From SXSW – Diving Deep: Best Practices For Interviewing Users
I spoke at SXSW recently about the interviewing process in user research. As I’ve been working on a book about this topic the timing was great for me.
While we know, from a very young age, how to ask questions, the skill of getting the right information from users is surprisingly complex and nuanced. This session will focus on getting past the obvious shallow information into the deeper, more subtle, yet crucial, insights. If you are going to the effort to meet with users in order to improve your designs, it’s essential that you know how to get the best information and not leave insights behind. Being great in “field work” involves understanding and accepting your interviewee’s world view, and being open to what they need to tell you (in addition to what you already know you want to learn). We’ll focus on the importance of rapport-building and listening and look at techniques for both. We will review different types of questions, and why you need to have a range of question types. This session will explore other contextual research methods that can be built on top of interviewing in a seamless way. We’ll also suggest practice exercises for improving your own interviewing skills and how to engage others in your organization successfully in the interviewing experience.
Slides
Audio
Presentation (45 minutes + 15 minutes Q&A):
To download the audio Right-Click and Save As… (Windows) or Ctrl-Click (Mac).
Also see
- The Rosenfeld Media page for my book in progress The Art and Craft of User Research Interviewing
- Slides and audio from last year’s presentation at SXSW