User Interview Guide

WHAT'S INCLUDED

Template sections

• Interview context — project name, research objective, session date, and moderator/observer roles
• Participant profile — screener match, role, company size, and experience level
• Warm-up questions — 3 low-stakes openers to build rapport before core topics
• Core question bank — 5 primary questions with follow-up probes and silence guides
• Task walkthrough — space to record think-aloud observations per task
• Closing questions — wrap-up probes and opportunity for participant additions
• Post-session debrief — key quotes, surprising moments, and immediate hunches

HOW TO USE

Best practices

1. Ask about behaviour, not opinions. "Walk me through the last time you..." beats "Do you usually...". Behaviour is evidence; opinion is hypothesis.
2. Embrace silence. Count to five after each answer before probing. Most of the gold comes in the pause after the first answer.
3. One question at a time. Compound questions ("Did you find it easy and would you use it again?") produce compound, useless answers.
4. Pilot with a teammate first. Run the guide with a colleague to catch confusing phrasing, timing issues, and missing follow-ups before real sessions.
5. Debrief within 30 minutes. Memory decays fast. Fill in the debrief section immediately after the participant leaves — not at end of day.