Bernie's Blog Week 11: Fordham Futures: Qualitative Interviewing

"In my view, stories and novels consist of three parts: narration, which moves the story from point A to point B and finally to point Z; description, which creates a sensory reality for the reader; and dialogue, which brings characters to life through their speech."
Stephen King 2000
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

     In 1991, after six years of creating, developing, and implementing an undergraduate interview training program, I began to realize that the deck was stacked against interviewees, as they participated in an adversarial process called interviewing, where the conversation was controlled by the interviewer, with no or little interest in assisting the applicant through the process. Rather than viewing the interview as a selection process, interviewers' primary focus,during the interview, is to evaluate, investigate, assess, and eventually eliminate the applicant from the pool of candidates. In other words, they want you to believe that you are participating in a selection process, while, at the same time, working hard to find ways to eliminate applicants.
      When asked if they enjoy their work, the research overwhelming shows that most Americans respond in the negative, depending on the survey, anywhere from 70 to 85%, state that they do not enjoy their work, and this number is currently expanding as more individuals realize that they are underemployed. Maybe, an interview process vested in evaluation, assessment, and elimination plays a roll in America's unhappiness at work, an interview style that is too quick to eliminate candidates too early in the process. In response to these adversarial mindsets and attitudes, I expanded the interview training menu and created a Qualitative Interview approach to these critical conversations. For the past twenty-five years, I have counseled and instructed Fordham students about interviews and interviewing using this model.
      Qualitative Interviewing looks to revolutionize the interview process and turn what has forever been a process of elimination into a selection process centered on creating a positive collaborative conversation that focuses on the candidate's strengths, possibilities, and opportunities. The interview, whether it be for employment or networking, is the most overlooked and misunderstood business communication within the world of work. If interviews are viewed and assessed, by both the candidate and the employer, as the most critical part of the selection process then why are interviews filled with evaluative and investigative rhetoric designed to eliminate candidates.
      Let's be candid, no one involved in an employment interview really wants to be there. Not the interviewees, who like most of us, are always more comfortable at displaying and performing our skills, then we are at describing our experience to others. Not the interviewers, who would much rather observe candidates working as interns, or watching videos of their performances, then asking questions about their past experiences. It is this inability to perform during an interview that causes much of the anxiety for individuals on both sides of the conversation.
      Most interviewees fail to get the job because of a breakdown in communication, either, the candidate lacks the preparation and expertise to tell their story, or the interviewer is not engaging or creative enough to select the best candidate. Interviewees should not expect the interviewer to help them tell their story. You would hope that interviewers were more interested in assisting interviewees tell their story during interviews. However, this lack of assistance needs to serve as motivation for interviewees to develop and deliver well thought out interview presentations that tell their whole story. You need to acquire a mastery of the interview if you are to effectively and persuasively tell your story.
      Consequently, the dominant psychology of the interview is vested and centered in employers viewing themselves as experts in personnel selection. Employers adopt this narrow misperception mainly because they have had more interviewing experience and more time within their organization. Most interviewees want to believe that the psychology that underlies and pervades the interview is all about selection, when in reality, it is all about evaluation, judgment, and elimination.
      Individuals assume that if they present their qualifications in a reasoned and polite manner, and if they manage to impress the interviewer, with their experience and accomplishments, they will get the job. The applicant who best understands the psychology of the interview, and prepares the best interview presentation has the best chance to close the deal.
       If you are to turn the psychology of interviewing in your favor, you need to take the offensive. Instead of approaching the interview with the attitude that you are asking for something, you need to assume the interview posture of having something valuable to market. In other words, you seek to meet the interviewer on equal psychological footing, continually, utilizing your awareness, preparation, and presentation in understanding and articulating the importance of interview practice and preparation.
      The wise interviewee knows that self-esteem is crucial in all elements of performance and presentation, and she or he knows that unless they hold themselves in high esteem others will not. Many applicants approach the interview with a defensive attitude. They sense that the employer has the upper hand resulting in a defensive attitude on their part, a defensive attitude that generally results in 'overcompensating' - bringing a know-it-all attitude to the interview; taking a 'desperate position', that you will take the job at any price; and finally, an 'obsequious approach', where you are too anxious to please.
      The primary goal and mission of Qualitative Interviewing is for all participants, both interviewers and interviewees, to play an active role in the creation of a collaborative, qualitative, interview conversation. Interviewees are trained to come to the interview prepared to deliver a presentation that engages and informs the interviewer. Not a memorized script, but rather a memorized outline that leads to a positive and progressive dialogue that flows into a conversation that evolves into an equality of communication between interviewer and interviewee. Interviewees need to create visual images in the interviewer's mind's eye that clearly reflects their actual experience.
      Qualitative interviewing is inspired, humanized, and informed by the vision of family therapist Virginia Satir's HVPM. Virginia's model identifies the path of your interview journey, as seen by both the interviewer and interviewee. Satir's model begins as a social human connection that quickly evolves into the 'creative crucible of chaos' that serves as a qualitative incubator needed for effective integration. From contact to chaos to integration, Professor Satir lights a clear path of working assumptions that surround all involved in the interview with a qualitative cocoon of cooperation and collaboration:

