Accounts in selection interviews

This essay addresses consequences of providing accounts (explanations of conduct) in selection interviews. Previous research has suggested that using accounts in interviews might be detrimental to applicants, since providing accounts may be one of many indices of a powerless style of communication. On the other hand, in ordinary discourse, accounts have positive, beneficial uses: They explain away apparent improprieties, and restore favorable impressions of an actor's character. In this essay, questions about the negative consequences of account use are examined, an explanation of the relative frequencies of accounts by applicants and interviewers is developed, and a subset of selection interviews is conceptualized as a type of “hazardous” communication event. It is argued that accounts given in selection interviews are not necessarily powerless speech forms, and ways of usefully accounting in the context of interview hazards are summarized. Overall, while it is acknowledged that excessive account use might damage applications, it is argued that accounts can assist applications by explaining away questionable aspects of a candidate's history and prospects, within what is quite often a challenging, “hazardous” communication event.