The Art (and Science) of Interviewing

Martin Kuz, Senior Editor for Sactown magazine, March 19, 2009

Pre-Interview

• Deciding what your story is about will help you determine what questions to ask. What are the primary points or themes you want to touch on in your story?
•  Who is your audience? Understanding who reads the publication you’re writing for – and what writing style that publication prefers — will also help you craft your questions.
• Research your subject. Read what’s been written about the person. Depending on the story’s complexity, talk to other sources before you interview the main subject.
• Prepare a list of questions and bring it to the interview. Ideally, you’ll have your questions memorized so that you can stay in the flow of the conversation, but the list can help if you forget a question or get sidetracked.
• Practical matters: Pick a place that isn’t especially noisy (for taperecording purposes). Find out beforehand how much time the person has for the interview – you don’t want the interview to end with your most important questions left unasked. And always, always, always plan to take notes so that you have backup if your recorder malfunctions.

The Interview

• Keep an open mind. Don’t assume you know how a subject will answer a question – you want to try to understand how he or she sees the world. But an open mind isn’t an uncritical one – don’t necessarily take everything a person says at face value.
• Establish rapport. Some people are more comfortable than others giving an interview. But either way, you want to make the person feel less like they’re doing an interview and more like they’re having a conversation with you. Start with easy, open-ended questions that can’t be answered with “Yes” or “No” so you can draw out your subject.
• Ask your questions and then listen. (In other words, don’t pull a Charlie Rose.) Remember: It’s the other person who’s supposed to be doing the majority of the talking.
• Be patient – but not overly so. Always give your subject ample opportunity to answer a question because you never know what may
  be revealed. At the same time, remember that this is your interview – if the person is ranging far afield on a tangent, don’t be afraid to (politely) interrupt and steer the conversation back to where you want it to go.
• Save the toughest questions for last. If you plan to ask questions that might compel your subject to end the interview, wait until you’ve asked everything else first.
• Don’t forget to ask for the person’s e-mail address and cell phone number if you don’t already have them so that you’ll have a way to follow-up if necessary.

Post-Interview

• Don’t wait to transcribe your tape or go over your notes. It’s best to have the interview fresh in your mind when you review the tape or
  notes for several reasons, including a) It will help you to more clearly see what were the most interesting responses, which in the normal flow of conversation can sometimes be missed; and b) You’ll have a better sense of what follow-up questions you may want to ask.
• Organize your transcripts/notes into an outline so that you can see what topics and themes are most relevant and engaging.
• If necessary, arrange a follow-up interview, making clear to the subject what points you want to delve into more deeply