How do you deal with uncooperative interview subjects?
August 7, 2007 by Deb
Filed under Freelance Writing
Here’s one for the masses, something I’m sure most of us can relate to. What happens when you schedule an interview for an upcoming article and your interview subject is less than cooperative? What if the person is rude, gives one word answers or refuses to answer questions?
I once interviewed a woman who only spoke in one word answers: “yes” “no” “sometimes”. The thing is, she’s the one who contacted me about the interview as she felt my readers would benefit from her knowledge. I kept having to ask, “can you expand on that?” or “why do you say that?” Finally she said to me, “It’s really frustrating for you to keep asking that” and I told her it was even more frustrating to only receive yes or no answers for an interview. We found a sort of happy medium, but I will never contact that woman again for anything.
Another time the man I was speaking to was very rude and condescending. Halfway through the interview, when he began calling me “sweetheart” and “doll” I terminated the interview and told him I’d find someone else to answer my questions.
I wonder if these people consider how these interviews not only help us, but they also help their business and reputation. Why agree to an interview, if you have nothing to say, or just want to be hostile?
Since I started these “round tables”, I received a few emails asking if we can discuss how to handle interview subjects that are less than cooperative. It’s hard, because on one hand you need the quote from the expert, on the other hand, you want to just hang up the phone and move on.
So what do you do? How do you know when to kiss butt or when to cut your losses?
Discuss…
First thing is to ask open-ended questions, ones that can’t be answered with a yes or no. There are also tunnel and funnel sequences of questions (took a couple of interviewing courses in college). Tunnel and funnel questions are designed to warm up a subject and lead to the harder questions.
Failing that, one can try “do you mean …,” though that doesn’t work if subject matter is very technical or esoteric.
Put the subject at ease at the beginning of interview (not always possible if doing investigative journalism).
I write a ton of case studies and interview subjects are often reluctant. My tact “this isn’t 60 minutes, I’m not trying to give away any corporate secrets.”
When asking for specific information, I ask for a range or an “in excess of” figure if subject is reluctant to give an exact figure.
Refer to previous work so they can see what you’ve written before.
Some are unconfortable because they’re afraid they’ll say something that sounds stupid. I mention that I used to cover high school sports and had to sometimes turn comments into English. This is another place to use “do you mean…” and to paraphrase rather than use improper English, unless it’s someone like Yogi Berra and misuse of the language is part of the personality.
Depending on what you’re writing, you may be able to send it to them for review before publishing. A caveat, if they have to run it by legal, nothing will be approved.
There will still be times when someone is uncooperative. Look for an additional appropriate contact within the company or with an analyst.
I have had one of those “one word response” interviews and I’ll tell ya, it is frustrating. When that happens I try to focus more on information than on direct quotes if possible. But, you would think that if someone is an “expert” on a subject that they would have enough to say.
I say once people start getting rude, it’s time to end the interview and find someone else. Not only is it difficult to deal with, but it also is a waste of time and energy that is best saved for an interview subject with something useful to say.
I am going through some of the same frustrations.
Now, given that I come from the south, the doll and sweetheart thing doesn’t bother me. That’s what they say to everyone. Everyone. Girls say it to girls even. It just comes off the tongue down there. Now, if the guy isn’t from there, and he was kind of creepy anyway, I can see why…
The rude thing irks me. I’ve had people ask to be interviewed only to be told when I show up they ‘are not interested’.
They should all be shot. … Just kidding. Maybe beaten with a stick?
I think the kissing butt depends totally on if the person is giving you information you need already, so you can make a clean get away after.
And for those who freeze up during interviews, if you can email questions you will ask ahead of time, that helps. That way they can focus on the answer a while, give them time to build up what they want to say. If you do it with everyone before the phone or in person interviews, it helps.
I have never had that problem. I find that people love to talk about themselves, sometimes at great length.
It made me laugh that your subject told you that YOU were frustrating HER, lol.
I’ve been extremely fortunate in that most of my interview subjects are more than happy to be interviewed. They’re either happy to get the press or tell their stories. However, that may be due to the nature of what I interview about when I write stories.
I once had to chase down an interview subject who repeatedly gave excuses as to why she was busy every time I tried to re-schedule. However, once I did track her down, she gave some very good answers to the questions I posed. I really love doing interviews, actually but I choose to do most of my stories on feel good, happy topics – not investigative reporting where you’re exposing some scandal.
