Which of the following 2 sentences is correct, and why?
- You'll get an opportunity to be interviewed by us.
- You'll get an opportunity to interview with us.
Context: If a person performs well in the test, after an interview, we might select him for a job.
Best Answer
Both are acceptable phrasings and carry essentially the same gross semantic meaning to a native speaker. Namely, that the listener will receive a chance to be part of an interview. This is the important piece of information, especially if hearing this after taking an employment qualifications test, and is good news for someone applying for a job.
There are grammatical differences in clause construction here. The first option is a passive construction literally stating that the company (us) will conduct the interview, and the applicant (you) will be its object. The second says that both the applicant and company will engage in interviewing (you ... with us).
One might also read the second as stating that only you will do the interviewing, by taking with us to mean at our company. One might also use interview in an idiomatic sense to mean undergo an employment screening. Combining these two readings causes I will interview with the company to express that you'll be subject to a meeting with the purpose of answering some questions concerning your potential employment at the company. The semantics here are closer to the first construction than the second, because the speaker is still being subjected to the process; the company has a greater degree of power or influence than the applicant.
In all cases, it's understood that job interviews are typically dominated by inquiries from the employer rather than employee, though they are rarely a strictly one way exchange of information.
Technicalities aside, the major difference between the two sentences is in tone. The phrase to be interviewed by us conveys a stricter, more adversarial feel than to interview with us. One might therefore infer that an interview performed by us would be more aggressive than one with us. The latter phrasing is more open, suggesting that the candidate will engage in a dialogue and have sufficient opportunities to ask questions, rather than simply being grilled about their qualifications.