Interviewing Staff Training Practices

New interviewers receive 6 - 12 hours of classroom and hands-on computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) training.Three hours are on general interviewing techniques, followed by three to six hours on the use of the WinCATIŽ system. The hours focus on WinCATIŽ technology while reinforcing the general interviewing techniques.

Interviewers also receive additional, project-specific training. This involves extensive review of the materials, project-specific procedures, and item-by-item specifications for the questionnaire.

After training, interviewers must prove their competency by administering a standardized interview without errors. The interview is administered to a supervisor interviewer playing the role of a respondent. Supervisor interviewers must demonstrate their ability to handle a variety of responses that typically occur during the course of telephone interviewing and tests interviewer knowledge of procedures specific to a given project. The supervisor interviewer then meets with the interviewer to review the interviewer's performance.

Interviewers' phone performance, productivity, and response rates are routinely monitored; corrective or remedial training is provided if necessary. Interview quality is continuously assessed in a variety of ways: Performance is monitored using silent monitors installed on all telephones; interviewers receive written feedback on errors, as well as corrective instruction.