If you’re looking for a job as a secretary, hiring managers will always be interested in how you plan and schedule meetings and how you make sure that everything is recorded. They will ask about your strategies and techniques in organizing and preparing gatherings. Why do they want to know?

• They want to see if you have the ability to plan and organize well;
• They want to make sure that you’ll be able to come up with a good plan if you’re hired;
• They want to assess your strategies and techniques and see if they’re effective; and
• They want to evaluate your planning skills and abilities.

Now, how do you answer this question? These tips could help you in providing a response:

• If you already have experiences with planning meetings, you can easily answer this question by explaining how you did it in your previous job. Tell your story – the situations you faced and how you dealt with them.

• If you are new to the job, explain how you are going to do it according to what you learned and what you’ve observed from other secretaries.

• Mention the strategies you implemented to schedule the time, venue, and agenda with the participants. For example, explain how you sent out notice of the meeting to all participants involved and how you provided copies of the agenda and minutes from the previous meeting. Talk about how you executed your planning skills to set the meeting for the right time, at the right place, with the right purpose.

• Indicate how you take minutes because this will be a great opportunity for you to express how you get the job done. Show your samples to the interviewer so that he or she will have a better view of your explanation. You might also want to include in your explanation how you use tape recorders to show the reliability of the notes.

• Focus on your planning skills. Don’t say anything that will put doubt in the interviewer’s mind. Exclude unnecessary information; only include that which is essential. Remember that the question is all about your plans, so keep your answers focused on that.

As a secretary, you’ll be required to set meetings and appointments, and it’s your responsibility to demonstrate your skills in these areas. Follow the tips above and you’ll be able to show the interviewer what you’re capable of.