2024

40+ HRIS Analyst Interview Questions

Looking to know HRIS analyst’s interview questions that recruiters ask? You’re at the right place. 

According to Deloitte, almost 35% of organizations work to develop teams with good data analysis capabilities, while only less than 9% of the organizations commit that they have a strong analyst team working in their place. Thus, the demand for human resource information systems analysts inclines, which is why human resources information systems analysts are always valued for their quality analytical work.

HRIS analyst position is a technical role and is responsible for collecting, managing, gathering, and analyzing the data and contributing insights for business development and departmental growth. When you submit a job application for an HRIS analyst position, you attend technical and non-technical interviews to testify your knowledge and skills to recruiters. 

This article provides a detailed guide on the types of questions that recruiters ask in an HRIS analyst interview. This article covers these factors of an HRIS analyst interview:

  • Insight into an HRIS analyst’s interview process
  • HR analyst interview questions and answers
  • Contexts for each category of questions 
  • Tips to answer the questions and pitch to the interviewer

If you’re interested in learning more via video, then watch below. Otherwise, skip ahead.

Let’s start.

What Does the Interview Process for an HRIS Analyst’s Role Look Like?

The interview comes after the application screening process. The following steps reflect the typical HRIS analyst’s job application and interview process:

Interview Process for an HRIS Analyst Role

Step 1 – You as a candidate, submit the job application including your resume, cover letter, and mandatory documents.

Step 2 – Recruiters scan your application and the other applications received,  and select the ones that fulfill the job criteria.

Step 3 – Selected applicants receive an invite for a short online introductory interview. Recruiters in this interview assess your response and behavior towards a potential technical interview.

Step 4 – After conducting initial interviews, recruiters again screen the applications and select the most responsive and impressive candidates.

Step 5 – Finalized candidates receive an invite for an on-site/online technical interview in which recruiters assess your technical skills and knowledge.

Step 6 – After interviewing candidates, a meeting with the HR executives and interim HR consulting team is set to finalize the most suitable candidate after a proper discussion on the candidate’s personality, skills, attitude, business ethics, and behavior.

Step 7 – Chosen candidate receives the offer through a phone call later followed by an email upon final selection. 

Looking to become an HRIS analyst? Explore our top-rated people analytics certification course to learn more about the role and master the fundamental technical skills:

People Analytics Certification Course

HRIS Analyst Interview Questions and Answers

The HRIS analyst’s role is a technical and analytically driven position, thus recruiters ask respective technical and analytical questions to assess your skills. 

There are websites like Glassdoor that allow you to scroll through genuine questions put by the actual former candidates. Here are the questions put into various general categories that recruiters ask in an HRIS analyst interview:

1. Analytical Questions

Recruiters ask analytical questions to test your data analysis knowledge and skills in the interview since it is an analytical seat. 

In an HRIS interview, analytical questions test your abilities to handle challenges analytically. For an HRIS analyst’s seat, analytical skills are the most fundamental ones. Hence, it is mandatory for you to develop a sound grip on your data-driven analytical skills to successfully answer questions from recruiters. Here’s an insight into a few analytical questions recruiters ask you for an HRIS analyst’s role:

  • How do you analyze the employee and HR department’s own performance data to calculate the metrics?
  • How you do evaluate an HR operation and extract the metrics from it?
  • What steps do you adapt to analyze the performance of HR?
  • How do you handle data analysis and validation?
  • How will you benefit an HR process or department through your analysis?
  • Tell us about a time when your analysis contributed to anticipating and solving a complex challenge. How do you feel about your contribution to the challenge?

While answering such questions, keep in mind that they are attesting to how you assess and handle a challenge. Know that, your extraordinary contributing analytical skills make the most impact, hence we recommend you upskill your knowledge of advanced people analytics techniques. 

2. Strategical Questions

Apart from analytical skills, an HRIS analyst must exhibit good strategical skills. The HRIS analysts must exhibit skills to extract the trends and information from the employee and departmental evaluation data. You must the method to develop strategies that boost the department’s growth keeping in view the organization’s long-term and short-term goals.

Types of Questions asked in an HRIS Analyst Interview

In addition to that, HRIS analysts are responsible for strategic troubleshooting of the tickets opened by the business stakeholders. Strategic thinking weighs more than hardworking and smart thinking. Thus,  make sure you prepare to answer strategic questions for the HRIS analyst’s position in a way that puts you in a winning situation. 

Although the questions are vast, here are a few strategic questions to expect in an HRIS analyst’s interview:

  • How do you develop strategies out of evaluation reports for departmental and organizational growth?
  • How do you troubleshoot an issue ticket created by the business stakeholders?
  • What methodology will you adopt in learning a new HR system?
  • What methods do you use to streamline payroll and HR administration processes?
  • Tell us about a daunting time when you had to adapt strategic moves to resolve a challenge
  • How do your strategic skills contribute to increasing revenue, reducing costs, and saving time?

