A complete guide to interview transcription

What is an Interview Transcription?

As the title says, we are going to offer a comprehensive guide on interview transcription. But before we dig deep into the intricate details of interview transcription, let us share what is an interview transcription? Interview transcription is a written record of the complete oral interview. In this transcription process, a document is provided regarding the conversation of two or more people. The process can be executed in real-time or you can also opt for a video or audio recording.

Benefits of Interview Transcription

Creating an interview transcription requires patience, careful skill, and proper listening skills. The interview transcripts will help in streamlining the hiring process and offer accurate records for the vents that happened during the interview.

Another benefit of interview transcription is, it allows the interviewer to focus. While taking an interview, if an interviewer has to take down notes simultaneously, it might disrupt him/her. Thus, it will hamper the on-going communication between the candidate and the interviewer. With proper interview transcript, you can review it later and allow the interviewer to work with complete attention.

Apart from that, interview transcription will save a lot of time as well. The hiring process gets streamlined. The reason is, with an interview transcription at hand, you can use all the necessary information from every interview without having to remember all the minor details or facts about the interaction. You can avoid time-consuming tasks like creating notes, meeting with the supervisor for discussing candidates or taking second or third interviews. That being said, let us check out the details of the interview transcription.

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The steps for interview transcription

How do the professional companies offer interview transcription? There are certain steps to creating an accurate interview transcription. The first thing to do is to listen to the complete recording carefully before transcribing. A lot of people would straight dive into the transcription process. But the professionals would analyze the complexity of the recording. The audio is sometimes complex and if you dive straight into the transcription process without listening to it properly, it will cause you much frustration later on. While listening to the audio or watching the video files, it is important to check for certain things like the exact length of the recording, the number of speakers, the rate of speech, the language and accents, the technical terms and whether you want the full audio/video to be transcribed or just some specific parts of it.

The next step is to calculate how long it is going to take. The professionals have a high typing speed of 60-65 words per minute and they can offer you a complete transcription of a 1-hour recording in 3-4 hours approximately. But the time might vary depending on the complexity of the audio or video file. For instance, if the recording comes with multiple speakers, poor audio quality, and strong accents, then it can take up to 6-7 hours. But the benefit of taking the help of transcription professional is, they are well versed with multiple types of accents and also well-accustomed with the technical terms. Thus, it will not be difficult for them to derive the content of the audio file.

The next step is to create a draft. The drafting phase happens in steps as well. In the first phase of drafting, the transcription is done quickly without worrying about creating everything right. This is just the initial phase of drafting the transcripted file. Next are the research and proofreading. This is the time when the professionals ensure that every word on the document is accurate and error-free. They conduct their research online to ensure that every word of the audio and video file has been transcribed accurately. Then comes the proofreading segment where the document is made completely free of any typos, grammatical errors and any other sort of mistakes. One of the most important factors that differentiate a professional from a novice is, a novice would try to translate the complete file in one shot. But professionals break down the file into sections of 5-10 minutes and then work on it. Thus, it helps them to stay focused and not feel exhausted.

The next step is to use shortcuts. There are multiple shortcuts that can be used for transcription. One of them is the time coding feature. There will be certain sections within the audio and video files that are sometimes tough to comprehend. Instead of re-playing those sections of over and over again, you can simply insert a time code like [hh:mm: ss unclear] and carry on. You can come back to the time codes later during proofreading. The time codes are particularly important in qualitative research transcripts. They help in finding specific parts of the transcript on the actual recording. Another shortcut is to use placeholder text for the speaker’s names and speech habits. You can later replace the text with full spellings by using the “Find and Replace” function.

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Once the final draft is ready with the time codes and placeholder texts, then it is time to replay the recording right from the beginning and proofread the complete file. In this process, you have to check the accuracy of the transcript and then add the missing words, false starts, fillers, ambient sounds and more. The detailing of the transcription would depend on whether the transcription is meant to be verbatim, intelligent verbatim or true verbatim. Next is, you have to format the document by changing the font size, adding headers, titles, page numbers and justifying the whole document. Unless you have a specific instruction for formatting, that’s it, you are done.

Interview transcription - consolidating the whole process

Interview transcription can be done in multiple ways. You can outsource it to a professional transcription company, opt for the audio to text converters, you can try transcribing it yourself, or you can hire a freelancer.

Among all the above-mentioned ways of interview transcription, the best way is to opt for a professional transcription company. Why? Yes, you can always opt for a free tool for audio to text converter, but those tools are basically software that works on an algorithm. But they are not completely error-free. Thus, even if you use the converter numerous times, there will always be a certain percentage of error. It will reflect on the final document. Thus, it is not a good idea to choose software tools for interview transcription. board meeting transcription services / psychology transcription services / insurance transcription services /media transcription services

Next is, you can choose to do it yourself. But if you are not well-aware or well-versed with the overall process of transcription, the end-product will not be something that you would like. Also, it will take a lot of time for you to do it on your own.

Speaking about freelancers, yes, there are certain freelancers that can provide good work. But freelancers are not reliable and you have to risk experimenting a lot to find the right freelancer for a good end-result. It would also take up a lot of time and money as well.

This is why the best option is to choose a professional transcription company. They have got experienced professionals that can deliver accurate transcription services at one go. Also, if the recording is in a language that is difficult for you to understand, then it is always better to choose a professionals company. You will also get better customer service along with accurate interview transcription.