Friday, June 12, 2009

Discuss different forms of interview and its advantages and limitations.

Discuss different forms of interview and its advantages and limitations. Cite an instance where interview method helped in the process of organisational analysis. Describe the organisation you are referring to.

Different Forms Of Interviews Are As Follows:
The interviews may range from highly structured forms, to totally unstructured form. Normally unstructured interview methodology is used for exploratory diagnosis purposes. In exploratory diagnosis the interviewer may simply open the interview session by saying that he is trying to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the organisation and the interviewee may talk about anything he sees as the strength and weakness. In such cases the interview may reveal a lot of significant information about strengths and weaknesses. The issues he chooses to speak himself may reveal the concerns of employees. Unstructured interviews also could be used for probing in relation to specific issues. In such probing every question asked by the interviewer depends on the responses given by the interviewee earlier. Unstructured interviews require skilled interviewers.

Semi-structured interviews may consist of a list of pre-determined set of questions the interviewer has with him and seeking answers of these questions. These interviews are useful for hypothesis testing and probing.

Highly structured interviews are almost like questionnaires. They may infect take the form of verbal administration of questionnaires or asking a series of open-ended questions which are pre-determined. These forms of interviews are useful if the respondent cannot answer questionnaire or if the respondent is likely to give better quality responses in interview settings than in writing, idea generating, influencing, probing for more insights etc.

Conduct Interviews For Analyzing
In the case of medical diagnosis the patient goes to the doctor with a problem and hence in his own interest he gives all information whereas in organizational diagnosis although the top management who goes to the consultant may give all information, the other interviewees may not have the same need as the top management and hence may not be willing to volunteer information. Alternately they may destroy data depending on their attitudes to top management, the consultant, and the study. Therefore it is very important for the interviewer to establish credibility and build rapport.

Before interviews are conducted it is useful and even necessary for the top management to legitimise the diagnostic study by informing all those who are to participate in it. Such a legitimisation could be done either through an announcement giving details of the study, its purposes, the consultants or interviewing team members and the help they need from the employees etc.

After such a legitimisation, in the interview process itself the interviewers should clarify once again the purposes and assure the confidentiality of responses. Aggressive postures trying to impress the interviewee by talking about the closeness of the interviewer to top management, lecturing, demanding, criticising others, expression of interviewers opinions even before the interview starts etc. are behaviors that hinder rapport building. Starting with general and non-threatening issues, talking about the background of the interviewer himself, getting to know each other, pleasantries etc. help in establishing rapport.

Using open-ended questions, information seeking questions and suggestive questions helps in probing and discovering many unknowns. Sometimes during the interview process paraphrasing the responses given by the interviewee may help improving the listening process and understanding process.

It is useful to conduct diagnostic interviews in settings, which are free form noise and other disturbances. A peaceful atmosphere always enhances the quality of data collected. In case of probing interviews the interviewer should constantly guard himself against the danger of putting ideas into the mind of the interviewee. Normally after interviewing a few, the interviewer starts developing hypothesis, Presenting these hypothesis impatiently to the subsequent interviewers may endanger the diagnostic process.

Interview data are relatively more difficult to code and analyze as compared to questionnaire data. Since interview data are qualitative data after few interviews are completed it may be useful to develop a coding/analysis scheme. It is useful to categories all responses into those coding categories. Number of person giving a particular hypothesis etc. can be indicated.

The greatest advantage of interviews is the amount of insight it can provide into organisational processes. Many hypothesis can be generated and tested spontaneously during interviews. Interview data obtained from a small sample of individuals using semi-structured interviews is presented at the end as an illustration. The reader may have a feel of a diagnostic report given in the appendix.

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