Building Trust With Users
Interviewing Challenge #2: helping our users enter ‘sharing mode’ is hard, but the feedback is worth it
[This essay is part of a series in which I’m sharing my experiences and takeaways from years of user interviews. The previous essay was What Users Need]
Some of my closest friends are just terrible when it comes to sharing what they’re going through. No matter if they’re doing great or having a crisis, to get them to share requires a lot. A lot of what? Well, it’s only possible after a lot of small talk, various questions, and even then they might not share with me what’s really on their minds. But once they do open up, there’s no stopping them. Yet I always remind myself that that is just a dance we have to go through if I want to be there for them.
I used to think it was mostly about asking the right questions until I unlocked something in them which triggered ‘sharing mode’. But in recent years I’m increasingly noticing how the questions I’m asking are not important, and what matters most is the vibe the questions facilitate. With the risk of sounding a bit weird here, it’s about priming my friend into a mode where he feels like he wants to share.
I started feeling comfortable with this once I realized that ‘sharing mode’ wasn’t a conscious decision my friend was taking. Let me explain.
This entire relationship dynamic became apparent to me after years of running user interviews at work. For years, I’ve wondered what made users always wait till the last minutes of the interview to share their most important feedback. How could it be that some user calls would be so dry and boring for the first 40 minutes only to flip completely in the last 5 minutes?
Because building rapport and comfort takes time. Because getting our minds in the right place is not easy. We all need to be primed.
I started accounting for it. At the end of each user interview, I would ask “what important questions haven’t I asked you today?” Or “what haven’t we talked about?”
In answering these questions, very often users would provide information they could have shared in regards to previous questions I had already asked, and it made me wonder “why the hell did they wait so long to share this?!” Then I realized, it was on me to build rapport, relaxation, and context.
Rapport. As the interview progresses, users will (or at least should) become more comfortable with the interviewer and the conversation. This comfort level often encourages them to open up and provide more candid feedback. I’ve had the most success with building rapport using the principles of active listening.
Relaxation. Conversing with another human always involves some level of uncertainty. We never exactly know what the other person is going to say, and how they will perceive our words. This is why, as conversations build, people tend to get more relaxed, and when they are relaxed, they are more likely to share information that is important to them.
Context. During the final minutes of the interview, the user has had time to think about the questions they've been asked and their experiences. This reflection can help bring important insights to the surface that they might not have initially thought of. The idea of interview reflection means that, as interviewers, we must consider how the questions we ask might (hopefully) lead the user to a greater understanding of their situation.
Overall, it's important to keep in mind that precious feedback can come at any time during an interview and it's important to be attentive and listen carefully throughout the entire conversation.
I recently conducted a feedback interview with a customer from a large enterprise. Even though we’ve been on plenty of calls together, that was our first 1x1. The call went great. The customer shared several pain points relating to product functionality, and she even sent over some screenshots emphasizing her struggle. Near the end of the interview, I asked her my regular “What haven’t we talked about?” After pausing for a few seconds, she said that, even though it’s not final yet, she wanted to share that her company is facing a new regulation which will require them to revisit our product’s approval process from a security standpoint. If it were to be finalized, such a process could take months so it was clearly in my best interest to get behind it and ensure all relevant stakeholders were aware and involved.
That ‘early detection’ of a customer issue helped us maintain the continuity of our service and strengthen our relationship with the customer. If it wasn’t for that question at the end of the interview, and the customer being open with me on a matter that wasn’t even finalized yet, I would be spending the next weeks and months focusing on the wrong things.
Knowing this, what can you do to help users (and friends) enter ‘sharing mode’?
Consider how the questions you ask could help build trust and comfort. For example, open-ended questions encourage people to share more about their thoughts and feelings, which can lead to more meaningful insights.
Practice Active Listening and take the time to respond to the user’s answers to show them you deeply care about their experiences (simply nodding to the user sharing their frustration is not a great way to build trust and comfort).
Leave 10-15 minutes at the end to ask “What haven’t I asked?” or “What haven’t we talked about?”
Follow up after the interview over email to allow the user to share any additional feedback they didn’t get a chance to share.
These four steps, and especially the 4th one, helped me shift my focus from the questions I ask and the answers I’m looking for and to simply building rapport with the user. Whether it’s during the interview or after over email, ‘trust’ will always get our users (and our friends) to share openly. And it’s on us to help them do it.
P.S. Asking one of these “what haven’t we talked about?” questions could also be a great practice between friends. Too often we engage in conversation while skipping the subjects that are most top of mind (and heart) to ourselves and others.
I tried asking this to my candidates at the end of interview. Turns out, it works here also. I discovered some aspects of candidates that they wanted to share but had forgotten initially due to nervousness in the beginning. Everyone deserves a chance to retry telling their top-of-mind in a more relaxed setting - which we achieve after 45-60 minutes of rapport building.
Great insights Or. Thanks for this one.