How to interview practically anyone

By on June 25th, 2009 In Best Practices

I was voted “Quietest” in high school.

So you can imagine the 1,000 deaths I died when I first had to write case studies after grad school.  I was working for a mainframe company, Data General (now owned by EMC Corporation) , and sent out to various locations around the U.S. to interview engineers.   These are people not known for their ability to make you feel at ease right away. 

It was good training, however.  If you can interview an engineer, every other occupation is a layup.  Here are some things I learned the hard way. 

  • Meet over food if possible.  It relaxes people and prevents you from staring at each other from only 2 feet away.  I started out interviewing engineers at their control stations, which was bad news.   They warmed up more when they had food in front of them.
  • Take good notes, but don’t record, unless it’s extremely technical information that’s new to you.   I listen better if I’m not relying on a recorder, ironically.   It also unnerves many people to know they are being taped.  They’re more open if you just take written notes.
  • Know your stuff.   Read up like heck before the interview.  If you think I look young now, you can only imagine what I looked like 25 years ago.   I had to know the topic inside and out in order to convey credibility, and to gain trust.  People often expect PR pros to be all fluff, no content.   Surprise them. 
  • Emulate their tone and pacing, to make them comfortable.   I tried to match the reserve of the engineers, so they wouldn’t think I was into marketing hype.  
  • Don’t be too intense.   I saw an episode of William Shatner’s new (is it cancelled already?) talk show format, and he’s just too intense with his subjects.   It gets boring really fast.
  • Ask your interviewee where he or she is from.  I love listening to accents and trying to figure out where someone hails from – since I grew up near a navy base in Rhode Island, I had friends from all over the world with many different accents.  Most of the time, unless they had a really unpleasant childhood, people like to talk about where they are from, and chances are it will give you a connection you didn’t know you had.
  • Don’t be tempted to go off into tales about yourself and your own stories.   I’ve had a couple of occasions where I was invited to speak, and the host chewed up my time talking about himself or herself.  It’s rude, so don’t do it.
  • Listen to what they are saying, instead of thinking about your next question.   If you watch talk show hosts like Larry King, they have so much going on that they’re really not paying attention or following the flow of the conversation.   Listening is a great tool I learned in an improv class I took.  You can tell great improv players because they wait and LISTEN to what their counterpart is saying, and play off that.
  • Show empathy.  Think David Frost.  Many of his old shows are on Youtube, like this interview of a very young Paul McCartney .   Don’t ask any shock questions or weird questions (remember Barbara Walters asking, “What kind of tree would you be?”
  • Ask the interviewee to provide you with followup written answers for any areas that you find tricky/complicated.   Engineers love to edit, so it reduces the chances of having them critique your work if you doublecheck the complex areas with them. 

That said, I think one of the trickiest interviews I’ve seen on TV was the Joaquin Phoenix/David Letterman show last February.   If you haven’t seen it, click here.  Was Joaquin pulling a fast one, or not?   I don’t know.

Comments

Bart Butler Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 9:36 am

Linda:

Good article. I like to tape interviews with a very small digital recorder. The tape helps me capture the cadence, the unique word choice and the thought process that helps define the subjects personality. It really brings quotes to life. I’m frequently amazed when reviewing a tape how my notes missed or my brain didn’t recall some telling phrase.

The downside is the fairly painful process of reviewing the tape or transcribing it. And I agree the taping itself can risk intimidating the interview subject if you don’t explain its purpose clearly.

Courtenay Dulak Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 10:53 am

Thanks for featuring the Letterman-Phoenix interview! It can only go up from there!

Linda VandeVrede Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 12:29 pm

Did the media every figure out if Joaquin was in character or not? It is such a bizarre interview. Either he’s incredibly good at playing a space cadet, or he was on something.

Angelo Fernando Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 3:00 pm

Good stuff. I could use a lot of them like ‘tone and pacing’ that i never thought about. I’d like to add a few more, based on some interviews I do for stories and podcasts:

1. Don’t be afraid to ask ‘dumb’ questions. The interview is not supposed to show how smart you are but how much clarity you let the interview provide.

2. It’s OK to interrupt –esp when you hear an acronym or a bit of jargon — to shift gears from the format you have so lovingly come prepared with.

Wendy Kenney @23Kazoos Says:
June 25th, 2009 at 5:41 pm

Great post Linda! Especially after yesterday’s PRSA Meeting!

Allison Thomas Says:
June 29th, 2009 at 11:17 am

This is so true! Great article. I sometimes use a recorder, though, especially if I know the person is a fast talker and won’t have a lot of time for follow-up questions. Besides researching and making the effort to understand as much as you can, showing a little humility by admitting what you don’t know can go a long way as well.

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