Interview Role Play: Customer Service

Hi, thanks for coming in. For a jump into my technical questions, I'd like to know a bit more about you. Tell me why you're interested in this position?

When I came into college, I was a pre-med major and eventually, I led down the path to take an introduction to IT course. After that course, I realized how impactful IT was and I became more curious to how computers work and why did they break. I changed my major to IT after that class. After two years of being in the major, I got a job at the IT services [inaudible] where I was able to help students with their computer issues. I believe having the job will allow me to advance my knowledge and troubleshooting skills and then also I'll be able to learn new things. Cool. Can you tell me what in particular you find appealing about IT? I like IT because it allows me to be very creative. Then it also allows me to hone in on those problem-solving skills. Also, I like IT because it's very broad. I felt like the trajectory of my career, it could be in multiple IT fields such as database management, software engineering, IT support, and networking.

That's awesome. All right, well, let's get started with our first question then. Let's say that you're the only person supporting a help desk and you're currently helping me with an issue when a VP walks in and they ask you for help and they say they have a presentation to give in 15 minutes, how would you handle this situation?

 I want to prioritize issues based on severity, it seems the VP the issues are little bit more time-sensitive. I would ask you if it's okay, if I would help out the VP.

 That's fair. I'm okay with that. Now, how would you help the VP?

 I want to get the VP up and running as soon as possible. I will offer them a spare laptop and then in the meantime, I'll be able to fix their computer while they're at the meeting.

Great. Now let me rewind for a second. Let me change things up. What if you were helping me, and my issue was actually very critical and it was part of a larger issue that was affecting a number of users. Say maybe our wireless network was having issues. How would you handle that?

If I was able to help the VP right away, by offering a spare laptop, then I would do that. But if that's not the case, then either let the VP know that the issue that I'm dealing with is a little bit more severe because it affects the business. I hope the VP will be a little bit more understanding and I would probably have to have a co-worker come and help the VP or I could tell the VP to probably reschedule their meeting if that's possible.

 Great. I think that's fair and you're right. We should take into account what's most important to the business in that type of scenario. Good job.

 In this scenario, we saw Candice deliver her elevator pitch and show why she's passionate about IT and becoming an IT support specialist. We also saw one typical complication of troubleshooting problems. Getting priorities right. Time-sensitive issues usually have higher priority, but issues that are preventing a large number of users from getting work done should be dealt with first, even if the person asking for help is a director or a VP. That's it for now. See you again at the end of the next course.