I have more than 10 dedicated servers now, and i'm looking for a system admin to help me with support. The biggest problem i'm facing is, the person i want to hire will be working remotely from different state, so i don't have a chance to meet him face to face. So i'm really concerned about giving him root access to all servers and WHM to resolve issues for clients.

Is there a better way to handle this other than giving him root access and server access to WHM? I know i can create him an account to access via SSH, but about WHM, is there a way to create him a separate account with permission setting to limit his access to WHM, but he still has ability to resolve issues for clients?

Or is there a software out there that helps you do manage that? I'm using Cpanel/Linux servers

Thanks in advance for your suggestions/inputs

You need to hire someone who you trust to operate autonomously, you shouldn't be worrying about "controlling" people.

if you outsource support with a good company you can trust them.

Thats why you should go with a company rather then just this 1 idividual.

Your best bet would be to have a conversation with him over the telephone. If possible, you can talk with him 1-on-1 using some type of live conferencing solution (with sound and video capabilites).

If you are not that comfortable with hiring a specific individual, you should not hire them to represent your company. Before I recruite and officially list someone as an employee, I make sure I am completely happy with them and my gut feeling is saying "he/she is a good choice!" - your business is essential and you always want to make the best choice. Sometimes, your instincts/gut feelings are your most reliable.

Simple...you should outsource

Yes, I reccomend Gr8Support from previous experiances.

if you outsource support with a good company you can trust them.

Thats why you should go with a company rather then just this 1 idividual.

Simple...you should outsource

Agreed, you'll then be 24/7 guaranteed and not at a set times to go on and off. This way you are [in a sense] are on a legal contract with the outsourcer and I don't think they care about ruining your company; they don't want the bad reputation etc.

So you can trust to outsource!

If you don't trust your system admin, then you should find someone else.

Some of my thoughts: ;)

1) Just give sudo acess to the administrator(s) for some weeks/months so that you can watch his/their activities on the servers. If you feel that your tech is trustable, you can give root access to that guy.

2) Avoid risks by hiring techs from countries having high fraud rate.

3) Outsourcing to companies having SLA is god. But remember, not the company owners are working for you, but their employees. All are human beings, the moral responsiblity is different for every person. Some techs can hand over the passwords to their friends/relatives and it may lead to some serious problems. (Hopefully, it won't happen and I haven't even heard about such an incident). Anyway, you can avoid such an incident by allowing root shell access only for some IPs.

You could request account passwords etc in support tickets. But yes, I know what you mean about giving root access to anybody else, especially if you are used to managing everything on your own.

But you may be surprised, you may find the perfect partner/worker. You need to look out for one.

You have to develop a relationship with your team - that includes trust. If you dont' trust them, they won't work for you but rather slow you down. Just think by hirring someone it frees up your resources to focus on the business.

Look at it from a cost perspective, is it more beneficial to have an employee who gives your company a voice/perspective and feedback or is it better to have a managed service from a reputable 3rd party? Will you be spending more time managing an employee than you did managing the servers?