Murray Barrick

Both authors contributed equally to this study. We would like to thank Frank Schmidt, Ralph Alexander, Paul Costa, Mike Judiesch, Wendy Dunn, and Jacob Sines for thoughtful comments about the article and some of the data analyses. We gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Mike Judiesch, Wendy Dunn, Eric Neumann, Val Arnold, and Duane Thompson in categorizing the personality scales.

Job interviews typically begin with a set of seemingly innocuous questions unrelated to the job: How is your day going? Got any plans for the weekend? How was traffic on your way in? It is commonly assumed that job candidates and interviewers both prefer to start with these types of questions rather than just diving into the more rigid and formal structured interview topics. After all, small talk is typically how most interactions between strangers begin.