Interview Questions for a Jamf admin

[kevin_plack]

We are interviewing a few people for our JAMF admin and i am looking for some good interview questions that would let me know they have some knowledge of how MDMs work. Some of the interviewees come from other MDM apps like Air Watch or Meraki. This will be an intermediate job so just looking for questions that would let me know they have a good knowledge of MDM products.

Thanks!

[blackholemac]

General questions to see if they understand the concepts of MDM at all or are just clicking when someone told them to:

"Describe for me the flow of traffic communication starting with issuing an MDM command on the server to verifying it has taken effect on the device." They should probably discuss the triangle involved between server, client, and APNS.

"Define DEP and VPP and how do they work with setups you've used" you could see if they're doing deployment by device or user or if they have no idea of what those very important concepts are in managing Apple devices .

" describe for me how I would add a device to a DEP instance Using MDM products you have used in the past."

"If I closed the App Store on a given iPad, how would I let users add an approved app without calling IT. Tell me this in terms of MDM solutions you have used in the past." They should be able to describe some sort of self service-like portal on the device.

"I want to push a proxy out to all the fleet... describe the process on both computers in iOS devices." This tests familiarity with payloads...iPads and Macs handle these a bit differently. Have them show you using Apple configurator perhaps for iOS.

You could give them a very difficult installer to repackage such as Office or a smart board installer and watch what they do.

"I want to deploy adobe creative cloud with the following apps in the following settings." Watch what they ask for to do it .login for them when they need you to to get the packager and to build the package.

You could give them a Mac with a wiped hard drive and tell them to reinstall the OS, patches and two pieces of software. Watch carefully what they ask for to do that and provide some things such as a thumb drive or an Apple ID if they don't have it. Also offer a working Mac to build the thumb drive on. Maybe ask if they know of any good tools to build a base image with . (Not as important, but you would see what their position is on imaging versus apples newer methods.)

You could show them in Jamf Pro where to create profiles and how to scope devices quickly, then ask them to design a profile that does what you want them to do and apply it to an iPad or Mac.

If working extensively with Macs, have them design a script that does something simple such as deleting a file or adding a file at login or logout time.

Finally throw an ugly one at them... ask them how they would keep flash updated on both an iPad and a Mac . That one's a bit of a wild card anyway because as you know flash doesn't work on an iPad. On the Mac they better be familiar with where to get the admin installer and describe how they might get it out to their users in an automated manner.

Sorry one more..."I want to have Apple drop ship these Macs/iOS devices to these end users and have all of our stuff be available to them without IT touching the devices... describe broadly how I would do that." That is what modern-day MDM is all about ... even if we all aren't quite there yet in reality.

On the lab questions listen and watch broadly the answers. You may have a creative new approach to how to tackle something like that . You may also scare the daylights out of someone who is not competent.

In short anyone can be taught Jamf Pro with either training or classes....you would need to test a candidate on theory of operations. A good candidate should be able to answer all of those and maybe even offer creative solutions to take on a challenge that your org deals with.