Deciding to hire an event assistant is a big step in your business. One piece of hiring that can be very nerve-wracking for both the business owner and the candidate is the interview!

How do you know what questions to ask that will give you a solid understanding of whether or not someone is the right fit as an event assistant?

Having been around the block for hiring, especially hiring wedding planner assistants, we’ve narrowed it down to 10 must-ask interview questions for hiring event assistants. Let’s dive in!

How do you prioritize and manage your time?

Naturally, event planners and assistants need to be very organized and skilled with their time management. It’s important to ask how the candidate prioritizes and manages their time, so you can get a feel for whether or not you think they’ll be a great fit.

What do you do when you feel stressed out during an event or while planning?

It’s true that event planning is one of the most stressful jobs in the world. You want your candidate to be committed to maintaining a healthy work/life balance, a great communicator, and have an awesome attitude.

What do you think makes a successful event?

People measure event success differently depending on the business goals and overall goals of the client. You want to make sure the candidate understands the goals of the event and how to work towards making it successful as you define it.

Have you ever had to work with a difficult client or resolve conflict? Tell me about the results.

As much organization and meticulousness that goes into event planning, you also want to make sure your assistant is keeping the overall happiness (as it’s maintainable) of the client. Of course there will always be those clients who are dissatisfied no matter the solution, but you want your candidate to be able to confront those issues as they arise.

What types of events are your favorite to plan, and why?

It’s always helpful to know what kind of events a candidate really loves to plan, whether it’s birthdays, small ceremonies or celebrations, large weddings, etc.

Have you ever negotiated or made deals with vendors?

If this is a part of the role that you wish your event assistant to be able to fulfill, you probably want to know if they have experience handling this in the past.

What tools and software do you have experience using when planning events?

You may want to know if the candidate has never used the particular tools or software that you use in your process. Even if not, this could be a great opportunity to possibly make your process even better if they have experience with a more streamlined or organized tool!

How do you stay up-to-date on the latest trends and news in the event industry?

Event trends are always changing with the season, so it may be important to you depending on the role that your assistant is able to keep up with those trends.

What are the first steps you take when kicking off a new event?

Keep in mind that they may be used to a different process than yours, but it will give you great insight into how they’re used to kicking off events.

When was a time you needed to accommodate a last minute challenge? What was the challenge, and what was the outcome?

Already being under tons of pressure, you want to make sure your candidate will be able to adapt to unexpected challenges versus succumbing to the stress and pressure.

And there you have 10 must-ask interview questions for hiring event assistants!

Hopefully, this will aid you in interviewing candidates for an event assistant position. We break down further what the roles and responsibilities of an event assistant could look like in this blog post if you want to check it out!

For more help with building and growing a team, learn more about our 12-week Building Your Team Intensive right here! We’ll walk you step-by-step through every single part of prepping your business, finding talent, interviewing candidates, creating SOPs, onboarding and expectation setting, and more.