Forem: Allie Bailey

How to Conduct a Successful Interview

Allie Bailey — Mon, 13 Jul 2020 21:12:57 +0000

When writing a blog post or article, sometimes it’s useful to include an expert opinion or personal quote to boost your credibility and to improve engagement with your content. If you’ve been assigned to conduct an interview or if you think it could benefit your writing task, follow these guidelines to successfully conduct a professional interview.

Ask, don’t expect.

Generally, it’s best to never assume someone is free. In an email or a Slack message, ask the person politely if they would be interested in answering some questions. When sending the first message, outline what you’re working on and the topic you would like to interview them about so they know what they’re agreeing to from the beginning.

You also want to figure out how you’d like to conduct the interview. If you only have a few questions that can be answered via email or Slack, stick to that (this also saves everyone time). If you have several questions or want to have an engaging conversation to spur new ideas, have an in-person or Zoom call meeting. Determine what medium you want to conduct the interview on before asking, so you can let them know what type of interview they’re agreeing to.

Come prepared.

Once you’ve arranged a time to meet with your interviewee, be sure to prepare for it. Outline all the questions you need answered before the interview, and even memorize some of them so you can work them into the conversation naturally. If you’re only emailing them, be sure to order the questions naturally, so they can write their answers in a coherent way.

The way to figure out what to ask is by doing research first. Look up the person’s job title, work they’ve done, papers they’ve written, etc. Use this information to come up with creative and in-depth questions on their profession or area of expertise. If you can find the answers to your questions on Google, make new ones, otherwise it’s a waste of both of you and the interviewee’s time.

This might look different for different professionals. If it’s a professor, look into their research or lab. Figure out what they’re interested in so you can be as specific as possible with your questions. It looks good to them when you know what you’re talking about. If you are interviewing a young web developer, they might not have publications or websites like professors do. If you can’t find out about their personal career, read up on their job in general so you still have knowledge on what type of work they likely do.

Ask the right questions.

Make sure you know exactly who you’re talking to and what their area and level of knowledge is — avoid asking them something they don’t know the answer to. Don’t assume they know anything unless you have confirmed through your research that they have information on it. If you aren’t sure about their level of expertise, ask a general question to gauge what they know before diving into the subject. Of course, if they don’t seem knowledgable, avoid further questioning.

Ask open-ended questions rather than yes/no questions, so they have the opportunity to elaborate on their ideas. Try not to ask only what, but also why, so later on you can explain their ideas well in your written work.

Here’s a few example questions that apply to different types of interviews.

What experience do you have with []?
Can you explain how [] works? How do you use it in your company/job/research?
What works about [], and what doesn’t?
Why do you use [] over other products/ideas/platforms on the market?
Would you recommend []? Which groups would it be helpful to?

Obviously, every interview is different. Re-work these questions to apply to your interview topic, or come up with your own if these wouldn’t make sense in your case.

Record the interview and take notes.

You will need to document the answers to your questions. It’s possible to write everything down in real-time, but it’s easy to miss things, and it can be rude to constantly ask someone to repeat themselves. Ask them at the beginning of the interview if they are comfortable being recorded, so you can go back after the interview and transcribe it. During the interview, take notes on the main ideas for you to reference later.

Let them speak.

Remember why you’re interviewing them: they have information you want. Let them do most of the talking, only interjecting for clarification or elaboration on a concept you want to know more about. Once the questions you prepared have been answered, give them the chance to bring up other topics by asking, “Is there anything else you’d like to add?” This tells them that you value their opinion and want to hear it.

You should also get comfortable pausing, or not responding right away when they finish talking. If you remain silent for a few seconds after they finish a sentence, they might continue on to share more information that you didn’t deliberatly ask for. Again, they have answers you want, so give them the space and time to talk as much as they want. If they don’t keep talking, continue with your line of questioning.

Be polite and appreciative.

Whoever you are interviewing took the time to talk to you, and they didn’t have to. Maintain a friendly, polite demeanor throughout the interview, and don’t forget to say thank you! If you’re speaking with a professional, you want them to think highly of you and the organization you represent so you can establish a connection with them or their company. No matter who you’re interviewing, it’s good practice to show that you respect their time and appreciate the favor they’re doing you.

Following these guidelines, you can take your interviewing skills to the next level. Preparation, respect and appreciation will improve both your and the interviewee’s experience, ensuring the most positive, informative interview for your blog!

