Interview preparation is one of the key contributors to your success when interviewing stakeholders to gather critical information. Time is of the essence, as most of the people you will be interviewing will be busy and see consultants interviewing information that they already know as a hindrance to their day job. However, interviewing is the quickest way to gather information and provides two-way communications and ultimately provides you with a strong level of understanding about the organisation you are assigned to with as well as insights with what working, and not!
Introduction
Interviewing is the most widely used method of information gathering. This chapter considers the task of interviewing under the following headings:
- general considerations,
- preparation of interviews,
- the conduct of interviews.
- questions
General Considerations
Background Information
Always research the latest news and information about the company you are working for. Nothing is worse than rocking up to interview a key executive and not doing your homework on the latest news on the company and industry. It goes without saying to avoid items that are sensitive or may cause embarrassment. The background will depend entirely on the nature of your assignment and at what stage of the assignment you are at.
Sequence of Interviews
Start at sponsor, level before moving onto other management levels: you may then work downwards. This helps you to get an overview of the potential of the assignment (and disengage if needed)
Confirmation of Interviews
Ideally, and especially in larger organisations, issue an interview confirmation which details the objectives of the interview and includes an agenda.
Preparation
Objectives
A common mistake is to conduct the interview as a general conversation; the only stated aim being to find out what’s going on’. At the end of the interview it is difficult to quantify exactly what has been achieved. To overcome this problem, define the objectives.
Objectives must be specific and measurable so that after the interview you can ask, “Has that objective been met? Yes or No?”
Unmeasurable Objectives
Objectives that include phrases like:
- Find out about the current requirement,
- Understand the client’s function.
Are not measurable. You might find out something, but how much? 10%, 25%, 90%? It would be very difficult to measure, and therefore success could not be assured. Also, it is difficult to quantify how much “understanding had been gained.
Typically, objectives, which use words such as “know”, understand”, or appreciate are difficult to measure, so the remedy is to break them down into smaller, quite clearly measurable objectives.
Measurable Objectives
The following objectives are measurable:
- Identify and obtain the current metrics by which the contract is being measured.
- verify the organisation chart
Use words like: Obtain, identify, list, establish and construct.
In summary, objectives should be:
Specific
Measuable
A chievable
Realistic
Timeable
Interview Plan
The next step is to construct an interview plan that defines the structure of the interview. This plan provides a framework for the interview from which a detailed question list is developed.
In simple terms the plan has three sections, an introduction, a middle, and a conclusion.
Introduction
This must include:
- the name of the consultants
- where they are from,
- what they are doing (taking care not to upset or worry the interviewees).
- how they are going to do it (approach)
- how long the Interview will last (short as possible, say 30 mins or 1hr)
- what the objectives of the interview are.
Middle
This breaks down into sections, each of which relates to one of the objectives. Each section will typically be a list of topics to be discussed in order to meet the objective. This gives a structure to the interview, and ensures that the objectives are met. It also details any documents that the interviewer should take to the interview.
Question List
The list of questions can be derived from the interview objectives. The question list helps you to structure the interview and can also form a record of the interview.
Conclusion
This must include:
- a review of the interview. This provides an opportunity to check the notes and the interviewer’s understanding, and also to ensure that all questions have been asked,
- thanks for the time and help given,
- permission to see the interviewee’s staff (if needed – be careful with this, judge the mood),
- establish whether one can return if necessary,
- a description of what happens next.
Check-Points
During the construction and review of the interview question list and guide, the following points should be considered:
- Has the What, When, Where, Why, How and Who method of questioning been used?
- Are the questions as simple as possible?
- Have multiple questions been avoided?
- Are the questions:
1. Phrased to suit the interviewee?
2. Within the objectives?
3. Relevant to the interviewee’s work?
4. Relevant to the interviewee’s subordinates? - Is the language and phrasing suitable to the likely educational and organisational level of the interviewee?
- Are the questions unambiguous?
- Is the flow of questions in a logical sequence?
- Have the questions been set out with adequate space for writing the answers (at speed)?
- Have possible optional answers been shown in order to save time when taking notes?
- re all the points raised in the form of questions, and not statements?
Recording the Interview
Recording notes helps to identify whether the detail and the understanding is adequate. If a third party checks interview notes, inconsistencies and ambiguities are likely to be highlighted.
Conducting Interviews (set the right objectives)
Planning Call Objectives (This applies for all meetings)
Before any contact with a customer-phone or face-to-face – you need to review your understanding of their situation. Out of this review will emerge ideas or themes which could form the basis of the meeting/contact. In setting up the meeting, you will want to get an agreement with the client that one of these ideas is the reason why the meeting is to take place (Premise). You will test your other ideas during the conversation.
Once you have established the starting point for the meeting, you can start planning. The most critical decision you will take is what objective to set. It must have some connection to the Premise so the client will recognise its relevance.
Your objective should be reasonable but ambitious. Above all, it must seek commitment from the client. You must therefore seek to agree actions s/he will take after the meeting that require him her to invest resources (people, time, and money).
It is ‘actions’ by the customer, not by you, which help to progress your assignment. Unless you test his/her willingness to act, you will not know in s/he is serious.
You should make it a discipline to write down your call objective and to take it with you to the meeting. You should write it in the form:
“At the end of the meeting, I want him/her to agree to ………
Here are two examples:
- “I want him/her to initiate an internal review of the benefits to his/her company of implementing MiFID2 compliant service”
- “I want him/her to send two-three of his/her key people on the workshop on mapping the sales workflow for the organisation….
