Step 1

Understand why you want to interview stakeholders

You want to define the primary research topic that you're looking to expand your understanding on. Decide if the topic is related to your users or to the product/service/feature.

Good Reasons to Interview Stakeholders

• Build trust / rapport with stakeholders
• Document product needs or requirements
• Uncover hidden or latent expectations or emotions on the product roadmap or product requirements
• Find additional data sources or persons to connect with and learn from
• Understand constraints that affect the user experience (such as legal, technical, or budget constraints)
• Document small and large goals for the product and/or the business

Understanding the expectations and constraints that stakeholders have about research will help you make actionable recommendations and conduct fruitful research.

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Step 2

Draft interview topics

Based on the reason for your stakeholder interviews, draft 2-4 topics to discuss. While you might not get to all the topics, each conversation is a chance to build your relationship. Over time, with regular stakeholder interviews or one-on-one conversations, you can build your research culture.

TIP: What you don’t cover can be discussed via email or messaging, or saved for another, stakeholder interview or conversation.

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Step 3

Schedule a 30-minute conversation with all relevant stakeholders

Let your stakeholder know that it’s an Informal conservation (see example below) when sending the meeting invite. Make sure to include your interview topics so your stakeholders have a chance to collect their thoughts or any relevant data.

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Step 4

Be an attentive listener & notetaker during the meeting

Make regular eye contact, take good notes, clarify and probe into responses. You can read more about conducting better interviewers in Collection 4, Handbook 1.

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Step 5

Thank the stakeholder for their time and clarify your notes

At the end of the meeting, thank your stakeholder for their time and reiterate the main themes in your notes. You want to end the meeting with confidence that your notes and understanding matches or reflects what your stakeholder intended.

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(Optional) Step 6

Get referred to another stakeholder

Ask your stakeholder if they’d be open to referring you to another relevant stakeholder or colleague. This can be a great way to network and learn about important teams or parts of the business.

For Product Owners / Product Managers:

Common goals for product owners include things like faster product releases, meeting business goals and deadlines, recognizing and starting on low effort but high value initiatives for the user, and getting regular user or customer feedback. Useful questions are listed below but feel free to make your own.

• “What data do you use as signals for making decisions?”
• “What initiatives on the current product roadmap make you nervous?” Why? What data could help lower this nervousness?”
• “In your opinion, what are the team’s greatest bottlenecks?”
• “What initiatives are low-effort for us but high-value for the user?”
• What are the greatest sources of friction in the product today?
• Where does the product have lots of support costs?
• What journeys haven’t been studied or supported in a while?
• Where is the market/competition moving?
• “What are the most frustrating or challenging issues of being a product owner here? How do you work around these issues?”
• “How do you work with any engineers or designers?”

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For Software Engineers:

Common goals for software engineers include things like writing simple, readable, and replicable code, maintaining systems with low or predictable effort, more regular and effective code, performance, and integration tests, and logging and debugging issues quickly. Useful questions are listed below but feel free to make your own.

• “How does the current technology or system work today? Is it possible to get a diagram or drawing of how the various parts and data work together?”
• “What level of technical documentation do you have? How often is that documentation updated? How helpful is any documentation?”
• “What’s the engineering culture here? How does work get reviewed and critiqued?”
• “How often does the engineering team release or ship products and features?”
• “What are the development or engineering sprints like? Who’s involved in planning and assessing them? Can research get involved in the sprints?”
• “How is work delegated or completed among the engineering team? How many projects or initiatives does each engineer work on?”
• “What engineering or technology decisions are now unchangeable or unmodifiable? What can change or be improved? How does this affect the user?”
• “Do you have any solutions or ideas to any identified or known user problems? How could it be implemented?”
• “What are the most frustrating or challenging issues of being an engineer here? How do you work around these issues?”
• “How do you work or partner with the product owner and/or designers?”

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For UX Designers:

Common goals for UX designers include things like simplifying or improving the design system, ensuring visual and interaction consistency across various parts of the product, lowering friction or barriers to product usage, and recognizing overlaps between use and business goals. Useful questions are listed below but feel free to make your own.

• “What ideas about the user do you have in your head when you design?”
• “What’s the best way to give design feedback to you?”
• “Could you walk me through the current design system? What areas are challenging to use today?”
• “What are the common technical constraints you consider when designing?
• “How often do you review or get feedback on your designs? Can others be invited to any design reviews or critiques?”
• “What research questions or topics do you want to study? How can I help get these studies started and done well?”
• “When you’re ideating or sketching ideas, can I be involved and offer insights and data from research?”
• “What is the explicit problem you’re trying to solve with this design or idea? How would you know you’ve solved the problem for the user and for the business?”
• “What are the most frustrating or challenging issues of being a designer here? How do you work around these issues?”
• “How often are you able to usability test your work before it’s released or shipped? What are the issues that stop or limit testing?”
• “How do you work or partner with the product owner and engineers?”