Hiring a new staff member can prove problematic at the best of times, especially if you don’t prepare the right questions to ask during the interview.
For example, you may be hiring a team of virtual assistants, so you must ask questions about the specific skills required to fill the role.
Conducting interviews may seem easy, but asking the wrong questions at the interview can lead to hiring the wrong person, which invariably leads to problems that cost you time and money.
This article explains some of the most crucial virtual assistant interview questions you must ask candidates during an interview.
The Top Questions You Should Ask When Interviewing A VA
Below are the crucial interview questions that you need to ask when hiring a virtual assistant.
1 – How Many Years Have You Been A Virtual Assistant?
Experience counts, so it is important to determine how much experience your candidates have in being virtual assistants.
If a candidate has the required skills and experience in a virtual assistant role, they will likely prove a good fit for your company.
However, it is optional to have experience if you require the person you hire to perform basic administrative tasks like data entry using core skills.
On the flip side, if you require specialised skills such as compiling financial reports, you need to hire an excellent virtual assistant with a high skill set in this area.
Sometimes, you will need to use your judgement when a candidate has the skill set but not the desired experience.
2 – What Things Would You Say Are Your Expert Skills?
When hiring virtual assistants, it is essential to remember that each role is different. Gone are the days when a virtual assistant only had to answer phone calls and do primary data input, so you have to ask what skills they excel in.
For example, suppose the virtual assistant candidate’s expertise lies in sales or bookkeeping. In that case, they will be perfect for the role of bookkeeping virtual assistant to upskill them in the future.
A candidate may be a bookkeeping expert and have a passion for social media. However, with continuous learning and the proper development training, they could potentially become an asset to your company in both areas.
3 – What Motivated You To Become A Virtual Assistant?
When hiring a virtual assistant, you must know the type of character you are interviewing for the job. The best way to do this is to ask open-ended questions such as this one.
The answer you receive will often indicate if the person has good communication skills and the right motivation for doing the job.
A virtual assistant candidate may have a passion for the role or a driven desire to improve their skills and advance their career.
For example, an experienced virtual assistant may have worked in different roles which have required them to provide customer service, which means they could communicate effectively and provide good customer service for your company moving forward.
4 – Do You Have IT Tools You Like The Most?
New technology is constantly being introduced to help communication channels within businesses that use virtual assistants. Therefore, you must find out what IT tools each candidate is capable of using,
Each administrative assistant will use different IT software packages than other virtual assistants, so it is vital to find out if the candidates are familiar with using the IT software most in line with the job role you are interviewing them for.
You may have stated within the job description that you require experience using specific IT software, but you must also ask for more information during the job interview.
Using IT tools, such as project management software, is meant to help make it easier to complete tasks.
5 – What Tools Don’t You Like?
It may become apparent during the interview that a candidate has excellent problem-solving skills. Therefore it is essential to find out which software they find problematic.
An experienced virtual assistant will have some knowledge of using a variety of IT software, so they will be in an excellent position to offer constructive feedback on which software has caused issues for them in the past.
For example, you may use software to improve your time management skills. Therefore an excellent VA should be open and tell you the problems they encountered using this software.
Their answer will help you to make a better-informed decision when you come to hire.
6 – How Do You Ensure Security On Your Computer?
To continue providing exceptional customer service, you must ensure that your IT security is second to none.
Finding out what IT security your potential virtual assistant has on their home computer is vital.
As well as having an excellent internet WiFi connection from a private connection, remote workers must also have up-to-date anti-virus software packages installed.
If you do decide to offer them a role working for your company, your IT department may need to implement a two-way authentication on crucial apps and packages they may use.
Ensuring your IT security is not compromised is imperative when using remote virtual workers.
7 – What Hours Are You Most Likely Available?
Establishing what hours are suitable for your potential new hire to work is critical because working as a virtual assistant, they will have many clients.
An excellent virtual assistant can be flexible and work around your business hours and family life.
As they are remote workers, it is essential to remember that they will be based in different countries, often in different time-zone. However, this need not be a problem and can often be an advantage if structured correctly, but bear in mind you both may have different communication styles.
Depending on how many clients they have, you need to schedule times to conduct a phone call or video call with your virtual assistant.
8 – How Many Hours Do You Want To Work Each Week?
Like the above question, you need to determine how many hours your potential virtual assistant is available to work each week.
