The job revolves around the management of day-to-day business activities and the management of the team. If you can handle this, then this position is for you. In this article, we will be sharing some of the questions with answers that you might be asked in your interview as a Business Administrator.
1. Why Are You Interested In This Role?
I believe that good administration is the foundation of any business unit. I am always been passionate about this and I do have the computer skills that are required for this job. I am efficient in using Microsoft Office and I am a well-organized multitasker as well. I am sure I can bring a lot of good things to your company too.
2. What Are The Roles Of Business Administrators?
The role includes the following responsibilities as Business Administrator:
- Supervision of all administrative tasks that ensure business growth
- Improvement in efficiency in all tasks,
- Introduction and implementation of all methods that can help in achieving business goals,
- Consulting with clients, internal staff, and vendors on board,
- Evaluation of employee performance and suggesting ways to improve it,
- And Budget management and overseeing all details related to it
3. What Are The Qualities That A business Administrator Needs To Be Successful?
To excel in this role, Problem-solving skills are a must as being able to prioritize tasks as per the requirement. Basic mathematic skills are essential too since budget management is a requirement of this job too. For effective communication, internally and externally, it is important to have excellent verbal and written communication skills. An applicant should also have good networking skills because this role involves a lot of communication external and internal and connections are important too.
4. What Major Challenges Did You Face During Your Last Role? How Did You Manage Them?
In my previous role, I had a few challenges due to a shortage of funds that led to a lack of equipment needed to perform basic duties. I requested my line manager to arrange a piece of basic computer equipment for myself that would help in doing the job. It was immediately approved and I started organizing all my tasks through it.
5. Describe Your Daily Routine As A Business Administrator?
The day starts with attending to post-it stickers on the table that has the last day of pending jobs. Next is to go for a quick ten minutes meeting with staff to plan the day and jump over to the MUST DO list and then return to work after hours to finish off the tasks that did not get done during daylight hours. One thing to focus on is being present when talking with anyone. Multi-tasking is necessary at times but sometimes it is not done the best. By all means, he/she has to adhere to company rules and policies expecting others the same way.
6. Describe Briefly About Your Experience?
I started my administrative carrier as Admin Assistant in a multinational setup. It was a manufacturing cum consultancy setup. From there I was switched over to their overseas project in Dubai where I supported the human resource department and management of workers’ transport, messing, medical facilities, and lodging handling for 11,000 people. After I completed three years, I took an exit for seeking a job in my home country. I am a law graduate and have a command of English and three languages.
7. What Kind Of Strategies And Mindset Are Required For This Role?
The story continues and attention to detail, multitasking, and keeping calm are the special traits in this profession. Staying calm is not alone but I attach immediate reaction to undo a mistake if reported. Then we all need to adhere to company policies and I guide people but refuse to forgive any misconduct repeated.
8. What Is The Biggest Challenge You Foresee In This Job?
Keeping a balance between official assignments and maintaining friendships or even good working relationships. People do greet me when they see my visiting card but as they demand an extra benefit without any qualification, I have to speak plain refusal or tell them what maximum is possible.
9. How Do You Stay Motivated At Work?
My motivation for this role is to provide a good administrative role to all staff present at work and vendors too. To stay motivated in this role, I spend some leisure time that helps in staying focused on my work. I also love spending time with my friends and family.
10. Describe A Time You Failed In This Role And The Lesson You Learned?
I remember an event when a bulk of return work arrived in late hours with a tight timeline. We had no choice except to ask the technical team to start working so they stopped all ongoing tasks and switched themselves setting up returned goods in awe and shock. Within two hours, it dawned on us that the items received were inconsistent while some details were also mismatching. We tried contacting the client for details but the other end was not responding. I asked the technical manager to escalate the matter to management seeking their help which we do rarely. The management also tried to see who sent this pack but in vain. It took us three hours to know that the incoming information landed in our area by courier company’s mistake. It was our fault too that we skipped to cross-match sender’s information from our official record and directly started reworking. So, the lesson was that we should always go by the book adhering to procedures else we waste our time.
11. Why Do You Feel You Are Qualified For This Role?
Being proficient with Microsoft Office and Excel stuff, I am a highly organized multitasker who works well in any fast-paced environment. That is not the end but I have the willingness to learn eagerness to grow too. I focus on business and maintain relationships accordingly having excellent communication and organizational skills and having eye for detail.
12. Share With Us Your Greatest Achievement
In my previous role, I have been able to maintain more than 200 product inventory through the database that helped in product research and assisted the internal team to increase the client list. I have been able to improve the efficiency rate at the organization by planning timely meetings and scheduling everyone’s calendar and creating online documents for everyone to view via cloud access. I am sure I will be able to do a lot more here and for this team.
13. To Increase The Life Of Any Organization, What Will Be Your Role?
Longevity is dependent on the techniques that are being used in any organization. As an administrator, one should implement both new and improved techniques to run an organization. In my opinion, there are a few steps involved to increase longevity i.e.
14. How Do You Define Qualitative Decisions And Quantitative Decisions In Business?
As per my understanding of these two terms, To make qualitative decisions, experiential knowledge is required. On the other hand, quantitative decision-making is for measurable issues identified only. For such methods, mathematical skills are required too for all business administrators to sort out the issue.
