IT support and helpdesk

What interviewers look for

• Patience and plain words with people who are not technical and may be stressed, rushed or embarrassed.
• A method for any problem: ask, reproduce, check the simple things, change one thing at a time, and confirm with the user.
• Prioritising by impact: a whole team that cannot work comes before one slow laptop, whoever owns the laptop.
• Ticket discipline: every request logged, updated, and closed with a short note of what fixed it.
• Everyday skills: Windows, Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace accounts, printers, Outlook, remote support and basic hardware.
• Knowing when to escalate, and saying “I don't know yet, I'll find out” instead of guessing.

Questions they ask

1. 1“Three requests arrive at once: the director's printer, a new staff member with no email account, and the finance system down for the whole team. What order, and why?”

   Why they ask: They check you prioritise by impact and urgency, keep everyone informed, and are not led only by rank.

   How to answer

   • Start with the problem that stops the most people or the most important work.
   • Tell the others you have their request and when you expect to reach them.
   • Use waiting time for quick tasks, and log all three requests.

   I would start with the finance system, because a whole team can't work and payments may be due. While I check it, I'd message the director's office and the new staff member to say I have their requests and when I expect to reach them. If the finance fix needs a call to the vendor, I'd use the waiting time to create the email account, which takes a few minutes. The printer comes next, and if the director has an urgent document, I'd send it to another printer meanwhile.

2. 2“A user is angry because their laptop is very slow and a report is due in an hour. How do you handle it?”

   Why they ask: It tests customer service under pressure: calm first, protect the user's work, then find the real cause.

   How to answer

   • Stay calm, acknowledge the deadline, and protect the work first: save it, or move them to a spare laptop.
   • Then find the cause: Task Manager, disk space, updates, startup programs, an old hard disk.
   • Explain the cause in one plain sentence and follow up later.

   First I make sure the report isn't lost: I ask them to save it, or move to a spare laptop if we have one, so the deadline is safe. Then I look for the cause. On a similar call, Task Manager showed the disk at 100% because updates were installing on an old hard disk. I let the updates finish that evening, and later we replaced the drive with an SSD. I told the user plainly: the computer was busy installing updates, and the new drive would make it much faster.

3. 3“The network printer has stopped printing for everyone. Walk us through what you check.”

   Why they ask: Printers are a daily ticket. They check you separate the printer itself, the network path and the print queue.

   How to answer

   • At the printer: power, error message, paper, toner, jams, and a test page from the printer itself.
   • On the network: check its IP address has not changed, and ping it.
   • On the computer or print server: clear stuck jobs and restart the Print Spooler.

   I first check whether it's the printer or the path to it. At the printer: is it on, is there an error on the screen, paper, toner, a jam? Then I print a test page from the printer's own menu. If that works, I check its IP address, because if DHCP gave it a new one, every computer is still sending jobs to the old address, so I'd set a reservation. Finally I clear stuck jobs in the queue and restart the Print Spooler service.

4. 4“How do you set up a new staff member, and what do you do when someone leaves?”

   Why they ask: The account lifecycle is both daily work and security. Old accounts left open are a common way in for attackers.

   How to answer

   • New staff: account, licence, MFA, the right groups and shared folders, a prepared laptop, and a short welcome.
   • Leavers: disable the account on the last day, collect equipment, and change any shared passwords.
   • Follow a written checklist so nothing depends on memory.

5. 5“A user says Outlook is not receiving any new emails. What do you check?”

   Why they ask: It shows whether you split the problem: the account and the mailbox, or only the Outlook app on that computer.

   How to answer

   • Check Outlook on the web: if mail arrives there, the problem is the app or its profile.
   • If not: mailbox full, rules or junk folder, a changed password or MFA prompt.
   • Then repair or recreate the Outlook profile, and check the service status page.

6. 6“How do you support a user in another office or town remotely?”

   Why they ask: Many organisations have field offices. They check you use approved tools safely and keep the user involved.

   How to answer

   • Use the approved remote tool, with the user's consent and a session code.
   • Stay on the phone and explain what you are doing; never ask for their password.
   • End the session, confirm it works, and note it in the ticket.

7. 7“Tell us about a time you could not fix a problem yourself. What did you do?”

   Why they ask: They want honesty and good escalation: what you tried, who you passed it to, and how you kept the user informed.

   How to answer

   • Describe what you tried, in order, and that you wrote it down.
   • Say who you escalated to and what information you gave them.
   • End with the fix and what you now check earlier.