It may sound like a trivial question, but there needs to be total transparency by all parties to ensure you avoid issues in the future.
There is little point in hiring a virtual assistant who can only work 20 hours per week when your advertising role requires 30 hours per week.
You must establish which tasks you need them to do, and prioritising tasks based on a matter of urgency will help you to avoid any issues.
9 – What Task Management Techniques Do You Use?
A good virtual assistant must be able to manage their time effectively, so you must find out which task management techniques each candidate uses.
Working remotely requires virtual assistants to be well-organised to ensure they provide exceptional service to your company.
As a virtual assistant may have many additional clients, they must be able to prioritise time management and scheduling appointments.
You must ensure that your virtual assistant has all measures in place if they cannot complete a task on time. In addition, they must be able to notify you of any problems within a timeframe that allows you to make alternative adjustments.
10 – How Do You Prefer To Communicate With Employers?
Each virtual assistant may be from a different country and have their preferred method of communicating with management and other staff members.
For example, they may like to have weekly phone calls or video calls or to have daily contact via email or by instant messenger using Slack.
Finding out during the interview process which method of communication they are most at ease using will save you a lot of time if you decide to hire that person. In addition, doing this will ensure that they hit the ground running as soon as they are hired.
11 – Why Did This Job Seem Right For You?
The answers you receive to this question will always be varied depending on the role you are advertising.
Suppose the role is for a standard administration assistant who is expected to perform basic and mundane data input tasks. In that case, they will not be that enthusiastic, but they may use the role as a stepping stone to progress.
If you seek someone to manage your social media accounts, the candidate is likely to have excellent communication skills and be enthusiastic.
In this case, their skills may include excellent graphic design capabilities to help bring your social media posts to life.
12 – Do You Have Certain Career Goals?
Excellent candidates will always be the ones who display drive and enthusiasm to further their careers. However, it is up to you, the interviewer, to determine those career goals.
Depending on what business sector your company operates within, the candidate may display skills suitable for becoming a customer service representative within your company in the future.
If your company has a clear career pathway for all employees, you are more likely to attract staff of a high calibre.
A highly motivated virtual assistant willing to upskill will always greatly assist your business.
13 – What Is Your Problem Solving Process?
All businesses encounter problems from time to time, but you still have to provide excellent customer service. Therefore, it is essential to find out how the candidates would problem-solve if faced with an issue relating to their job role.
You want your staff to be confident enough to deal with minor issues themselves but also not be afraid to have the interpersonal skills to seek help from other team members if they are struggling with a problem.
The last thing you want is for your staff to struggle with problems that may impact your future business growth. Therefore, your management style must allow you to be approachable when staff encounter problems.
14 – How Do You Deal With Conflict?
It’s unrealistic to expect to go through business without personality clashes happening. So you must try and work out how your candidates would handle difficult team members.
Asking this simple question can go a long way to establishing each candidate’s character. The last thing you want is to hire someone with poor people skills who can’t work as part of a team.
Suppose a person displays that they have specific methods, such as holding a clear-the-air meeting, to resolve any conflict. In that case, this clearly indicates that they are not confrontational.
Compromise is vital in business, but if staff members cannot find a suitable compromise between themselves, you will have to intervene to find the fairest solution to solve problems for all staff.
15 – Are There Skills You Would Like To Learn?
An excellent VA will always draw on prior experience to stay motivated and want to learn new skills to enhance their career prospects.
The answer to this question will give you a strong sense of how driven the candidates are. There will always be those few who stand out from the other candidates to give you a clear idea of who to hire.
The candidate who is a quick learner and has little trouble articulating what they need to do to gain the relevant experience to learn an important skill to become a graphic designer will always stand out from the crowd.
Sometimes it may be something simple as wanting to improve their command of the English language. In this instance, your company should make every effort to provide them with extra English lessons.
Contact Us For Help With Interviewing VAs
Interviewing can be daunting at the best of times, especially if you haven’t prepared the right questions to ask.
With this in mind, you must prepare the right virtual assistant interview questions, and another important aspect is to get references from the candidate’s other clients.
It is also common business practice to offer a paid trial period to the outstanding candidate before you commit to hiring them on a long-term basis.
If you haven’t got the time or the experience to go through the whole sourcing, hiring, training, and management of your virtual assistant, then why not let us take care of all that for you?
Call us today to arrange an appointment to find out how hassle-free it is for us to match you with the perfect virtual assistant.