work most interesting.

Answer that by staying organised and keeping a strict diary you find that stress does not become a real issue. As soon as you identify a possible delay due to high work volumes you raise this with your manager to see if the work can either be reallocated or given priority.

Ideally you have some real work experience that you can talk about. Talk in some detail about what you did and why it was great. If you have no direct work experience then talk of an event where you helped a friend to resolve a problem and that these skills can be used in administration and customer care work.

If you have experience, mention the packages you have used. If not, get some training in the most important packages before your interview. Ask your recruitment consultant what are the best packages to learn.

Say that they are very good and that you can communicate well face-to-face, on the telephone and via the Internet on email. Tell us about a time in your professional career when you went out of your way to complete a task for someone else.
Hopefully you have some real experiences - but you may have forgotten them by now. Think back and try to recall a time that you may have helped somebody when they were under pressure or off sick.

Not all administrators need to be excellent problem solvers so if you are not the best, be honest and say so. You could say that you are not good at solving problems but you understand the skills of your colleagues well and will always be able to persuade somebody to assist.