The Art of a Yes/No Question in Interviews
April 3, 2009 by Terreece Clarke
Filed under Interviews
Most of the time when you’re interviewing a source you don’t want to ask yes or no questions. Nothing kills a interview faster than a transcript full of ‘Yes,’ ‘No,’ and ‘I don’t know’s.’ There are times, however, when a yes/no question is both useful and necessary. The key is the follow up.
Often a good interview subject will answer the question and then elaborate on why they feel that way. If they don’t it’s up to you to ask them to give more detail. How you do it is important.
For example, say you’re interviewing a politician who has an opposition to the proposed new budget:
You: “Do you think the new budget will positively impact the city?”
Politician: “No.”
Several follow-up questions could be asked here:
- What would you like to see eliminated/added?
- Do you have a better plan that would work in the current economic environment?
- Are the issues you have with the proposed budget deal breakers or is there room for compromise?
Following up a yes/no question takes a bit of thought, but it allows you both to go deeper into the subject in a variety of ways. A simple question can open the door to so much more.
Better is to ask an open-ended question.
Rather than: “Do you think the new budget will positively impact the city?”
Ask “How do you think the new budget will impact the city?”
Another problem with the question as initially posed is that it is biased toward a positive response (interviewing 101).
Hi Phil,
In the beginning I wrote that it is best NOT to ask yes/no questions, however, there are times when these types of questions come up or as I point out are helpful because they can lead down another or specific path. Also, especially when dealing with politics and particularly this example’s situation, the question isn’t biased toward a positive response because I stated we are interviewing the opposition to the new budget. It is assumed that the one who proposed the budget obviously thinks it is a positive/best case scenario.
So to get specific, you could ask, “Do you think the new budget will positively impact the city as the mayor suggested in his speech?” This gives the opposition the opportunity to say “no, yada, yada” as opposed to assuming that because they are the opposition/opposition party they are opposed the new budget in it’s entirety or disagree with the impact which is where the bias would would adversely impact the line of questioning. They could agree with the budget’s positive impact, but disagree with the way the budget was proposed or the level of positive impact implied by the mayor, or items within the budget or feel there is another way to get the same impact without certain elements i.e. taxes, etc. This line of questioning gives them the opportunity to level their exact opinion without any assumptions on the interviewer’s part.
The only time I ask a yes-or-no question is when I’m fishing for a short and sweet answer.
Using your example — and ignoring the fact a real politician can make a mountain range out of a molehill (i.e., they’re physically incapable of saying yes or no to the media) — instead of saying “Do you…”, would it not serve the same purpose to say, “Why don’t you…” and let the politico expand on it? You’re able to follow up with the other questions if you need to, and you’ve used one less back-and-forth to reach the same place. Longer answers almost always yield nuggets of article gold.
But sometimes you just have to pin somebody down on something though.
“Will you have to cut the city’s budget for landscaping?”
or
“Are you going to cancel the school’s prom because of this incident?”
or
“Will this mean that the city will go into debt?
or
“Were you arrested for driving under the influence?”
Often, people–particularly in sensitive matters–try to wiggle out of answering questions, and sometimes you just have to ask, flat-out, for a yes-or-no answer. Then you can ask the follow-ups. That still allows the interviewee to expound and yield those nuggets of gold that Scott alluded to.
Terreece,
It’s also good to, in preparation, ask yourself “what if s/he says yes” and “what if s/he says no,” etc. for each of your questions. Don’t assume the answer you’re expecting will come.
And also keep “can you clarify”", “why?”, and similar questions in your pocket. If you can’t come up with anything more specific, it may still get you the information you need.