Business Problem 1-Interviews
Interviewing "customers" will be essential for gathering insight that will help formulate and validate/invalidate solutions.
Before you meet anyone for an interview, you need to take the time to get prepared. Below are a few actions you should spend time on before speaking with anyone - people value their time, so don't waste it.
Abstracting Your Assumptions
Prepare for an interview by generating a list of questions based on your customer segment assumptions. Then, abstract your questions to disguise what you would otherwise ask directly. This may sound counterintuitive, but you don't want to ask questions in a manner that can influence a potential customer's response.
Developing Your Interview Plan
1. Conduct research on the industry-if you are not a domain expert, you are going to have to take time to become one. Search for industry reports, read scholarly articles, etc.
2. Starter Questions-make sure to have a few opening questions to build rapport.
3. Conversation Prompts- asking "yeah, but why?" or "that's interesting, but how?" are great fallback questions if you feel the conversation stalling.
4. Conducting interviews with people you've never met before can be a little intimidating. It is important to practice!
Interview resources:
-Watch the video and discuss the approach from Customer Development Labs
-Article from the Daily egg regarding customer interviews.
-Interviewing Tips and Templates from Lean Startup Circle Wiki.
-List of possible interview questions from Mike Fishbein.
-Problem Interview script from Startitup.
-Interviewing mistakes to avoid.
Interviewing: Pass/Fail Experiments
Interviewing: Asking the Right Questions
Example of Final Presentation:
Inca Tea (Hawken School)