'admin test' at interview

[milkmoustache]

I have an interview coming up soon, P/t admin role in a small charity. I have had a previous admin post which ended almost a year ago, but nothing in between. That role was my first after a very long career break, and it helped update my IT skills, but I am currently feeling a bit rusty and not very confident. I have been told I will have a 10 min admin test, not to worry about it at all, because it's not something I can prepare for.
IT is not my strong point, but I can cope more or less, but I haven't a clue what kind of thing they will test me on - has anyone got any experience to share on this? What might they get me to do? The job involves using Word, Excel, Outlook, but that's all it says, it's a general admin role rather than an IT based one. I really need to do well!

I would imagine that a prioritising task would be in there, writing a letter and maybe dealing with an awkward phone call

When I had an admin test once it was to organise an excel spreadsheet, input data and sort into order.

As it's only 10 inutes they probably just want to see that you can use the programs - input values correctly on a formulated spreadsheet, set a calendar appt in Outlook, navigate Word documents using find functions/proofreading tools?

That's why I've been asked for in previous interviews anyway!

Write and print a sensitively worded letter explaining why X will not be at a meeting.
Prioritise these tasks:
Can't remember what else...

This is very helpful, please keep the suggestions coming! I did get an interview for a different post in the same organisation 18 months ago, completely screwed up the IT test (the post had more of a data entry focus), but had excellent feedback for the interview itself. So I am really keen to do what I can about the test second time round!

For a very similar job interview recently I had the following tasks at the admin test:

create a spreadsheet and enter the following data:

Compose a draft email to change a venue booking. (I did this in Word as the email system wasn't one i'd used before)

Type up some handwritten 'minutes'.

I couldn't finish it all and couldn't read the handwriting (plus see above about the email). They also had a wanky ergonomic keyboard that was seriously slowing me down but I got the job.

best of luck.

We usually give someone a spreadsheet that either has multiple tabs that they need to find information from, or several cells in different columns that need adding together or to have VAT calculated. We're looking to see that they can manoeuvre around a spreadsheet and/or use basic formulae (e.g. =SUM(A3+B6+E7) or for example realising that there may be more information in a cell than just what you can see if text is wrapped, so you need to click on the cell and check the formula bar)

For Word, it's usually something like an email inviting a high profile speaker to come and give a keynote speech at an annual conference - we provide a sheet of paper with basic facts like date, title of the conference, location and we're looking for someone who's articulate enough to get the tone of the email right.

checking spelling grammer in a paragraph was common
even had to type up a letter which had spelling mistakes...so I had to spot them

I work part-time for a small charity.

In my admin test I had to format some Word documents (change font, font size, centre, etc).

I was also given some data to put into whatever format I thought would work best - I created a spreadsheet in Excel and entered all the data. I also had to create a formula but didn't know how to do the formula they wanted - I asked them to show me at the end of the test and they couldn't!

I also had to deal with a phone call in the middle of doing the above.

The whole thing took 30 minutes. I can't imagine you'll be given too much to do in 10 minutes.

This site has good tutorials to watch MS office

Thanks all, I did the interview yesterday and am waiting to hear from them tomorrow. I had to enter some data from emails onto an excel spreadsheet, copy the format of the first page and create two new sheets. And that was it! Once I had taken a few deep breaths I realised it wasn't too intimidating...