I’ve found that if I have to interview someone I know will be difficult (from past experiences, or word of mouth, etc), I give them the option of doing an email-interview. Some people are just nervous. When they can type their answers and read it back to make sure they’ve said what they’ve meant to say, they calm down a bit.
Of course, email-interviews aren’t as good for getting the juice stories and interesting angles, but if you just need a few questions answered, they can work really well.
There at least two things a writer can do to facilitate cooperation with interviewees, and that is first to know your subject, at least something about it, before you ask questions. Nothing is more off-putting to someone to have an interviewer ask questions which are so basic as to be inane. A writer should always do the homework first. You will impress your interviewee and earn cooperation with your knowledge. If you come unprepared, then you will appear lazy, and not worth the interviewee’s time.
Secondly, if your male interviewer is rude and refers to you as sweetheart or doll, then refer to him repeatedly as “Skippy,” “Junior” and “Little Man.” Just the expressions you’ll get are worth it. If he has half a brain, he’ll get the message.
I always tell them that there are no wrong answers, and that seems to soothe them. I almost always start an interview with “Tell me about . . .” or “Give me an overview . . .” and that gets them talking. A wonderful hint passed along to me is to pause between then end of their answer and your next question. People hate silence and in their attempt to fill in the gaps, you’ll get the best quotes of the interview.
I’ve offered to let them go over their answers again before writing the interview, or letting them send me additional information via another telephone interview, fax or email. Just knowing they can see their answers, that they could change something — sometimes that just loosens them up and they really start talking. One woman gave really short answers over the phone but when she got to see her interview via email, she lengthened everything and gave much more interesting quotes that made it a very valuable interview. I think she also really appreciated that because she warmed up to me right away when that option appeared on the table. lol.
Also asking the person if this is a good time, if they’d like to reschedule. You never know what is going on in someone’s life, if you’ve caught them at an upsetting or distracting time. Doing the interview tommorow when they are more rested or focused could be just the trick.
I”m going to come at this from the other direction; I used to be in corporate PR, and was under pressure from the company director to get the media to write about his brilliant researchers. Unfortunately, the top researcher was rude and uncooperative in interviews, and often cut off the interviewer after a couple questions, announcing that he had more important things to do. My job was on the line over media placements, so finally I tape recorded one of the rude researcher’s interviews and sent it to the director. After that, the direct decided he’d do the media interviews himself, and he was truly excellent at it. Lesson for interviewers? Sometimes it works to go up the ladder a notch to someone in the organization who is highly motivated to communicate, and more experienced at it. Talk with the PR person and says it’s important that you interview an authority who enjoys being interviewed. They’ll know who that is!
I’ve been on the flip-side, the one being interviewed for a newspaper article on green living. When I was contacted and asked what times would work for me, I indicated that I would rather answer questions via email. I have three young children who, upon hearing the phone ring, will commence screaming and fighting and crying and doing whatever to get my attention. I think most moms know what I mean. I very rarely talk on the phone, and the last thing I want to do is give an interview late at night after the kids have gone to bed and I am exhausted. This person wouldn’t agree to an email interview, so he had to put up with the distractions in the background. Plus, I am sure I gave half-ass answers to his questions because all I really wanted to do was get OFF the phone. I didn’t even get to see the finished piece before it was published! As a person doing the interview, always ask if that moment is a good time.
I agree with an earlier post about doing your homework before going to an interview. But on the flip side of that, sometimes not knowing anything about the topic, or at least actiging like you don’t know, can help in an interview. People like to have their egos fed. If you know someone will be a difficult interview and you go in telling them you know nothing about the topic and could really use their info to educate yourself, it can flatter them into helping you.
Also, if writing for a paper and covering a difficult topic, I have said this: “I know very little about this topic and I have to write for a seventh grade audience, so it would be great to explain this as though you’re talking to someone who knows NOTHING about the topic.” That has rendered good results.
Though I understand why Melissa doesn’t want to do an interview with noisy kids, I have to take the other side on that response. I’ve been a journalist for 30 years — going back to the days of faxes being state of the art.
