The Art & Science of Conversational Job Interviews

The Oxford Languages Dictionary defines the word conversation as “a talk, especially an informal one, between two or more people, in which news and ideas are exchanged.”  Such friendly conversations tend to be natural, organic and spontaneous, with an easy rhythm and variable cadence, and high levels of engagement.  Stress levels are often quite low, under 10 on a 100-point scale. 

On the other hand, job interviews often induce stress for both the interviewer and the interviewee, with stress levels ranging from 20 to 50 on a 100-point scale, depending on how high stakes the job interview is.  Both candidates and interviewers diminish the effectiveness of their interviews when stress levels rise.  That’s where conversational interviewing comes to the rescue, mitigating or eliminating stress levels and allowing each to be their honest, open true self. 

Gold Rarely Lies on the Surface

Many job interviews are held at a surface level… ask one or two questions about an area of interest, then move on to the next question area. 

No wonder that managers who interview candidates at a surface level complain that the person they interviewed is not the same person who showed up for their first few weeks on the job.  That’s because many candidates are better prepared to answer superficial questions with strong answers than their interviewer is in digging deep into a topical area. 

Gold rarely lies on the surface – one needs to dig deep to find it.  You strike gold when you go deep enough in an interview to reveal the core of who someone really is. 

Anatomy of a Questioning Sequence

Think of a questioning sequence like tracing the roots of a tree from the ground’s surface into the soil. Where the trunk meets the ground you’ll usually find a series of main roots, each of which divides into lesser roots, each of which divides into still lesser roots, and so on until you come to the smallest hair-like roots.

A well-designed job interview follows a similar tree-and-root structure. Identify five to seven general question areas you’d like to explore during an interview. The answers to each general question you ask should prompt several follow-up questions; the answers from each follow-up questions should likewise prompt deeper questions, and so on, until the general question topic has been fully explored, and you have the details you wanted to learn.

Making it Conversational

Think of the last time you had a friendly conversation with someone you know.  What specifically made it conversational?  Here are some key factors:

• There was no script to follow, so the conversation was organic.
• The other person’s statements or questions prompted you to tailor your response to him or her, and vice versa.
• There was a natural ebb and flow to the conversation.
• Both parties exhibited genuine and largely spontaneous body language and message delivery (such as tone, emotional content, or inflection).
• The pace was largely relaxed but lively as appropriate for the topics being discussed.

Putting it All Together

What makes a conversational job interview effective is that a good interviewer will need to know only five to seven general questions to ask ahead of time, then use natural questioning sequences to explore the candidate’s answers at a deeper level.  The interviewer sets a conversational tone throughout the interview.   

Here’s what a conversational questioning sequence might sound like, with Mary interviewing Ric for a job at Mary organization:

Mary: Ric, how young were you when you first started earning money?

Ric: Probably ten or eleven.

Mary: What was it that you did?

Ric: We lived in a subdivision and it snowed a lot in the winter.  I cleared our neighbors’ driveways.

Mary; Hmm… whose idea was that?

Ric: It was my idea.

Mary: Tell me more…

Ric: My mom was a nurse and she had to leave by 7am, so I was up early to shovel her out.  Once I got done with her car, I was up and dressed so I asked my neighbor if I could do their driveway.  Took me a half hour and they paid me $20, so I asked them if I could blow out their driveway every snow.  And then I asked the neighbors on the other side…

Mary: Interesting! Ric, what did you differently than the other kids that cleared driveways in your neighborhood?

Ric: I watched the weather and got up early any morning that it would snow, and I was always the first one at it. I was fast but thorough.  Plus, I used a leaf blower to clear off each car so the neighbors could jump in and go.  Just paying attention to the details.

Mary: Ric, please tell me… what did you learn from your snow blowing experience as an eleven-year-old that you bring to your current job with your employer?

Notice how the interview flowed with a natural conversation… and how much Mary learned about Ric?

Bottom Line

Conversational job interviews using well-designed questioning sequences are incredibly effective in getting candidates to move past the rehearsed answers and open up and reveal who they really are, so you can make a better hiring decision.  Candidates respond favorably to the positive experience of a conversational interview and make your organization an employer of choice. 

This article is based on the principles taught in Module 5 of our acclaimed leadership development program Leading Through People™ – Staffing, Recruitment & Onboarding.