     Making Contact: All interview participants need to establish trust and enlist hope as ways of creating a qualitative communication environment that inspires all involved to take risks. In order to make effective contact during the initial stages of the interview the interviewer needs to display direction, knowledge, and comfort. Interviewers need to create a safe climate in which interviewees need not worry about the consequences of their descriptions, expressions, and revelations in an atmosphere that is free of intimidation and rich with trust.
      Self-awareness, on both sides of the interview, is the key ingredient needed to connect. Awareness of self, as well as, awareness of their interaction and interconnectedness during the interview, works as the qualitative fluid that lubricates the collaboration between interviewer and interviewee. Developing mutual respect and understanding is facilitated by an expression of hopeful expectations throughout the interview, rather than a search for problems and negativity. There is nothing to loss, and everything to gain by being inspired by a restless search for the positive. Qualitative interviewing wants to move from an interview experience filled with implicit ideas and understandings to a more explicit understanding of ideas and feelings, merging two perspectives into a focused view of the interview equation.
     Chaos: Qualitative interviewing is designed to directly address the general confusion and disorder associated with the interview process. During most interviews, interviewees are unable to perform the skills and abilities that they need to describe as part of telling their story. Interviewees need to create a visual presentation of their past, present, and future performances for the interviewer.
      Qualitative interviews involve mutual dependency and vulnerability in order to succeed. Because interviewees are unable to rely on displaying their skills and abilities they need to access their descriptive abilities to tell their stories. Only actors applying for a role or part in a production enjoy the luxury of performing during an interview as they display their acting expertise for the interviewer.
      Qualitative interviewing challenges the interviewer to do the unspeakable, which is to assist the interviewee during the interviewer. Qualitative interviewers need to only ask questions that are designed and directed at discovering what makes each candidate unique and special and a perfect fit for the opportunity, adopting a cooperative [rather than a evaluative or dismissive] interview posture and approach.
      When chaos occurs in an interview it is characterized by a feeling of paralysis and hopelessness that restricts the interviewee's ability to move backward and forward within and throughout the interview. Qualitative interviewing looks to develop a therapeutic alliance between interviewer and interviewee, a healing approach that brings out the best in both individuals. Interviewers need to be more interested in gathering as much positive information as possible.
      When qualitative interviewing works best both the interviewer and interviewee are actively engaged in the present, merging the past and the future, a qualitative dialogue designed to assist all interview participants. Empathy and patience need to be always present in an effort to find another connection, another channel, or another bridge that facilitates the creation of a qualitative employment conversation. During this period of chaos, flexibility and the ability to adapt serve as the most powerful tools available to the qualitative interviewer, as she or he utilizes a wide array of methods and modalities in order to assist in the creation of an atmosphere and environment vested in collaboration and cooperation.

