Helping Interviewees Tell Their Stories

Abstract

Employers' use of behavioral description interviews has increased dramatically within the past decade. Yet the pedagogical literature geared toward helping appli cants respond to these unique interviewing questions has not kept pace. Evidence shows that behavioral description questions require respondents to tell stories and that storytelling is now critical to applicants' success in employment interviews. We present criteria by which to judge the effectiveness of applicants' stories and demonstrate how business communication instructors might use these criteria to help applicants tell better stories. Specifically, the criteria presented in this article are : To what degree is a story internally consistent? To what degree is a story con sistent with facts the listener holds to be true? To what degree is a story relevant to the question asked and the claim being made? To what degree is a story univocal? To what degree does a story provide details that support the claim being made? How does the way a story is told reflect the teller's beliefs and values?

Best Practices in Preparing Students for Mock Interviews

“…The classroom lecture/discussion activity that students found most helpful required them to prepare five "success stories" about their accomplishments and then asked to draw from those stories while responding to behavior-based interview questions in roundrobin fashion. This technique aligns with research by Ralston, Kirkwood, and Burant (2003) describing how to help interviewees tell their stories in response to behavior-based questions, as well as Martin's (2004) recommendation that job candidates write success stories to prepare for interviews, particularly behavioral interviews. Students offered feedback about this activity that included comments such as, "My nervousness is usually what holds me back, and that definitely made the interview less stressful," and "It was good to see how others answered questions and think about how I would answer them differently based on my own experiences.…”

Storytelling in the Selection Interview? How Applicants Respond to Past Behavior Questions

“…Research might focus on identifying conditions that affect the production of stories: applicant individual differences, question formulation, recruiter behavior, and type of competency seem to be important factors. Research might also focus on the content of stories and the question of story quality, i.e., what constitutes a good story in a selection context, both from the point of view of the applicant and the recruiter (Ralston et al 2003). From a practical point of view, there are implications for training for both interviewers and applicants.…”

“…They might also be trained in techniques to elicit stories, or to help applicants transform pseudostories or abstract self-descriptions into stories (e.g., via follow-up questioning). Training programs for applicants could also focus on helping them think about their experiences in ways that can be framed as good stories (Ralston et al 2003); i.e., stories that express in an accurate and detailed manner their level of mastery of a specific competence.…”

“…A better understanding of the properties of applicants' responses to behavioral questions could lead to several improvements in interview practice. For example, it may be possible to teach applicants to produce meaningful and representative stories as part of training programs (Maurer et al 2008;Ralston et al 2003). And interviewers may be better trained to help applicants produce such stories (e.g., by appropriate prompting).…”

Disfluent Responses to Job Interview Questions and What They Entail

“…In other words, candidates are expected to respond to such questions by telling a story. Behavioral interviews are increasingly used (Roulin & Bangerter, 2012), and, as a result, storytelling skills will become more and more important for candidates (Ralston, Kirkwood, & Burant, 2003).…”