My first interviewee, Zoe, was by far the best of my two interviews. I connected with her through a mutual friend of ours on the dance team. Zoe is a senior living in One Tribe Place, also known as the Hospitality House (Ho-House). I interviewed her in a study room in Swem Library
Although she was the best interview, achieving success with her wasn’t easy at first. Before the interview, I put pressure on myself to build as much trust as possible with Zoe. I was nervous that she wouldn’t open up honestly enough for me to get good enough data to use. We spent about 3-5 minutes talking before beginning the actual interview, and I quickly realized I was talking to an extreme introvert. She was very quiet and conversation was very lopsided – I was introducing myself, sharing stories, making jokes, etc., but she hardly even cracked a smile. She barely made eye contact or spoke for more than a sentence. Her demeanor made me rather nervous. It was my first time interviewing someone and the outlook seemed bleak. Nonetheless, I think I did a great job of keeping things light and upbeat, hiding any signs of nervousness. Even though it didn’t seem like she wanted to talk with me at all, decided to make this an opportunity to challenge myself. I didn’t have many expectations for success, but I was determined to draw as much information out quiet Zoe as possible.
Amazingly, as soon as I pressed record on my iPhone’s voice memo app, Zoe’s switch was flipped. Her demeanor changed completely. Her introversion completely disappeared and she was willingly making good eye contact and actually began answering questions with more than two sentences. I’m not sure if I got lucky, or I’d built barely enough trust during our pre-interview talk, or if she felt obligated to help me out, but our recorded conversation was nothing like the talk we had beforehand. This behavior change caught me quite off guard once the interview went underway. I was so taken aback that my first few questions fell completely flat, but I soon found a groove and the interview ended up being a success.
I wanted to go in with the goal of finding answers to specific questions from my team’s interview guide, but after a few questions, decided to let Zoe and our conversation take the interview where they would. As long as Zoe shared with me a few informed stories that could inspire me to better impact our project scope, I was perfectly fine. Thankfully, that’s exactly what happened. Of all things, the vast majority of our talk was spent on bathrooms. There wasn’t a single mention of bathrooms in my groups interview questions or on our interview guide!! We had hardly mentioned them in our group conversations. In retrospect, I’m extremely surprised we missed them because they are such a huge factor in the physical health of dorm housing.
In the end, I felt extremely relieved that Zoe opened up to my interview. When she was acting unreasonably quiet, I wasn’t sure if I would have to pry for answers or just surrender the entire mission and find a second person to interview. Also, I found myself to be a naturally good interviewer! I’ve always considered my people skills to be above average, but this was a realm I’ve never experienced before. Would I be able to adapt on the fly? Would I be able to dig deep enough or lead Zoe to tell stories well enough for the interview to be usable? The answer to all of my doubts was a resounding yes. And in the end, my final product included a long conversation on bathrooms – something my group had hardly considered beforehand.