Retail surgery: How can we ensure that we are not putting the company at risk when we interview staff accused of fraud or other disciplinary incidents?

In the US more than 150,000 people have been trained in a non-confrontational interview technique called Wicklander-Zulawski, including staff from many of its top retailers.

Those who learn the technique become able to accurately interpret physical and verbal behaviour during the interviews.

It has now hit the UK, and the few retailers that have adopted it here - including HMV - have reported that it has improved the quality and consistency of the interviews they conduct. One Irish retailer used the technique to get a staff member to admit to e1,800 (£1,611) worth of fraud, when they were only being interviewed about suspicious transactions worth e45 (£40).

Courses in the Wicklander-Zulawski technique are being run by Cardinal Security. Director Geoffrey Northcott explains that those trained in the technique are able to get a “confession” in an average of 17 minutes within an interview lasting an hour.

He adds that “the aim of the interview is to get to as close to the truth as you can. The idea is that you establish empathy with the individual”. The technique is also designed to make people interviewed who are actually innocent feel that they were dealt with fairly.

Northcott also says that using the technique can reduce the likelihood of being taken to an industrial tribunal: “If everyone interviewed to this standard it would eliminate disputes afterwards.”