The key to a good user interview is simple. Don’t get too attached. Similar to proving a hypothesis in an academic study, you must be open to disproving your hypothesis, too.

 I was adamant that when I cross-referenced the subjective elements of the Paris Agreement, I was sure to find elements of climate denial embedded in the agreement. To me, it was obvious that the subjective elements within the agreement had been weakened by so many conditional verbs that consensus was agreed upon whimsically rather than emphatically. Yet there were no plausible links.

Learning Detachment

Don’t be so attached to an idea that it becomes impossible to understand why you could be wrong. To synthesise a radically different idea is incredibly difficult if you’re attached to the concept or idea. Diplomatic or detached questions can encourage the exploration of these views. But strategically placed controversy can also surface vital data points that will help you build better products.

Signposting is an essential part of directing people to the right content they need, when they need it. Working with high-density information in audio recordings means providing a platform for scan-readers as well as those who prefer or need audio or visual content. SEO-wise, it ranks higher to provide a combination of the two.

Today, we work with a mixture of short attention spans. Users need to find important content quickly with a mixture of written and visual stimuli.

Synthesising data & radical views

Synthesising radically different views can take several forms:

• Views that are designed to be controversial
• Views that are designed to be critiqued
• Views that aren’t represented but provide a broader analysis
• Views that reveal problems and explain a solution

Radical views that contain one or straddle the line of two or more of these forms. If you want to understand a contentious view in the 21^st Century, antivaxxers come to mind. Whilst controversial, for many of its proponents, it signals the start of a broad-based discussion and critique. Broadly, however, these views can provide an understanding of a person’s beliefs about solutions to tackling monopolies in health insurance or pharmaceutical companies. 

These radical views are often antithetical to my own. What’s important is remaining objective and continuing to probe to find the information necessary to assess the views for concrete solutions and explanations.

As an academic, understanding international debates over protection for children (ICRC), environmental protection (The Paris Agreement), and even protection for whales (ICRW), prompted an understanding of the base beliefs that weakened or strengthened its objective or subjective elements. Put simply, what were the nations’ deep-seated needs and pain points going into the negotiation? How can we see those reflected in the conventions, and what questions should we ask to get better answers. Not different, but better.

Diplomatic Strategies & creating content

Training in diplomacy studies meant examining how people create and fail to create consensus, impacting the objective. Deciding which values would be most important to state blocks in mock discussions helped me build email marketing campaigns, based on hooks that would gather interest.

Using contentious areas such as:

• Whether dance constitutes sport/athleticism
• Support for activities programs for educational goals during and post-pandemic
• Use of sport as an incentive in the criminal justice system, to support health & wellbeing, and as a means of using school sports grounds

As a skill, this manifested in user interviews that built an understanding of pain points. What were their challenges, and how could our products fill the gap?