The Art of the User and Having a Good Interview

This week I had to read two online articles in addition to the chapter three book reading. Nick Babich’s article “The Art of The User” is more like a step-by-step guide of how a person can get the most out of the interview that they conduct.

Step 1: Prepare for the interview
    Have a clear understanding or goal of the interview you want to accomplish
    Conduct a method of interview (in-person or remote via phone or web-based video)

Step 2: Prepare a discussion guide
    The questions should be selected according to the learning goal. A wrong set of questions can not only nullify the benefits of the interview session, but also lead product development down the wrong path.
    Two sections of questions — intro questions and product-specific questions.

Step 3: Do these 15 things when interviewing People
    1. Put yourself in the mood
    2. Provide a warm welcome
    3. Build an arc
    4. Explain that there are no right or wrong answers
    5. Start with three to five easy questions before working to the difficult ones
    6. Ask interviewees about specific moments in the past (references to real-life examples)
     7. Prioritize open-ended questions - I was surprised a little by this step because I thought some simple yes or no questions might do the trick, but I quickly learned those are dead-end questions. Instead of using these types, I read that it’s better to start questions off using the five w’s.
    8. Ask follow-up questions - be eager and curious to learn as much as you can if an answer is left open-ended. (Providing examples, or this is also where the Five Whys technique comes into play)
    9. Ask for extremes  - If you interview people about a product and ask them how they use it on a regular basis, they’ll describe an idealized interaction without common problems they face on a regular basis and deviations that characterize a real interaction.  (asking these extreme questions will reveal user’s pain points and delights)
    10. Ask to observe behavior
    11. When in doubt, clarify
    12. Keep an eye on the time
    13. Minimize note-taking
    14. Watch out for non-verbal clues
    15. Finish with a wrap-up summary

Step 4: 7 things to AVOID when interviewing people
    1. Don’t ask leading questions  - Leading questions are questions that frame the interviewee’s mind around a particular answer.
    2. Don’t fill the silence
    3. Don’t draw attention to specific issue
    4. Don’t ask if they’d buy your product
    5. Don’t answer a user’s questions
    6. Resist the urge to judge or educate your interviewees
    7. Don’t express your own opinion

The second online article by Teo Yeu Sheng is a little bit of a re-hash of what Nick Babich talks about in his article, the only take away from this is that he talks about questions being seen as problem statements (having have some idea of the problem or main idea you want to be answered or addressed), and also regarding the last of the five steps where he talks about structuring your user interview in four parts (introduction, warm-up question, main body questions, and wrap-up - that little tidbit was quite helpful in understanding the structure of the questionnaire)

Here is a summary that I copied and pasted for this section.
5 steps to create good user interview questions:
    1) Come up with problem statements -
    2) Reframe your problem statements.
    3) Build a list of questions based on your reframed problem statements.
    4) Paraphrase each question 2–3 times.
    5) Structure your questions properly.