In-depth interviewing

Interviewing is, first and foremost, good listening. In this training you learn to move beyond the rehearsed answer: toward the experience, emotion, doubt, interests, motives, or truth hidden behind it. We call this the 'second story'.

I give this training together with Evert de Vos. What is special is that — because there are two of us — we can practice realistic role-plays. You interview one of the trainers (who takes on a role that you get to determine) while the other gives feedback. You learn just as much from your own interview as from watching and listening to the other participants.

Target audience

• Journalists, editors, researchers, podcast- and documentary makers, and communication professionals.
• Beginning interviewers who want to build a solid foundation.
• Experienced interviewers who want to probe more sharply and handle difficult conversational situations better.
• Professionals who conduct interviews for journalistic productions, research, internal communication, profiles, or customer stories.
• The training is suitable for both critical and friendly interviews.

What you will learn

• Carefully preparing an interview: mapping out the background, role, interests, expertise, and possible sensitivities of an interviewee.
• Determining a clear goal: what insight, quote, evidence, image, or contact do you want to come away from the conversation with?
• Devising questions without being locked into a rigid questionnaire; working with a conversation agenda.
• Asking open questions, listening to the answers, and probing them in a targeted way.
• Returning to decisive moments and asking about concrete actions, circumstances, and sensory details.
• Recognizing and using signal words that point to emotion, doubt, discomfort, pride, fear, anger, or contradiction.
• Summarizing, allowing silences, asking for examples, and seeking clarification.
• Asking about knowledge, experience, opinion, emotion, motive, responsibility, and reaction.
• Finding the 'second story': what someone had not prepared or does not volunteer, such as a setback, dilemma, hidden interest, motive, or uncomfortable truth.
• Confronting with facts, documents, and statements from other sources, without unnecessarily shutting down the conversation.
• Dealing with evasive answers, rehearsed messages, abstract jargon, lies, and attempts to take control of the interview.
• Safely and respectfully interviewing vulnerable or traumatized sources.
• Recording, taking notes, transcribing and writing up the story.
• Maintaining a professional relationship with sources, even after publication.

Structure

The training combines the preparation, execution, and processing of an interview.

First you learn how to research a person and topic, what your goal is, and how to create a strategic agenda for the conversation. You then practice the core of interviewing: listening, observing, probing, and responding to what is actually being said.

We then address challenging situations that can arise in journalistic and professional interviews. Think of a source who is afraid to speak, an expert who keeps getting stuck in abstractions, an executive who evades questions, a politician with a rehearsed message, an interviewee who may be lying, or someone being confronted with research findings.

Finally, we pay attention to practical and ethical aspects: consent for recordings, careful note-taking, transcribing, the right of reply, handling confidential information, and protecting vulnerable sources.

Teaching method

You will get a brief explanation with demonstrations and analysis of interview clips, followed by realistic role-plays in which the trainers play the interviewees. You practice with self-chosen roles and situations, such as witness, victim, expert, executive, politician, suspect, or pioneer, and receive personal, direct feedback on your preparation, questioning, listening skills, timing, and follow-up technique.

You learn both by interviewing yourself and by observing interviews conducted by other participants. You'll also get practical checklists, sample questions, scenarios, and techniques you can put to use right away in your next conversation, plus room to bring in your own interview dilemmas, topics, and experiences.

Duration

Two days. Also available as an in-company training; content, case studies, and emphasis can be tailored to the organization's practice.

Outcome

Afterward, you will be able to:

• Prepare interviews thoroughly and with a clear purpose.
• Conduct a conversation out of curiosity rather than working through a checklist of questions.
• Listen more effectively to what someone says, does not say, and shows.
• Obtain concrete, verifiable, and usable answers.
• Probe beneath the rehearsed story.
• Ask sensitive, critical, and confrontational questions carefully.
• Professionally handle vulnerable sources, emotions, anonymity, and the right of reply.
• Process interviews more quickly and completely into quotes, facts, observations, and new research questions.
• Conduct interviews with more confidence that yield not only information but also human meaning, evidence, and strong stories.

The course comes with an extensive handbook containing checklists, questionnaires, and scenarios that help you prepare for your next interview.