Interviewing for VMware vSphere Support Engineer job role. Part 2: Junior engineer

This is a Part 2 of  ‘Interviewing for VMware vSphere Support Engineer job role’ series of posts.

In my previous post I covered some of the questions which I ask in the first part of the interviews I lead. Those questions are asked to evaluate if candidate has general IT knowledge, and if he is motivated to work.

In this part, I will cover questions and scenarios intended for a Junior engineer.

Junior vSphere engineer

Question: Have you ever used VMware Snapshots? How do you think snapshot technology works?

Asking this question, I do not expect the candidate to explain how exactly Snapshots work (although it could be a plus), what I want to hear is how (s)he thinks it works.

Scenario: Drawing on whiteboard

Look at the drawing. Snapshot 1 is currently the active state. What will happen to Snapshot 2 when ‘delete all snapshots’ function will be executed on vSphere level.

With this question we are checking if candidate has good understanding of Snapshots.

Question: What is vMotion, how it works?

Question is self explanatory. Depending on the answer it is possible to ask the next question.

Question: Does vMotion of a VM require downtime?

This question checks if candidate really understands vMotion.

Scenario: Troubleshooting

You are trying to perform vMotion of the VM ‘TESTVM’. The ‘Migrate Virtual Machine’ Wizard reports an error. How would you troubleshoot the issue? What do you think the issues is? How would you resolve it?

In this scenario we are checking:

1. If candidate knows the requirements for successful vMotion.
2. The approach candidate is using to troubleshoot issues.

Question: What is vSphere cluster, what features does it bring?

Checking if the candidate knows Clustering features.

Question: Talk about vSphere HA. How do you think it works?

Checking HA knowledge.

Question: Talk about DRS. What are the main benefits of using DRS?

Checking if the candidate understands what DRS does and why it is used.

Question: Have you ever used vSphere Update Manager? What is it used for?

I don’t usually expect much here, just description of what VUM does.

Question: What will be the output of the flowing CLI command

esxcli network ip interface list

With this question, I am checking if candidate ever used CLI.

Scenario: You are running a vSphere 5.5 environment built on top of  Lenovo x3850 X6. Your customer sends you a request to virtualize Mac OS X on your environment. He claims, that he tested it at home, and it works for him on VMware Workstation. What would be your answer to that request?

This question is asked to raise a discussion, and see how candidate will behave in a sensitive situation.

Conclusion

There are a lot of questions which you can ask on this level. This post does not cover even 10% of those. My main goal when asking these questions is not only to measure the level of knowledge the candidate has but also to identify how the candidate thinks, what steps would (s)he take in various situations. Questions are simple, answers in most cases as well but each of the answers can lead to new discussions.

Thanks for your time. In Part 3, I will cover questions I usually ask candidates with more experience with VMware vSphere.

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Aram Avetisyan

Aram Avetisyan is an IT specialist with more than 18 years experience. He has rich background in various IT related fields like Cloud, Virtualization and SDN. He holds several industry level certifications including but not limited to VCIX-DCV, VCIX-NV. He is also a vEXPERT in years 2014-2021.

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