User Interviews Guide: How to Interview Users Like a Pro

The goal is understanding behavior and motivation at a deeper level.

The primary function is to invalidate your assumptions, not validate them. Don't use these interviews to confirm what you already believe, instead fight your own bias.

User-interviews should fundamentally be a bias-reduction tool. The mechanics should be geared towards getting out of your own head.

Structured Neutrality: A skill for controlling a conversation without biasing it.

• Be strict on structure, loose on direction.

• Dig deeper on what was said.

• Anchor to real past behavior.

• Separate exploration from evaluation

Raw interviews -> Decisions:

• Cluster by behavior, what people do. Not based on what they say.

• Identify repeating patterns, look for frequency (how many users showed this behavior) and intensity (how strong was the frustration / workaroound)

• convert patterns to problem statements

• rank problems

• map problem to decision layer

• force clarity and articulate what changes