/interview-frameworks

name: interview-frameworks
description: "Frameworks for user interviews, question design, and qualitative research. Use when conducting user interviews, designing interview guides, researching user needs, or gathering qualitative insights. Trigger on: 'create an interview guide', 'how do I interview users', 'customer discovery questions', 'user research plan', 'validate assumptions with interviews'."

Interview Frameworks

Overview

Frameworks for conducting effective user interviews including question design, interviewing techniques, and extracting actionable insights.

**Core Principle**: Good interviews come from great questions. Focus on past behavior and specific examples, not hypotheticals or opinions. Listen more than you talk.

**Origin**: Synthesized from Teresa Torres ("Continuous Discovery Habits"), Erika Hall ("Just Enough Research"), and Rob Fitzpatrick ("The Mom Test").

**Key Insight**: User interviews are the foundation of customer discovery. Good interviews uncover unmet needs, validate assumptions, and reveal the "why" behind user behavior that quantitative data cannot.

When to Use This Skill

**Auto-loaded by agents**:

• `research-ops` - For user interview guides and JTBD interviews

**Use when you need**:

• Customer discovery research
• Problem validation
• Solution validation
• Usability testing
• Feature prioritization research
• Understanding user workflows
• Jobs-to-be-Done research

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Four Types of User Interviews

Discovery Interviews (Problem Exploration)

**Purpose**: Understand problems, needs, contexts, pain points

**When**: Early product development, new market, problem validation

**Focus**:

• Current workflows
• Pain points and workarounds
• Unmet needs
• Context and constraints

**Example question**: "Walk me through how you currently manage projects for your team"

**Complete script**: `assets/interview-script-templates.md` (Discovery section)

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Validation Interviews (Solution Testing)

**Purpose**: Test solutions, get feedback on concepts

**When**: After problem validation, before building

**Focus**:

• Solution fit with workflow
• Feature prioritization
• Willingness to pay
• Alternatives considered

**Example question**: "If we built [solution], how would that fit into your workflow?"

**Complete script**: `assets/interview-script-templates.md` (Validation section)

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Usability Interviews (Product Testing)

**Purpose**: Test actual product, identify friction

**When**: During or after building

**Focus**:

• Task completion
• Confusion points
• Feature clarity
• Missing functionality

**Example question**: "Try creating a project. Think aloud as you go."

**Complete script**: `assets/interview-script-templates.md` (Usability section)

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Generative Interviews (Open Exploration)

**Purpose**: Broad exploration, no specific hypothesis

**When**: Exploring new markets or pivots

**Focus**:

• Day in the life
• Goals and motivations
• Decision-making process
• Context and constraints

**Example question**: "Tell me about a recent project that didn't go as planned"

**Complete script**: `assets/interview-script-templates.md` (Generative section)

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Core Interview Techniques

The Mom Test (Rob Fitzpatrick)

**Principle**: Ask questions that even your mom couldn't lie to you about

**Bad questions** (invite lies):

• "Would you buy this?" (people lie about future)
• "Do you think this is a good idea?" (want to be nice)
• "Would you use this feature?" (hypothetical)

**Good questions** (reveal truth):

• "When's the last time [problem] came up?" (frequency)
• "How much time/money did that cost you?" (severity)
• "What are you currently doing to solve it?" (existing solutions)
• "Show me your [current solution]" (actual behavior)
• "Who else should I talk to?" (validates problem is real)

**Complete guide**: `assets/questioning-techniques-template.md` (Mom Test section)

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The 5 Whys

**Purpose**: Get to root cause by asking "why" repeatedly

**Process**:

1. Start with observation 2. Ask "why" or "what causes that?" 3. Repeat 4-5 times until reaching root cause 4. Stop when you have actionable insight

**Example**:

"I don't use feature X"
→ Why? "It's too complicated"
→ Why complicated? "Don't understand buttons"
→ Why? "Labels unclear"
→ Why? "Use jargon I don't know"
→ Why? "Never learned terminology"

Root cause: Onboarding gap + plain language needed

**Complete guide**: `assets/questioning-techniques-template.md` (5 Whys section)

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Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD) Interview

**Framework**: Understand the "job" user is hiring product to do

**Question Structure**:

1. **Context**: "Tell me about the last time you [hired product/made decision]" 2. **Situation**: "What was happening? What triggered you?" 3. **Desired Outcome**: "What were you hoping to achieve?" 4. **Alternatives**: "What else did you consider? Why didn't those work?" 5. **Decision**: "What made you choose [solution]?"

**Key Insight**: Find the real job (not surface level)

• Surface: "Manage tasks"
• Actual job: "Maintain visibility and accountability as team scales"

**Complete guide**: `assets/questioning-techniques-template.md` (JTBD section)

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Laddering Technique

**Purpose**: Connect features to emotional benefits

**Structure**: Attributes → Consequences → Values

**Process**: Keep asking "Why does that matter?" until reaching emotional value

**Example**:

Feature: "Real-time collaboration"
→ "So team can work together" (Consequence)
→ "Faster to get things done" (Consequence)
→ "I can go home on time" (Consequence)
→ "Spend time with my family" (Value)

Marketing insight: Sell "time with family" not "real-time sync"

**Complete guide**: `assets/questioning-techniques-template.md` (Laddering section)

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Best Practices

DO

**Ask open-ended questions**:

• ✓ "How do you currently solve [problem]?"
• ✗ "Do you solve [problem] with a spreadsheet?" (yes/no)

**Listen more than talk*