Interviews with SMEs can be challenging. You may find they are more time-consuming than other data-gathering methods, such as surveys or documentation. Sometimes, SMEs are reluctant to share information, or give responses that are nor relevant to your goals. Despite these challenges, interviews are the best way to gather detailed, insightful, and high-quality information for your learning solutions.
During an interview, you can follow an agenda, but still be flexible to dig for details. You will get a holistic picture by hearing the participants’ tone, or, in the case of face-to-face interviews, observing their body language. This helps establish a personal connection with a project’s sponsors and key stakeholders.
How can you maximize the power of interviews, including one-to-one meetings and focus groups? Here are five best practices:
#1: Validate that an Interview Is the Best Method
Do you need to conduct an interview or is another data-gathering method better suited to your goals? Ask the questions below. If you answer yes, then an interview is necessary.
Do you need to understand the perspective of a few key stakeholders?Would your learners benefit from a story, example or detailed content to meet their goals?Do your learners require a deep understanding of the topic?Do you need to make a decision that is complex?Will you need to clarify information with the SME?Can the desired purpose be achieved ONLY with an interview? Interviews are especially powerful at the start of a project. In a survey conducted for Top 10 Skills for Interviewers, the majority of respondents were most likely to use face-to-face interviews to analyze a problem/opportunity and define learning requirements.
#2: Use Your Goals to Prepare for Success
To prepare for an interview, set your goals and identify the outcomes (perspective, information, or decision). Goals for learning solutions include getting perspectives about a problem or opportunity, defining learning requirements, and gathering content.
Before the interview, validate your SMEs have the necessary experience and authority to fulfill the goals of your interview.Your questions should be specific, clear and focus on the need-to-know. The more informed you are about the topic, the better you can focus your questions.
Prepare your participants by giving them context for the interview, either in your meeting request or the start of a meeting. Explain the ”why” of the project, and its connection to business objective. Also describe how their expertise will benefit their team or the greater organization. Send questions in advance so participants are not caught off-guard and can provide high-quality responses.
#3: Use Templates to Organize Your Results
Templates help gather information and organize your interview results, especially for when there are multiple participants. A template should include the most important questions, space to write the answers, and the opportunity to document other important issues that are discussed.
For one-on-one interviews, use a template to guide the meeting. For focus groups, distribute the template to the leaders of small groups so they can record answers. It is always helpful to share results with the larger group. For example, to prepare for a workshop at a manager’s conference, the SMEs completed a template with the goals, main topic areas, and possible activities. They shared this outline and received valuable feedback.
#4: Use the Time to Dig Deeper
Despite the wealth of knowledge available through the Internet, there is no match for the unspoken knowledge and depth of information a person can provide during an effective interview. Open questions facilitate broad, deep answers. Interrogatives (who, what, where, why, how) are the best way to start an interview, and are most likely to elicit rich responses. They also demonstrate curiosity without prejudice.
To get rich responses during your interviews:
listen for cues that relate to the goals for your interviewdive deep to ask for stories that demonstrate a point or specific examplesstay with the concrete and avoid philosophical discussionskeep asking “what else?” until you have covered all the “must-know” informationuse a semi-structured format to ask the same questions, but also allow for flexibility to explore issues, differences, and perspectives. #5: Tie It All Together
A successful meeting achieves its goals and also identifies areas where there are still questions. If there are missing gaps, consider if the SME can fill them, or you’ll need to interview other SMEs. You may want to know if your interview findings apply to a larger audience. In this case a survey is helpful.
Also consider how the interview findings connect to other data, surveys or documentation you have gathered about the subject. Do the findings align? If not, investigate the areas where there are disagreements, or consult with your sponsor.
For more information about advanced interviewer skills, see the new eBook, Top 10 Skills for Interviewers: How to Ask the Right Questions to Create Targeted Learning Solutions.