   At a school I supported, one laptop kept losing Wi-Fi every few minutes. I updated the driver, reset the network settings and tested it near another access point, but it still dropped. I wrote down everything I had tried and escalated to our network engineer with the laptop model and the times it dropped. He found a power-saving setting on the network adapter. I updated the teacher every day while we worked on it, and now I check power settings early in cases like that.

Example answers are in English, the language most panels use. Say it in your own words.

Topics to revise

• Ticketing, priorities and SLAsEvery request is logged with who, what, when and a priority. Priority comes from impact (how many people) and urgency (how soon it hurts). An SLA is the agreed time to respond and to fix. Close tickets with a short note of the fix, so it becomes a knowledge base.
• Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace adminCreate users, assign licences, reset passwords, set up MFA, shared mailboxes and groups, and share OneDrive or SharePoint folders with the right people. A common question: how do you give two staff access to the info@ mailbox without sharing a password? A shared mailbox.
• Active Directory and Group PolicyActive Directory holds domain users, computers and groups. You reset passwords, unlock accounts and give access through groups, not one person at a time. Group Policy pushes settings to many computers, such as mapped drives or locking the screen after ten minutes.
• Printers and the Print SpoolerA network printer needs a fixed address (a DHCP reservation), the right driver on each computer, and a working print queue. When jobs get stuck, clear the queue and restart the Print Spooler service. They may ask why only one computer cannot print: usually its driver or queue.
• Outlook and email troubleshootingTest Outlook on the web first to separate the account from the app. Common causes: a full mailbox, a rule moving mail, a changed password, a corrupted profile or cache. Know how to repair a profile, and how to spot and report a phishing email.
• Remote support toolsTools like Quick Assist, AnyDesk or TeamViewer let you see and control a user's screen with their permission. Use only the tool your organisation approves, never ask for passwords, and warn staff about fake “IT support” callers who ask them to install these tools.
• Hardware basics (RAM, SSD vs HDD, power)A slow computer is often too little RAM, a full disk, or an old hard disk (HDD); an SSD is much faster. No power: check the adapter, the socket and the battery. Beeps or no display at start: reseat the RAM. Know what to check before you say a machine must be replaced.
• Windows tools (Task Manager, Event Viewer, Device Manager)Task Manager shows what is using the CPU, memory and disk. Event Viewer records errors. Device Manager shows drivers and hardware problems. Safe Mode, sfc /scannow and System Restore help when Windows itself is damaged. They may ask which tool you would open first for a missing Wi-Fi adapter: Device Manager.
• Onboarding and offboardingJoining: account, licence, MFA, groups, shared folders, a laptop recorded against the person's name. Leaving: disable the account on the last day, keep or pass on the mailbox as policy says, collect equipment, and change shared passwords. A written checklist makes it reliable.
• Asset registerA list of every laptop, printer and phone: model, serial number, who has it, when it was bought and its warranty. It answers “where is the laptop of the officer who left?” and helps plan replacements. NGOs and UN agencies often check it in audits.

Practical tasks you may get

1. 1Live fault-finding on a real computer with a planted problem: a disabled network adapter, a wrong printer driver, a full disk, a missing mapped drive or a locked account. Say your steps aloud and change one thing at a time. Practise on an old computer by breaking things on purpose.
2. 2Role play with an upset user: a panel member acts as a stressed manager. Listen, offer a workaround, explain in one or two simple sentences, and give a time for the next update. Practise with a friend playing the user.
3. 3Prioritising exercise: a list of six to ten tickets to put in order, with your reasons. Use impact and urgency, and say who you would update while they wait.
4. 4Admin console task: create a user, add them to a group, reset a password and set up a shared mailbox in Microsoft 365 or Active Directory. Practise in a Windows Server evaluation copy on a virtual machine, or in any admin account you are allowed to use.
5. 5Short written test on hardware, Windows and network basics, sometimes multiple choice. Revise the topics on this page and answer in short, clear sentences.

Mistakes to avoid

• Using jargon with users: “your DNS is failing” instead of “your computer can't find websites by name; I'm fixing it now”.
• Fixing things without logging a ticket, so nobody sees your work or learns from it.
• Always serving the most senior person first, even when a whole team is waiting.
• Asking users for their password, or writing passwords on sticky notes for them.
• Saying “it's fixed” without checking with the user that it now works for them.
• Guessing an answer instead of saying “I don't know yet; I'll find out and come back to you by two o'clock”.

Quick check

5 questions. Answer each one to see the explanation.