7 Dos and 7 Don'ts on how to have great qualitative conversations

1. 1
Questionology
The 7 Dos and Don’ts of qualitative
interviewing

2. 2
Do: learn how to listen. Follow Julian
Treasure’s RASA model:
Receive
Appreciate
Summarise
Ask

3. 3
Don’t: follow a rigid set of
questions (that are research
objectives) – you won’t get the anwer
you need.

4. 4
Do: ask people their stories – it’s
the best way to understand decision
making and significant experiences

5. 5
Don’t: ask people about their
future behaviour – they are poor
predictors of how they will act in the
future

6. 6
Do: ask respondents about how
their peer group is likely to be
behave in the future – we are all
better predictors of other people’s
behaviour (and will reveal insight
into our own ‘social’ thinking too)

7. 7
Don’t: ask people to explain their
own decisions. (They aren’t reliable
witnesses and will post rationalise)

8. 8
Do: ask people what they were
weighing up or thinking about when
they were making a decision – that
reflects how our brains work better

9. 9
Don’t: ask people to talk about a
store or service experience in terms of
your metrics – like price; service;
value; quality – that’s not how people
think…

10. 10
Do: ask people to talk you through
their experience, this will help you
understand what matters to them

11. 11
Don’t: ask people to make big
mental switches in one interview: one
topic at a time – otherwise you will
break them

12. 12
Do: prime people in an interview so
they can mentally locate themselves:
do shopping interviews in a store or
after visiting one, a cooking interview
at home…

13. 13
Don’t: keep people in the dark
about the purpose of the research –
they will second guess it and ‘edit’
their answers if you do this

14. 14
Do: Rehearse people in creative
exercises or the imaginative thinking
you want them to do in an interview –
it will build their confidence and
deliver better results

15. 15
Don’t Just do group exercises in a
focus group, switch between private
and group responses to explore how
ideas travel in a group

16. 16
Do Think about Qual Street when
you want better answers to your
business issues.

17. 17
Free Thinking
kath@qual-street.co.uk
www.qual-street.co.uk
07738 180529
@qualstreet