Both seek commitment in the form of action by him/her.
Using Call Objectives in the Call
In the initial “Objective Setting stage of the call, you must:
- Seek his/her commitment to your call objective – discuss in a business-like fashion what you each want to achieve
- Ask him/her if s/he will be able to commit to the actions needed.
- If not, explore with him/her what s/he can commit to
Here are some examples of this objective-setting phase at the start of the call: The example is from an external supplier: you should be similarly focused if your clients are internal
- “My purpose in coming to this meeting is to get your agreement for us to undertake for £150,000 a review of your management information systems. I have an agenda that focuses on this. Can we agree that this is what we jointly are working towards in this meeting?
- “To Improve the quality of information, we typically review with the key people the relevance of what they currently receive – does it really help them run and strengthen their part of the business? By the end of this meeting, I should like you to authorise us to carry out a review of your current situation.”
- “At the end of this meeting / would like you to agree that my organisation will be included on your shortlist and that you and your Director will visit our Service Management Centre next month to evaluate our BSI 75000 and compliance credentials.
- “At the end of this meeting / would like you to agree to introduce me to the other senior managers involved in this decision. Is that acceptable to you?”
- “Should you not be convinced by my presentation I would like to agree with you the areas you still have doubts over and an action plan to resolve the doubts in your mind. Is that acceptable?”
People often shy away from this fundamental activity on the grounds that their proposal may be rejected. Remember that the clients you are meet have limited time available. If they have agreed to meet you, they expect something to come out of it. They also expect to be asked to make decisions.
Without agreement on an objective at the outset, the call will be second- rate and is likely to be a waste of time, energy and money.
Finally, in the “Commitment” stage at the end of the call test if you have done enough to get his/her agreement to the action you set out at the outset.
Using time to create urgency and gain control
When setting objectives you should attempt to influence timescales and in doing so get control. You achieve this by starting with his/her timescales.
You identify the cause of a problem and then work backwards to today. You show him/her that, based on your previous experience, the timescales will be very tight and that decisions are needed sooner than perhaps s/he expected.
A possible objective might be:
- “At the end of this meeting, I would like to agree on a timetable and joint resource plan to achieve your goal of a ‘live’ system by March 1st 2025.”
At the end of the meeting, you should map out the various milestones needed to achieve this and get a commitment to the next milestone as defined by you (ideally involving him/her in investment of some sort).
Once you have identified the objectives and passed this hurdle in your initial two minutes of the meeting, then you can get down to the real business. That is the business of identifying needs and emphasising how your product or service will meet those needs. We suggest the SPIR and “Feature Benefit” approaches.
Some Interview Tips and Traps
The conduct of an interview depends on the existing relationship between you and your client, as well as your interviewing style. Simple rules are to be:
- Be formal, polite, interested, enthusiastic and prepared.
- clarify and verify any assumptions and separate fact from fiction,
- obtain any information not readily offered
- be tactful to ensure that control of the interview is not lost,
- smile, be a good listener and be open-minded.
Don’t :
- assume anything or accept blanket statements,
- openly identify any conclusions about the solution until the analysis has been carried out in-depth,
- criticise, argue or antagonise the interviewee,
- use emotive language such as problems, difficulties, failings in user departments, etc.,
- make it an issue if the interviewee offers conflicting information,
- forget the user’s name, department, etc.,
- forget to bring a pen and notepad (I lost a contract on this for an energy company in 2019, they mentioned it an the exit interview)
- get involved in company politics,
Asking questions using SPIR
Unless, as a result of your activities, you and your organisation are seen to be delivering exceptional and unique benefit to a customer’s business, the customer will treat you as technology suppliers. At worst you could be seen as a “socially
inadequate techie”. Note you can combine SPIR with “SPEIRFAB”
The immediate consequences of this are:
- price becomes the most important decision-criteria
- you get locked into the IT function
Using questions such as those focussed on SPIR, especially with senior non- technical staff enables you to breakout of this straitjacket.
SPIR will help you to develop and agree on business-critical opportunities
To the point where the customer actively wants to tackle them and explicitly states the business benefits s/he wants. You need to understand and master the five levels of questioning required and how and when to move from one questioning stage to the next.
Situation Questions
You use situation questions to identify broad areas where it might be fruitful to probe for implied needs using a judicious blend of open and closed questions. Remember the ‘Big Picture’ and ‘Filter Free!
Problem Questions
You seek to get all the business-critical problems out on the table and assess which of them is most appropriate to pursue. Don’t just stop at the first sign of an opportunity area-keep surveying across all the areas of the business he’s concerned with. A trap many people fall into is to find a possible cause and then jump straight to a solution. The effect of this is:
- valuable qualification information is missed
- the extent of the need is not explored
- the client sees you as a ‘salesman’ rather than partners
- maybe the wrong cause
Impact and effect Questions
These are simply stated as:
“You have told me the situation facing you and some of the problems, but how does that directly affect you”
From the effect, you can then identify the big issue or impact.
You can develop these implied needs by asking further implication questions to help you client recognise the negative knock-on effects across the business.
Requirement/Need/ Payoff Questions
Ask questions that get the potential client to state the value to him/her and the company of solving these problems.
Whilst you are asking these questions please remember the organisation needs and personal issues.
Question Examples using Value Analysis
This can be focussed on using techniques such as 5 WHys to drill down to the right level of detail and identify the root cause.