This document provides guidance on conducting user interviews. It discusses preparing for interviews by brainstorming topics and questions, practicing being an interviewer, and troubleshooting challenges. The document recommends starting with introductions and icebreakers, listening more than talking, and allowing participants to discuss topics in-depth. It suggests facilitating interviews in-person for most insight, and provides tips on analyzing interviews by looking for themes in needs, behaviors, and language. The goal is to understand users' perspectives to inform product design.

1. User Research
Interviews
Prep & Practice
James Oliver
Independent User Experience Consultant
17th Sept 2015

2. About me
• Freelance User Experience Consultant
• Working @ HMRC Digital Delivery team
• Relocated to North-east in Oct 2014
• Spent 1st year @StatusDigi as UX Director
• 11+ years design industry experience
• Particular interest in research & design
Clients I’ve worked with
www.studiosolo.co.uk | @Studiosololtd

3. Plan
1. Intro to some basics – 15mins
2. Break into groups of around 3, pick a topic & brainstorm
some possible lines of questioning – 10mins
3. James: demo of some example questions – 5mins
4. Structure everything into a 1st draft interview script –
5mins
5. Pilot-test your scripts by meeting with another group –
take turns being interviewer & interviewee. Helps sense-
check the running order & to revise where necessary –
15mins
6. Analysis tips – 5mins

4. Why?

5. Reasons to do research
• To inform a new product idea or more indepth insight
into a particularly blurry or complex topic
• The research you want to do is not already out there &
freely available
• To learn about all influencing factors of the intended
users who would ultimately use your creation
• Understand the user’s goals, attitudes, emotions,
and frustrations
• Generate further specific features and ideas
• Get to understand other competitors, or current work-
arounds (especially if a solution doesn’t exist)

6. How?

7. How to be a good interviewer
• Smile!
• Start with some small-talk or ice-breakers
• Do more listening than talking
• Ensure to keep some eye-contact (ideally you’d have a
separate note-taker and/or dictaphone to record audio –
although ask permission first!)
• Allow the participant to go off-topic, and be willing to
break the order of questions in your script

8. What if?

9. Trouble-shooting
• What if the participant is giving me short or
incomplete answers? Ask them ‘Why?’ or ‘Tell me more
about that…’. Avoid yes/no answer questions.
• What if there are awkward silences? It’s something you
should get used to & allow to happen, as it may prompt
the user to speak more. Don’t try to fill in silence or
provide them with easy answers
• What if the user is talking too much or going off-track?
The script is a guide, but don’t feel you have to stick
100% to the running order – as long as you cover all your
core topics. The more the participant talks the better!

10. Where?

11. Where should I facilitate?
• Depends on time, budget and access to participants
• In-person is always best – valuable cognitive insight
• Ensure the room you meet in is quiet & relaxed
• Natural environment? (Ethnographic research)
• Telephone & video-calls – speed, tighter budgets or
difficult-to-access participants
• Guerilla research at coffee shops – unexpected, random,
free/low-cost, issues with approaching strangers

12. What should
I ask?

13. Types of questions to ask
• Varies based on your specific topic
• Have a clear overall objective before you start
• Start w/ basic intro details & some warm-ups
• Main body of questions (usually grouped into key topic
themes)
• Think carefully about the wording (allow for emotions)
• Avoid leading questions
• Consider asking same/similar questions twice!
• Conclusions (wrapping-up type questions)
• Put everything into a logical conversational structure

14. Start to prep!

15. Choose a topic:
• Booking a holiday
• Travelling to work
• Your food shopping habits
• Buying a car
• Buying a house
• Last cinema trip
• Organising a party
• Going out for a meal
• Chocolate
• Coffee
15

16. Why Pets?
• Name, age, gender, occupation, no. & type of pets
• What interests do you have?
• Why did you choose your particular pet(s)?
• What do you typically do during a week with your pet(s)?
• Tell me about a positive experience with pet
• Tell me about any negative experiences
• Tell me about the bond you have?
• How do friends & family interact with your pet(s)?
EXAMPLE

17. Refine

18. Pilot-test!

19. Wrapping up

20. Post-interview analysis
• Do a 5-min take-away after each session
• Look for themes in terms of user needs, priorities,
behavioural patterns, and mental models – start to group
these together and tally them up
• Language is useful to pick up on, as it may help
influence & inform any tone-of-voice & dialogue
• With enough data & enough distinctive user types
emerging (usually 30+ participants) you may want to
consider creating Personas – useful reference tools for
the full length of a project’s development

21. Further reading
Interviewing Humans, Erika Hall, Alistapart
http://alistapart.com/article/interviewing-humans
Nielsen Norman Group
http://www.nngroup.com/topic/user-testing/
Remote Research Webinar Series
https://www.usertesting.com/resources/remotely-possible
5 Steps to Create Good User Interview Questions by @Metacole
https://medium.com/interactive-mind/5-steps-to-create-good-user-interview-
questions-by-metacole-a-comprehensive-guide-8a591b0e2162

22. Thanks!