Telephone Interviewing Techniques

Telephone II Graphic 22

Many industries such as insurance companies, financial institutions, and credit card companies rely extensively on telephone interviews to conduct their investigations. There are a number of different skills required to conduct telephone interviews versus a face to face interview. For this reason, we contracted with Daniel Marsano, a leading expert in telephone interviewing techniques, to help write this course. This three hour course is our most frequently re-ordered audio course by the same company -- after hearing the course they want to expose the techniques to other divisions or investigators in different locations.


(NOTE - THIS IS THE ELECTRONIC VERSION)

The training program is accompanied with a 64 page study guide and includes the following topics:

PART I: INTRODUCTION TO TELEPHONE INTERVIEWING

  • Limitations and benefits of a telephone interview
  • Goals of the telephone interview
  • Appropriate and inappropriate use of telephone interviews
  • When and where to call
  • Starting the interview
  • Establishing rapport with the subject
  • Procedural considerations
  • Personality traits of a successful interviewer

PART II: BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS

  • Channels of communication
  • General assessment versus specific event assessments
  • Evaluating attitudes
  • Psychological principles of verbal behavior
  • Truthful behavior symptoms
  • Deceptive behavior symptoms
  • Response latency
  • Voice characteristics
  • Erasure behaviors
  • Psychological principles of response content
  • Evaluating memory
  • Evaluating segments of an account
  • Evaluating pronouns
  • Phrases which indicate edited information
  • Evaluating logic within a response

PART III: QUESTION TECHNIQUES

  • Interview structure
  • The initial open questions
  • Techniques to draw out a response
  • Asking clarifying questions
  • Asking direct questions
  • Summary statements
  • Linguistic interpretations