Do a better interview
Copyright © 2002
by Lin StoneOne funny thing I've noticed about doing interviews is that people who clam up and refuse to speak to me as an individual will open up and reveal EVERYTHING when I promise to tell the whole world what they wanted to keep secret from me in the first place. Then after the piece is published these same people will have the nerve to call me up and ask when I'm coming to do another interview!
Since I don't have a press pass, when I go in to do an interview I take along a book of story proofs for the interviewee to glance through. If they aren't interested, I don't force the thing on them.
Also, unless I'm doing investigative work, I always give the interviewee a chance to go over their part of the article before dashing it off to be published. When I was first starting it saved my bacon many a time. "That may be what I said, but the way you wrote it isn't what I meant." and then they give me something much better to quote.
For example: one interviewee had to explain the difference between him being ONLY the President of the company, and being the CEO. It was embarrassing for both of us, but just think how embarrassing it would have been when read by 325,000 subscribers!
A tip on using a cassette recorder, Don't let the stupid thing keep you from keeping notes, and write your story from your notes FIRST, then go back to see if your recorder worked or not. If you wait until after you freak out from cassette loss to write the story from your notes you may find all associations with the notes you have written have mysteriously vanished.
I always used the little professional model recorder in interviews and if the interviewee looked leery I would put it off to one side, with the ON light towards them. "If you're still nervous about the recorder after I get your important personal information down I'll shut it off." Ten, fifteen minutes later some of them might glance at it once.
Don't forget that your interview may be the highpoint of this person's life, something they will brag about forever, and OFFER to send them a copy of the tape, with your name and bio right in front of course.
And, now for a progress report. When I first started a recorder was an absolute necessity and I would listen to it over and over again to get every last word right. Gradually my handwritten notes replaced the recorder. Next, my memory replaced more and more of the notes. And finally I can sit there and write the story on a computer while talking to the interviewee. When I finish, I'm done; the story is polished and I can make a copy for the interviewee before I leave. Two or three days later I'll read it again for typos and print it out for publishing.
You'll get better too, if you deliberately work at it.
the end
Lin Stone is an author, writer and photographer living in Mena Arkansas among the gentle mountains known as Ouachita. His articles and essays are syndicated by talewins to be published automatically on other web sites. He writes about adventures and he writes about the peaceable things of this world for Share Your State. In his spare time Lin writes copy for insurance roundup. You can have immediate, and free, reading of many more pieces when you send your little surfer scooting to Lin's home page at http://www.talewins.com/StoneSoup.htm where he keeps stirring up more good things for the soul.
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