Interview Tips

Journalists collect and scatter information about current events, peoples, trends and issues and their work are acknowledged as journalism. They need good communication skills to produce quality copy of report, creativity to search new angles from old stories, persuasiveness to convince unwilling people to be interviewed, Listening skills to pick out nuances of story, investigative skills to find new stories and autonomy to be able to work independently. Reporters are also one type of journalists because they develop reports as a profession for advertisement or telecast in mass media like TV, radio, magazines, newspapers, documentary film and on internet.

Interviewing is a vital part for being a journalist and conducting the journalistic interview requires skills that can be got from experience and practice. It is the best way to collect information and create content for a story. It doesn’t mean that you can only do successful interviews because good interview technique requires much practice so don’t expect to be master it immediately. There are several techniques you can use to improve your skills in right way.

Interview Techniques

Recording of Interview is a good way as you can make eye contact with interviewee as it seems like a normal conversations and person will often say things she/he might not say if are taking notes. Very few people have good memories so recorded interview is very beneficial as it reduces the chances of accusations of misquotations by playing back the section in questions.

Avoid Mundane Questions for which you can get answer by yourself after little research. Try to ask direct questions that indicates what you want to know and uncover. Most of the journalistic interviews take place in group situation or under time constrains where many reporters are firing off questions, in such situations make your questions and time slot count.   

Tailor Questions before interview according to your subject and keep in mind that questions should be directed for individual to get perfect information that person can provide.

Ask Open-Ended Questions through which you can get detailed information about your subject. Avoid asking such questions which result “yes” or “no” answers. Open-ended questions are often beginning with phrases like “Tell me about” or “What your opinion is about”. If you want to get best quotations to elaborate the topic design your questions according to his/her personality.

Be Persistent because it is a crucial part of conducting successful interview especially in the cases of hostile subjects. You should ask same questions in various different ways to get comprehensive information about whole story. If your interview subject refuses to answer any question then continue line of questioning until you get the answer.

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