I’ve had people request e-mail or fax questions. I generally refuse because subjects tend to give short, incomplete or unclear answers and a reporter doesn’t have a chance to ask necessary/clarifying follow-up questions without e-mail tag that’s more time consuming on both ends than a phone call.
So I might provide a few preliminary questions in advance, but I let the subject know I need to do a phone interview. However I aks for a few times that are convenient (in this case, when kids are otherwise occupied) so we can work at a time that’s mutually convenient.
That means I’ll conduct interviews early, late or whenever — even when calling to Europe (working on such an article now).
And, Melissa, of course you didn’t get to see the finished piece! Excuse the tone, but I spent 13 years on daily newspapers and never once had any article of mine or in the paper pre-approved by a source. That’s not journalism.
It’s a newspaper (did Woodward and Bernstein seek Nixon’d permission?!!). Even if it’s not a controversial piece, any newspaper worth a darn won’t let you see something before it’s published if it’s a news or feature article. Ads and Advertorials are a different matter.
A few points, then an anecdote:
I never, ever show my work to someone I interviewed. It’s against the ethics policy of some of the papers I work for, and my own personal ethics policy. People will want to change stuff to make them sound better. Agreeing to fact check later over the phone to make sure things are correct is better.
Even if I’ve done my homework, I usually start off asking for background. That way, the interviewee doesn’t assume I know a whole lot or a whole little – she knows I know at least what she just told me.
Trust is the issue for a lot of the clammer-uppers, some of whom may not be used to being interviewed. Will he distort my words? Will he make me look stupid? If I latch onto a tidbit of common ground, I may just put the notebook aside and start talking about myself, to take the focus off them for bit and help them relax and get to know and trust me more. That usually helps a lot.
I interviewed a man who worked at a national park lodge for 50 seasons. I had worked in the lodge for six seasons myself, so I knew he wasn’t too chatty, but I figured if he’d talk to anyone it would be me. No such luck. After 50 years – the Cold War, the 60s, rock ‘n’ roll, international turmoil – the deepest insight he could come up with was that men no longer dress for dinner. And he made clear that he wasn’t offended by such a shift in style. I tried turning lemons in lemonade by pointing out in my article that one doesn’t last 50 years at any job by flapping one’s gums.
Yikes! Thanks for the clarification, Phil and Ray. I had no idea it was a no-no for interviewees to see the piece before being published. Really, all I wanted to see was that he got the facts straight and that I didn’t come off as sounding like a complete dingus. I guess what bugged me about the situation is that this person (an inexperienced journalist himself) contacted me for an interivew and hardly had anything to say himself. I’m a shy person by nature and flounder for words face to face and via telephone. I am much more inclined to open up if I am allowed to think about what I want to say, as opposed to having someone wait on the line expectantly and rowdy children pulling at my clothes. But he never gave me that option, even when I asked. He didn’t even ask if it was a good time and clearly couldn’t take a hint despite the distractions in the background. I mean, he wanted me to provide him with a recipe OVER THE PHONE, and it was finally me who got a little huffy and told him if he wanted a recipe, he would have to give his email. That’s just not something you can dictate over the phone and hope to get right. Thank goodness he works for a small paper and not our large publication. In the end, I never did get to see the article, and there are no back issues available (I asked). I only know it was published because someone my husband works with happened to see it.
Obviously I have A LOT to learn. I would never dream of preapproving someone’s article or asking him to rewrite certain parts for my benefit. And I certainly wouldn’t let someone else tell me how to do my job. I just wanted to make sure my damn name was spelled correctly!
Melissa –
I wouldn’t say it’s a no-no to show the interview subject the article. Some writers don’t like doing so, or are prohibited from it by their publisher, but other writers prefer to have the interviewee check the actual article. Unless you are writing an extremely provacative piece or pitting two sources’ quotes against one another, I actually don’t think there is anything ethically wrong with it.
I do have a story about when showing the piece to your subject is a bad idea. I once interviewed a woman who was a very difficult interview subject, but not because she wouldn’t talk — because she talked too much. That should have been my first clue. She fancied herself a writer, too, which should have been my second.