     Integration: Interview integration evolves and occurs as a search for quality continues throughout the interview. In order for interview integration to expand both the interviewer and interviewee need to develop an atmosphere of trust, mutual understanding, and the willingness to take risks. The art of qualitative interviewing is in maintaining a balance between the direction that the interview is moving and any new issues that emerge throughout the interview. Qualitative interviewing is designed to weave a fabric of connectivity and communication that brings together ideas, concepts, interests, and values.
Qualitative interviewing is fueled by a relentless pursuit of the positive. Always looking for ways to hire individuals, rather than looking for ways to eliminate candidates, as expressed in the following principles:

• Qualitative Interviewing looks to foster an atmosphere of empathy and recognition through the creation of a positive dialogue; rather than measuring individuals on what they say or don't say.
• Qualitative interviewing transforms the interview from an evaluative process into a process of exploration and discovery, searching and seeking quality everywhere, a restless curiosity.
• Qualitative interviewing seeks to create quality conversations filled with 'wonder', 'freedom', and 'commitment'.
• Qualitative interviewing requires interviewers to take a positive leadership role in the interview, encouraged to alter their contextual control, while constantly looking for ways to enhance the interviewee's interview content in a progressive direction.
• Qualitative interviewing assumes that all interviewees possess the skills and abilities needed to fill a potential employer's needs.
• Qualitative interviewing needs to serve as a constant search for the unique treasures that are within each of us. Relevant similarities that lead to effective connectivity need to be discovered throughout the interview experience.
• Qualitative interviewing needs to be less about 'Why?' And more about 'What?', 'How?', 'When?', and with 'Whom?'.
• Qualitative interviewing challenges interviewers to seek a positive and fearless exchange of ideas, questions, and solutions.

      Qualitative Interviewing is a call for cooperation and balance within the interview process, it's all about creating an environment and atmosphere of equality between interviewee and interviewer. Both participants building a communications bridge in the co-creation of a positive qualitative interview conversation. Qualitative interviewing is fueled by a positive mindset that relentlessly pursues faith, hope and optimism in the creation of an atmosphere and environment of respect, receptivity, and recognition among all interview participants.
Qualitative interviewing looks to create connections and expand horizons through a communication process centered in cooperation, collaboration, and consideration. This approach is most effective when the interview relationship and environment are fully integrated into a diagnostic journey of discovering and creating connections.
      Qualitative interviews are focused on growth, change, and transformation, as both interviewers and interviewees recognize that they possess the necessary resources needed to succeed in a qualitative interviewing environment. In other words, both participants need to be able to identify their interviewing resources, discover how to access their resources, and learn how to utilize their resources in an effort to connect the applicant with the right opportunity.
      Qualitative interviewing needs to be holistic and integrative with a focus on the twenty-first century realities that all interviewees are performers. At this stage in your life, when you are assigned a task, after completion, you evaluate the experience first, then someone else [teacher, parent, employer] evaluates the performance, and then you move on to your next assignment. Usually, you don't spend anytime speaking about your past performances, there is never enough time, and quite frankly, no one is interested.
      We live in a society where performance rules. Where action speaks louder than words. Think about someone you know, (or someone you used to know) who did nothing but talk about themselves nonstop. Also, as a society, we are much more interested in performance than describing performance, especially, if we are interested in improving our performance.
As interviewees, you need to create a visual, auditory, and performance based description of your past experiences. As you describe this cognitive images to the interviewer they begin to serve as descriptive foundations that articulate, support, and structure your interview presentations. For each interview, you need to create a unique individual presentation, formed within your own set of explanatory, evocative, and illustrative parameters.
Your actions and your activities are the most specific and direct form of communication at your disposal. Consequently, you suffer from severe performance limitations that exist in all performance descriptions. Being unable to perform specifically restricts your interview presentation, and at the same time your performance descriptions need to be as specific as possible.
      Specific details facilitate the creation of a visual picture in the interviewer's mind's eye. Through specific descriptions you bring your past experiences into the 'here and now' of the interview. You need to describe your experience to a potential employer in the form of a specific comprehensive qualitative interview presentation. Specific and detailed preparation are the keys to great interviews. You need to develop a clear idea of the type of position you are seeking and be able to indicate your suitability for the opportunity. You need to identify, clarify, and describe your interests, values, skills, and abilities. Being able to articulate your message successfully is typically the difference between excellent and poor interview presentations. When you are asked to describe your experiences you need to avoid generalizations and personal discounts, you need not bring any negativity into the interview experience. You need to be prepared specifically, and specifically prepared to succeed in the art of interviewing.
      Most of the time, your performances occur in a specific direct fashion, while descriptions of your performances are sometimes vague and general. In order for successful interviewing to occur you need to be descriptively precise.