Building Trust Before the Recorder Starts
Launch library · evergreen read
The minutes before a formal interview officially begins, spent on genuinely ordinary conversation rather than the actual subject matter at hand, often do more to shape the eventual quality of an interview than any single carefully prepared question asked once the recording has properly started, however well written it might be.
A subject who feels genuinely heard as a whole person, rather than simply processed as a convenient source of quotes, tends to answer more openly once the questions eventually turn serious, and that openness rarely survives an interviewer who treats the warm up as wasted time to rush straight through.
This does not mean manufacturing false rapport purely for its own sake or as a manipulative technique, it means treating a subject's basic comfort as a legitimate part of the craft, worth the same careful preparation given to the written list of questions sitting in front of you on the page.