Questions To Ask During An Interview For Lead Tech/Service Manager

Define and describe the proper installation technique of EOL resistors.

How do you stay current with security technology advances?

what is the difference between a level 1 and level 2 door contact?

If he/she has worked on intrusion systems before, they should be able to give some basic information about them, without you prompted anything other than the question, "What systems have you worked on, and what can you tell me about them? What was it like to program them?"

Once I interviews to work for the local telephone company, and I was surprised during the interview when one of the technical supervisors asked me the question, "What steps would you take to troubleshoot a customer with no working phone" or something along those lines. Basically a very broad question, with no answer. I assume the idea was to see how I handled trouble shooting, and at the same time see what sort of knowledge I experienced.

I don't know much about fire alarm, but for intrusion a question could be, "How would you trouble shoot a faulty door contact?" This question could apply to your Access Control side as well.

Or to get more advanced on the intrusion side, if you do alarm monitoring, "How would you trouble shoot an alarm panel that appears to not be sending signals?"

For me, the answers would be;

Are there any errors on the panel? If I know when communication stopped, talk with customer to see if anything of note happened around that time.

Check customers phone, if using POTS. Check the GSM, if using that, or check the internet, if using the internet for communication. Make sure the devices/modes of transportation are operational.

Check Panel programming, make sure correct information is in there. Phone number, account number, that communications is enabled.

Make sure all the information in the alarm panel, matches what's on the other end in the Monitoring Center. The phone number programmed is the right phone number for the receiver the account is on. The account number is right.

Can I phone and reach the receiver from the customers telephone? Can I ping the receiver from the customers internet? 

I would have a couple questions for you first:

• Does your company already have a preferred brand of intrusion or fire panel? If so, I would ask something specific about the bus/addressable loops for that specific brand
• What markets or sizes of systems are you going to be selling? Will they be managing large, multi-building installations, residential, multi-tenant, etc? All of those things will affect the types of problems and systems they would be responsible for, and change the potential questions.
• Will they be responsible for training new techs on intrusion/fire system work? It could be helpful if you had them walk you through the actual basic setup/panel wiring of a system.

If they already have NICET II certification, they should have a pretty solid understanding of basic voltage/current, resistance, normally-open/normally-closed technical details.

Ask them to break in to your competitors office and take a selfie at the owner's desk.  If they can do this without tripping the alarms, they can probably be taught anything else.

(This is a horrible idea.  Don't do this.  Do the things the other people said.)

The secret to interviewing somebody about a product or line you know very little about is to ask them a few open ended questions, and listen carefully to how they answer. If they answer in a few monotone sentences, move on. If they're very passionate about the product or line, there's a better chance that they'll be good at it. 

I've met a few people who care deeply about a subject but were no good at it, but I've never met anybody who didn't care about a subject but were competent at it. 

Of course, if you can get a knowledgeable person to interview this candidate, that would be best.

NICET II is a written test that reflects your ability to understand where in the various codes to find an answer, some basic math and some knowledge of where to apply technology.

Before I get hammered, I passed 34 out of 34 elements my first pass and i’m not that smart.  Case Closed ;)

A lead tech should be able to demonstrate his ability by defining projects he/she has worked.  The scope, the issues and resolutions.  They should be able to describe specific obstacles and examples of how they were overcome.  Techs are problem solvers.

A good service manager needs to be a good manager.  I’ve seen some that weren’t technical but ran a great department and i’ve seen technical managers who seemed to always have to leave with a tool belt on.