To make sure you rock the HRIS analyst’s interview, take the above-mentioned questions and do research to know their smart answers. Practice these questions in mock interviews for better confidence and grip. 

3. Technical Questions

HRIS analyst is a technical role responsible for data analysis and strategic tasks. To assess your technical skills, the hiring manager asks about your coding and development skills. In addition to that, they inquire about formulas and performance evaluation charts to gauge your understanding of technical employee datasets.

Steps to Become an HR analyst

Here’s an insight into how the technical questions in an HRIS interview appear:

  • How strong you are at coding?
  • How do you extract the performance coefficient out of an HR campaign?
  • What is your technique to resolve issues through an HCM system?
  • How do you add a formula to a pivot chart?
  • How do you implement a change in the system?

Take inspiration from the above-mentioned questions to understand how will recruiters test your technical skills. 

4. HR-Related Questions

HRIS analysts work in a human resource department, you must exhibit sound knowledge of how HR operations take place. Understand how a talent acquisition program works, how HRs recruit employees, and how to analyze the candidate’s job applications to onboard the right talent based on the organization’s long-term and short-term goals. 

Have a look at a few of the HR-associated questions for an HRIS analyst’s interview:

  • What is a talent acquisition campaign?
  • Do you understand the confidentiality of employee records and the organization’s data?
  • What method do you use to gather and analyze HR statistics?
  • How do you train staff on a new human resource system?
  • What do you know about employee benefits and satisfaction?
  • How do you interpret employee retention and payroll operations?

Know that original questions will vary based on the job description and organizational preferences. To prepare an assessment for this section, understand how HR processes and operations take place to successfully answer the HR-relevant question. 

5. Management Questions

A professional HRIS analyst knows the importance of data management for the HRIS analyst’s role. HRIS analysts are responsible to manage, collect, interpret, and analyzing the data. They must exhibit good management skills to perform their fundamental job duties. 

HR Analyst Career PathRecruiters ask questions from candidates about the methodology to collect and handle employee data. They will assess how you manage your work in extreme workload situations. Here are insights into questions relevant to management skills for an HRIS analyst’s interview:

  • How do you handle the analytical and performance data from each department?
  • How do you manage and collect the data?
  • If you have a situation where you have multiple tickets or projects open, how will you manage the workload and handle such situations?
  • Do you have any prior experience in handling HR data?
  • Did you provide any HR solutions before through your management skills?

Enroll in an HR management certification course to nourish your HR management skills. Take a look at this advanced HR management course that helped candidates, like you, secure HR management jobs at Google and Amazon:

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6. Behavioral or Non-Technical Questions

No doubt, technical and analytical skills are mandatory for an HRIS analyst’s role, but organizations prefer candidates with excellent behavioral skills. Such traits lead the employees to build a healthy work environment. 

Thus, when you’re preparing for your interview, prepare behavioral questions relevant to the job description of the HRIS analysis position you’re applying to. Here’s a look into a few of the behavioral questions for this analytical role:

  • How do you handle unhappy employees?
  • Are you happy in a non-management role?
  • Why do you believe you’re a good fit for this HRIS analyst role?
  • How do you deal with unhappy employees? 
  • How do you manage to perform your duties in a tough work environment?
  • Where do you expect to see yourself in the next five years? 
  • What kind of employees do you prefer not to work with?

Research well about personable working relationships and extensive communication studies. Practice these questions in your mock interview, but make sure you answer them with a smart strategy to pitch the recruiter.

7. Intellectual Questions

Intellectual questions enable the employers to understand your knowledge about the role and your interest in joining the position. To prepare intellectual questions, enhance your knowledge of the HRIS analytic tools, and necessary job requirements and processes relevant to the analytics field. 

Here’s an insight into knowledge-based questions that a recruiter asks to assess your intellect about HRIS:

  • Have you ever worked with an HRIS system?
  • Describe your SAP experience.
  • What workday modules have you worked with?
  • Describe your experience with using digital tools for analysis
  • If you ever see an employee doing a job in an unethical manner, how do you address it?
  • How do you describe a human resource information system to a new employee?

Conclusion

Prepare for the interview well, and make sure that your knowledge about the technical and non-technical HRIS operations is complete. Practice giving mock interviews to your friends to boost your confidence in answering the questions in a way to pitch to the recruiter. 

Understand what is HRIS analyst role and what are the skills necessary for the HRIS analyst position. Upskill your knowledge and learn the latest analytical market trends. Practice and learn extensive communication studies, as candidates win a majority of interviews based on their developed communication skills.


If you are new to human resources and are looking to break into an HR analyst position, we recommend taking our People Analytics Certification Course, where you will learn how to build your skillset in human resources analytics, build your human resources network, craft an excellent HR analyst resume, and create a successful job search strategy that helps you land a sought-after human resources analyst job.

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Josh Fechter
Josh Fechter is the founder of HR.University. He's a certified HR professional and has managed global teams across 5 different continents including their benefits and payroll. You can connect with him on LinkedIn here.