Our Guide to Editing a Blog Post

Allie Bailey — Thu, 02 Jul 2020 22:16:07 +0000

Whether editing someone else’s written work or your own, here are some key steps to take to clean up a blog or article before publishing.

When assigned a blog post to edit, the author should give you a brief description of the following:

Title and/or topic of the post
Purpose for writing the blog
Target audience
Any specific issues you need to look for

This should all be provided in the GitHub issue. Otherwise, message them on Slack to get this information before editing.

Remember the following goals of a good blog post as you edit:

Hook and maintain the audience's attention from the title onward.
Be understandable for the target audience (this depends on what the target audience should already know prior to reading the blog post).
Be relatable to the target audience.
Use appropriate tone for the target audience and content of the post.

With the relevant information and the blog goals in mind, follow these steps to complete the editing process:

1) Initial look-over and first edits.
Read over the blog post without making major changes. Take note of the pros and cons that stand out to you. What does the blog post do well that can be replicated in other areas? What areas need improvement? Then, edit minor errors such as spelling, punctuation, or run-on sentences. For substantial edits, comment what is wrong with the highlighted passage. Provide an example of how you would fix it if possible, but don’t rewrite the section unless it’s necessary (this will be covered in second edits). It is up to the author to decide how to take your advice.

2) Second edits.

Before editing again, the second draft should be finished. Sometimes, the first round of edits is sufficient to complete the post, but you often need one more round to fix things you missed the first time. Repeat Step 1, but make sure that you’re focused on what the author has changed. Resolve any comments on areas that no longer need to be edited. Make new edits/comments and rewrite certain passages if necessary.

3) Final look-through.

By now, the final draft should be done, but make sure to read it over once more to be sure it’s error-free and prepared for publishing. Don’t forget about formatting and clarity — sometimes you can’t tell something sounds funny because you’ve read it so many times. Try reading from the audience’s perspective; be intentional with this last look-over.

4) Optional meeting for clarification.

If needed, set up a meeting with the author/editor to go over edits and comments. Prior to the meeting, the author should have at least read through all the edits/comments that have been made. If there are any remaining inconsistencies in the purpose for the blog post, ask for clarification. Editors should help the author start making the appropriate edits to their draft and clear up any confusion about editing suggestions.

5) Attend a workshop.

Weekly workshops with the writing team and the DevRel team will be held. These workshops are not mandatory, but are highly recommended for those who need help writing or editing their blog posts. At least one writer will be present to help those in need. Sometimes, the writing team will give presentations on important aspects of the blog post writing process. Blog post writers can come by with any questions, concerns, or feedback.

Throughout the editing process, you should be looking for (and fixing) these common issues:

Inconsistencies in tone, formatting, and/or citing of sources:

Your blog will look and sound better if these elements are the same throughout.

Lack of flow/no transitions:

Transitions make your writing make sense. When you move on to a new topic, alert the reader with a topic sentence introducing the new concept.

Poor organization of paragraphs and/or sentences:

If you were presenting your article word-for-word, would the audience understand?

Irrelevant information or filler words:

Avoid words like “truly,” “really,” “just,” “actually,” and “very.”
The idea is to be concise — most of the time, your writing is better after you cut things out. Every sentence should have a purpose. Ask, “does this need to be here?”

Repetition:

If you read over your draft and find that ideas are repeated in different ways, pick the best-written text and only include the idea once, other than for summarization purposes.

Grammatical errors:

Try to think about how you say things in conversation to help you translate words to grammatically-correct writing. Think about where you pause in a sentence, for example:
Common mistake: In case you forgot you need to use a comma in this sentence.
Correction: In case you forgot, you need to use a comma in this sentence.

Errors in spelling and punctuation:
‘Their’ vs ‘they’re’
When using “quotation marks,” keep the punctuation inside the “quotes!”
Run-on or incomplete sentences:

Break up long sentences into two parts, so more relevant information can be shared in a clearer way.
Run-on: “We will use Python which will teach you how to run this code and create a useful chatbot that can help your company with customer service in order to boost sales.”
Vs. clear and concise: “This tutorial will use Python to teach you how to create a chatbot for your company. Chatbots help to automate customer service, boosting sales and preventing employees from wasting time on FAQs.”

Keeping these general editing techniques in mind, you can improve your writing and create clear and informative blog posts!