Original in Spanish: Gladwell - no guionizar las entrevistas
In this Malcolm Gladwell course the guy recommends not preparing interview questions, because the most interesting thing the interviewee will tell you is what you didn’t expect them to say.
Well, I’ve spent my whole life saying I don’t like planning my trips because the most interesting thing I learn while traveling is always what I didn’t know I didn’t know. No way I’m leaving home knowing that on that day at that hour I’ll be looking at that particular old stone, because at that point I still don’t know what will make the trip truly worth it.
Anyway, I was thinking about these things and came here so as not to keep them just for myself.
By the way: what a guy. I’d buy him a thousand beers.
EDIT: Seeing that I explained myself terribly, I’ll add some things that matter for us to understand each other.
- The guy is a writer; we’re talking about interviews whose goal is learning what isn’t published yet and understanding the subject. Nobody is watching; it’s about making the subject shine, not the interviewer.
It’s not Pablo Motos preparing which joke to tell which guest to look as sleazy as possible; it’s not that kind of TV interviewer who asks questions so we all know how clever he is.
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Not scripting the interview is a different thing from not preparing it.
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Bringing a note with some ideas that are the actual goal of the interview is not the same as fixing all the questions in advance either.
The point is that if you’re able to script the questions you’re going to ask your subject, then you don’t need to listen to them to know what to ask, and so you’ll miss everything you didn’t know you didn’t know. To learn the things you didn’t know you didn’t know, you have to LISTEN.
Let’s see if this time it lands XD
Let me add that I APPRECIATE VERY LOUDLY that you come tell me when you think my fly is open. I’ve done something right in this world if my mates take the trouble to come tell me I’m wrong.
Related: Malcolm Gladwell
(Facebook, 2020-08-20)