9 tips for conducting great interviews

In my career I have given thousands of interviews, been interviewed hundreds of times and as a media consultant I have also observed thousands of interviews from a neutral position. There are a few tips that have consistently worked well for me and may help you. I’m writing this from the perspective of a media professional, but I think many of these points apply to business and job interviews as well.

1. Start slow, safe and personal.

I usually start with a question that focuses on the person rather than the topic at hand, such as, “Where did you grow up,” or “What was your first job out of college?” First, you relax your subject and humanize the interaction. This sets the tone, starts the conversation on a solid footing, and lets you get an idea of ​​where your topic is coming from. Second, sometimes you get a surprisingly good story.

Many years ago, when Oracle was a booming startup, Larry Ellison was interviewed by a veteran magazine reporter. The topic was enterprise strategies related to database software. But the reporter began by asking Ellison where he was born and raised. Ellison, known for his aggressive and independent style, revealed that he was raised by a single mother and spent much of his youth on the streets of Chicago. This over many years became a key component of Ellison’s personality and Oracle’s ferocious racing style.

2. Coaxial, do not hit.

A “shock athlete” interviewer might get a daytime TV audience to cheer and jeer, but chances are your audience is too sophisticated and business-like for such low-rent tactics. I prefer interviews that have a close but soft style that invites revealing, newsworthy, helpful answers. For this reason, I’m a big fan of NPR’s Terry Gross, host of the long-running series Fresh air. She extracts the most revealing content from her subjects by getting very personal understanding and asking “come on, you can tell me” style questions. People say the most amazing things to her. I bet some of them will later wonder what made them reveal certain things on national television.

3. Make some questions open-ended.

All interviews require you to ask specific questions that are answered with narrow data. “What was your last job title?” But in my experience, the most interesting answers I get come from open-ended questions like, “What is your vision for your organization in five years?” or one of my current favorites, “You worry Are you aware of any unintended consequences of what you are trying to achieve?”

Years ago I interviewed Alabama Governor George S. Wallace, a controversial segregationist candidate for presidential nomination. I wasn’t a fan of his, but I made it a point not to show my personal animosity. I asked him what he thought Massachusetts voters had in common with him. “They’re as tired as I am of big government stomping hard-working people’s asses,” he said. It’s a tired old saw today, but this interview may be the first time a candidate personifies “big government” harassing ordinary people. Wallace nearly won the Massachusetts primary. His campaign sent me a thank you note for giving Wallace the chance to make his case. I’ve regretted it since, but I learned there that my job was to get the interviewee to tell his or her story and let the readers decide what they thought of his or her ideas.

4. Ask what you don’t know.

There is advice from a lawyer that advises you to only ask witnesses questions you already know the answers to. I do the opposite. I ask questions about questions that I don’t know what the answer will be. Lawyers hate surprises. As a journalist – or reader – I love them. Surprises mean I have something that hasn’t been reported before.

5. Let the interviewees wander a little, but be careful.

In my opinion, interviewers try hard to control the conversation when the person in the other seat is the one who can produce the news.

I recently watched an Oprah Winfrey interview with Sean Penn in a refugee camp in Haiti on TV. Penn was in an unusually pensive mood. He obviously wanted to talk about the recent breakdown of his marriage, but Winfrey changed the subject for him. Then he wanted to talk about the children’s suffering, but she changed the subject to him again. Afterward, Penn looked bored and detached. I don’t blame him.

However, there is a danger. If you’re conducting a business interview, the company representative may resort to talking points and “Corpspeak” if you allow yourself a lot of slack. I usually stop writing, fold my arms and look out the window. They often disappear. Sometimes I complain that I was hoping to get something from the person that I couldn’t download from the company’s site. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

6. Do not send preliminary questions.

Sometimes time demands that I email questions and then receive written responses in return. They are often adequate, but the result is rarely as good as frank face-to-face communication. If I’m going to have personal time, I clarify the topics I want to cover and even ask if there are any other topics the interviewee would like to discuss.

But I don’t send questions in advance. The result feels too scripted, and the answers start to feel like they were written by committee. The result is that very little new ground is covered. It also eliminates my favorite follow-up questions, the ones that dig into what was or wasn’t said in the answer. Very often the follow-up question leads to the story I’m reporting.

7. Be prepared. Find the overlooked.

I used to spend days researching before conducting an interview. Thanks to Google, this has been reduced to approximately an hour. I see what the subject has said to other reporters and bloggers and understand what can be added to those previous conversations. I also look in forgotten boxes. In searches, I often go back to always go to result pages 3, 4, and 5, where I might find some surprisingly interesting content that no one else has looked at recently.

I walk into the room, know the topics I want to discuss, and try not to waste time asking about recently discussed answers. But I’m looking for updates and looking for the questions someone else forgot to ask. I recently got to interview Yammer CEO David Sachs for my Forbes column. I had planned to ask him about his $25,000 bonus for hiring Yahoo employees. Unfortunately, during the previous week, other reporters had to ask him about everything. I read them all and began my interview by asking Sachs how many resumes he had received and how many offers he had made. As a result, I got a little scoop by asking the missed question.

Quite often, a subject’s response to a question requires follow-up. Many times the follow-up question reveals more than the interviewer or the interviewee expected. You just can’t make that happen when you’re following a script. When you do this, your mind very often moves on to your next question and you don’t listen carefully to what your subject is saying.

I come prepared and let my subject know what topics I want to cover. I also ask if there are any other topics she or he would like me to add. I even write down a few topics to make sure I remember them. But I don’t write down questions and remain willing to change directions and topics based on what my subjects say.

8. Listen, really listen.

The value of my interviews comes from what people say, not what I ask. If I ask a question and the topic drifts, there’s often a good reason. I can get a feist and retort “Please answer my question” or I can see where the person wants to go. If it’s in Corpspeak and key points, I just stop writing. If it’s in an area that might interest my readers, then I let the topic wander. The key is to pay close attention to what is not answered and to make an on-the-spot judgment as to why that area was missed or silenced. Was it off topic? unimportant? Painfully embarrassing?

9. There are stupid questions.

Try not to ask a question that the subject has already answered. It reveals that you really weren’t listening after all. Also, try not to answer questions that are answered in the interviewee’s online bios or company FAQs.

And remember, above all, that the interview is about the person you’re talking to, not about you. Your job is to reveal them, not to build them up or cut them down. Good night and good luck.