15. What Is Your Decision-Making Style?
Before making decisions related to work, I always carry out the following steps. The steps include:
- Collecting information to identify was the cause of the problem
- Next, I look out for possible alternatives that could solve the issue
- Once done, I think of generating a few ideas that could be possible solutions to any identified problem
- After this, I evaluate all choices as per the standard and weigh both pros and cons of each solution,
- Now after choosing the best option, its time to put all plans into action and
- The last step is to evaluate the outcome because it helps in new decision-making tasks coming my way.
16. In Any Organization, What Are A Few Levels Of Management?
Few factors help in decision-making in any organization. These are known as the level of management.
- Board of Directors or Owners- a company’s board or owners create a mission and write a mission statement for the internal and external audiences that they will never compromise with their standards and values.
- The top Management-This team ensures that the mission and vision of any organization are turned into achievements throughout time. The main job of top management is to make plans and carry out decisions.
- Middle Management- Once Top Management has taken the decision, the middle management is supposed to translate the decision into small plans of action for staff to follow. These small action plans are subcategories of strategic goals.
- Operational Management- They is the people’s manager on the floor who assist on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. They are also known as first-line managers whose main role is to help middle management achieve its goals.
17. What Is The Difference Between Centralization And Decentralization Of Management?
In centralization management, the power to make a business decision is done by a few authority members only. Sometimes one or sometimes a team can be the decision-maker in centralization management. Decentralization management gives liberty of decision-making to all levels of management in any organization. The basis of the decision-maker is their knowledge and experience.
18. Can You Share Differences Between Vertical And Horizontal Organizations?
In the vertical, the decision-making power is provided from top to bottom and the top person has the most power overall. In a horizontal organization, people who share the same designation have a set of duties to perform and they can decide as per the requirement of the business.
19. What Is Job Enrichment?
This is a motivational technique used by organizations for their employees for a morale boost. Through this, employees feel important in the organization and additional responsibilities are given to all from the organization. An organization may increase skill variety in the team and create autonomy in the feedback too. The basic goal is only to motivate the boring jobs, sometimes even blue-collar jobs. Unfortunately, it performs less in such odd jobs as their primary concern is job security, pay, and rules of the organization. Overall, it is a beneficial part and does create motivation and increases satisfaction in the jobs for all employees.
20. In Your Opinion, Why Is There A Need For Departmentalization In Any Organization? What Are The Factors?
To promote growth and expansion, departmentalization is one of the key requirements. It helps in fixing responsibility and creating a better customer service experience as well. For employees, it provides Performance appraisal and helps in better resource control.
There are a few major factors involved in the process like
21. What Is The Difference Between Business Process Management And Service Orient Architecture?
The major difference between the two is that BPM is a business process whereas SOA is a technical aspect. Through BPM, IT business solution is integrated with the human-driven process and creates a roadmap for integration. On the other hand, Service Orient Architecture provides design to developments for the development of systems and integration as well. With Business Process Management process and goals are set while Service Orient Architecture helps technologically in achieving the goals.
22. What Is BPM Life-Cycle?
Business Process Management Life Cycle helps in business improvement as its captures the process through monitoring and process optimization. Through this cycle, improvement is ensured throughout the life of any business process. If introduced in the business, it brings the culture of continuous improvement within the structure and it is easy to implement too.
23. What Are The Steps Involved In BPM Life Cycle?
- The first step is the model. This step helps in acquiring business processes at the top level and ensures that all details are correct without any distraction.
- The next step is execution. This step helps in launching and interacting with the end-user who will be using it.
- In Monitoring, Key performance indicators and processes are measured for the understanding of any inefficiencies the process may have.
- In optimization, the process and performances are improved after obtaining results from the previous step. This gives out results related to which changes have benefited in the long run.
24. What Are The Key Features Of Effective Business Policy?
- Flexible- It helps in implementation by the managers and is used as per the requirement.
- Simple-all business policies should be easy to understand by all staff.
- Stable-This helps in providing better guidance to the staff and avoids uncertainty in the mind too.
- Appropriate-This assists in achieving the goals of any organization.
- Reliable-This helps in effective acceptance by all staff.
- Clear-This ensures that there is no misunderstanding regarding any policy.
- Specific-This avoids any difficult issues that could disturb the cycle.
25. What Sort Of Management Skills Do You Have To Perform Well In This Role?
I have developed several soft skills in this career that helps in performing several tasks.
- People Skills- This helps me in interacting with my team internally and externally. I can build a network with people involved in my role.
- Time Management Skills – This helps in aligning all my tasks as per the requirement of their importance. Few tasks can wait while few are urgent. I can meet all timelines of all projects with this skill.
- Project Management Skills– With help of brainstorming and strategic thinking, decision-making becomes a lot easier for me.
- Conflict Management Skill – You won’t find a single organization where there are no conflicts. It’s important to have the skill to sort out the issues to keep the projects running and teams motivated to achieve goals.
- Stress Management Skills- Due to workload and tight deadlines, teams often go through stress and it directly affects the project. It is important to engage teams in such activities that reduce their stress and improves efficiency.
Conclusion
Dress well for your interview and take your updated resume in a hard copy with you. Smile as you greet the interviewer and be confident as you answer their questions. These 25 questions are surely going to help in acing the first round of interviews as a Business Administrator. Good luck!