Anyway, when I emailed her the finished piece and asked her to verify that everything was correct, she “helpfully” copyedited the whole thing for me. (GRRRRR…) About half of the changes I didn’t care one way or the other, but the other half were either unnecessary or unclear (i.e. she was trying to stuff too much information into one phrase or one sentence). Then, after the paper went to press, she suddenly emailed me again and complained — as if she hadn’t already reviewed (and changed) the article — that I didn’t mention her husband enough.
That is, however, the only time anything like that has ever happened. I usually prefer to just send the interviewee the article and get him or her to verify the facts and quotes — that way there is no opportunity for a “Hey, I didn’t know you were going to say it like that!” after the piece appears.
Another note about interviewing in general –
I happen to like doing email interviews. A lot of writers say that then you don’t get the benefit of visual cues, but I think you get better quotes when the interviewee has more time to think about his or her answers. And, they are less likely to freeze up or be uncooperative via email.
I have had numerous sources ask for approval on my articles and I’m always flabbergasted that they think that’s how it works. A great deal of it comes down to who is paying me-the publication or the subject. Of course you can approve something if you’ve commissioned it, but that is seldom the case.
I have had many uncooperative interviewees, however, and I find that it helps to talk to them about something else entirely, current events, something they are at ease with to show that I’m not out to uncover dirt, just have a conversation. By the end, generally I have enough to not only craft a good article, but it has a little more of the persons personality in it. I am always astounded by people who refuse to help themselves in interview situations, even if there are distractions, etc. There’s nothing like free publicity and people are unfailingly ungrateful for it.
I don’t think people want to necessarily “approve” the overall content of the article. In my case, all I wanted was to make sure that the basic facts were correct. Did he correctly spell my name and the names of my family members? Did he catch all the steps to the requested recipe?
As a fledgling writer myself, I would never impose my style on another writer, nor would I tell him what to write. But I think interviewers have an obligation to their subjects to assure them that they understood the basic information. That’s what I didn’t get from the guy who interviewed me. A follow-up would have been nice.
I’ve been interviewed twice, and on one occasion I was offered the article to clarify any mistakes. Writers cannot assume that all non-writers know how the interview/article process works? It’s like my doctor friend interjecting medical lingo into our conversations. WHAT?? For someone like me, who is a very ordinary person, I had no clue that you aren’t suppose to ask for the article prior to publication. Now I do.
Sometimes I’ll make exceptions for profile articles, but in general I never send a multi-source article for source approval. I’ve learned that sources too often will either rewrite the article for you, requote themselves, or vent that they were used insignificantly.
Since I write mostly for trades, most of my editors will handle the fact checking themselves, after their department edits the piece. Showing a source the piece before it is submitted can create a lot of hard feelings and confusion if the final piece is different.
I work for a publication that allows the interviewees to ok the articles first- wow does that get to be a pain. I have a secret- gosh I hope they never read this….I always wait til the last minute to do the article and that way the subjects don’t have a lot of time to ask for multiple edits. Gosh I cannot believe I am putting this in print.
I have yet to really tackle interviewing. I am currently working on a project that will require me to interview two or more people, so I have to say that I’m quite nervous! I’ll definitely use everyone’s advice…
For Katrina:
Interviewing is much like making any business or social connection. Get a conversation going first, even if it’s minor chit-chat, but be respective of the subject’s time.
Know your subject matter first, meaning doing any background homework that’s available. That doesn’t mean being a subject matter expert. It may not be possible. A lot of football players may not be able to write, but someone writing about football should understand the game, with more sophistication for more in-depth publications.
You need to understand the audience that will read what you will write. Someone with passing knowledge can write a football article aimed at the novice, but you’ll need to know a lot more if writing for die-hard fans.
But even when writing for the novice, you need to understand the basics of the game.
(Yes, I am a former sportswriter).
Even if it’s not sports, the basics still apply.
If you’re very new to interviewing, treat it like you would being new to anything. Do a couple of practice interviews with friends, neighbors, etc., before doing the “real” ones. Did you get the information you wanted? If not, consider revising your questions.
Hope the above helps.
Phil:
Thank you so much for taking the time to write that out! You’ve definitely given me a lot to consider when I begin my interviews.
Thanks again!!
I have not had to interview anyone but I like the e-mailing them the questions. I used to be quite extroverted but not any more. I know if I was the one being interviewed…I would ASK for an email kind of thing. That’s just me.