Update July 2015 –Andréia’s original blog post isn’t accessible anymore sadly (I’m still looking for a link to an archived version).
Andréia Azevedo Soares has just posted an excellent blog on how to interview scientists over at YS Journal – an on-line journal written, edited and published by students. The piece is aimed specifically at students from 12 to 20 years old who are engaged with the Young Scientists Journal project from around the world, and Andréia – an established journalist herself – cautions that it might not be of much use to professional journalists and science writers. But I suspect that anyone on the giving or receiving end of science-related interviews will find the piece informative.
In writing the blog, Andréia corresponded with a number of scientists about their experiences being interviewed, including me. Having send her copious off the cuff notes, I thought it might be worth-while posting them here – if only so you can see how a good writer separates the wheat from the chaff in such situations 🙂
Andréia was interested in my thoughts on being interviewed as a scientist and someone who writes and talks to people about science. This is what I emailed her (edited superficially from the original, where I became grammatically challenged in the heat of the moment). Remember, these thoughts are aimed at students between 12 – 20 years old, rather than established writers:
Over the past few years I’ve been interviewed by many journalists – mainly over the phone, but sometimes face to face, and occasionally for TV and Radio. In most cases the experience – and the results – have been positive. Perhaps most importantly, the experiences have helped me understand how best to work with journalists as a scientist. But they have also given me some insight into how journalists can get the most out of scientists when talking with them.
I’ve always found that interviews go best when the interviewer is prepared – when they have read up on the subject, when they know who I am and what my expertise is, and when they have a clear sense of the information they are interested in. The worst interviews are fishing expeditions – where the journalist doesn’t seem to know why they are talking to me, and they are simply fishing for information they might use as the basis of a story.
I find a prepared journalist instills confidence in me, and helps me to convey what I want to say clearly and effectively. They don’t need to be experts in the subject. In fact I see it as an important role of the interviewer to ask the sort of questions their readers would want to ask – even if they seem scientifically simple and naive (there’s no such thing as a stupid question, but ignorant questions are another matter). But it helps if they know where they are going with the interview.
I don’t find small-talk helps at the beginning of an interview – I have better things to do than talk about the weather usually! But starting with straight-forward questions does help. I often find that I am providing my clearest answers at the end of an interview, because this is when I have relaxed sufficiently to start communicating well with the interviewer. Some simple warm-up questions help speed up this process.
The questions I dread are the open-ended ones: “what is nanotechnology?” is a perfect example of a question that potentially ends up with me rambling, because I don’t know how much information the interviewer wants. Of course, as a person used to being interviewed, I should have stock answers to such questions – but I’m not that disciplined! This is actually an important point – the clearer it is what the interviewer is looking for, the easier it is to provide clear answers.
Some of my richest conversations with journalists have come from what is usually the last formal question – “is there anything else you think is important, or that you would like to add?” – this is an open-ended question at the end of the interview that is okay to ask. What I find at this point is that I start to chat more informally with the interviewer about things that weren’t covered in their questions, or things that I think might be relevant – including emphasizing and clarifying things that I have said previously. And as a result, occasionally I say something that hits a chord with the interviewer, and we spend several more minutes exploring something that wasn’t in the original interview plan, but nevertheless finds its way into the final piece.
Ending interviews politely and keeping in touch with the interviewee is always important. It’s always good to be informed personally when the piece is published – whether or not you have been quoted. On occasions, I’ve had journalists send me the piece and explain why my comments haven’t appeared. This can sometimes be a bit of an ego blow, but it does raise my respect for these journalists. It also helps cement a longer lasting relationship. Developing a working relationship with scientists you may use as a source multiple times seems extremely important. It provides you with a list of sources that you are confident in, and who trust you.
This question of trust is critical, and it is mutually beneficial. A scientist is more likely to speak to a journalist that they have had good experiences with, and who does a good job in representing their work. This trust is built on how the interview goes, feedback after the interview, and the quality of the piece that is published.
When I see myself quoted in a piece, I first check that the quote reflects what I was trying to say – I’m not too worried about the minute details, but the broad sense of the quote and the context are important to me (I have colleagues who think very differently on this, but I always assume that in synthesizing and summarizing the science, some of the detail and scientific accuracy will be lost. This doesn’t bother me – as long as the science is not wrong, or that the implications of the quotes are inaccurate or inappropriate). If I am uncomfortable with the quote, I first check back to thinking whether the fault lies with me – did I express myself poorly? Most times, I am the one who could have done better. If I feel that the journalist has represented my work and my point of view poorly, I might send them a polite message noting this – although I usually acknowledge that I could have done better in expressing myself. On very rare occasions, I might say something in public if I feel the article is dangerously misleading – but this is an extremely rare occurrence. More often thought I just let it go – but I don’t tend to work repeatedly with journalists who do not do a good job of representing what I say.
That said, most journalists I have worked with are genuinely interested in feedback on their pieces – especially on whether they got the science right. Asking for feedback builds trust with sources – even if you write the occasional piece that isn’t perfect!
This is something of an aside, but there are a number of media advisors working with scientists who suggest scientists ask to check stories prior to publication. I’m not sure where this advice is coming from, but it seems naive, inappropriate and unfeasible in many cases to me. There are publications that will come back and fact-check the science, and even check that quotes are correct. But very few publications will allow sources editorial control over articles – and rightly so. However, young journalists should be prepared for scientists to think that they can somehow check over the work before publication – and work out how to politely decline!
What a lovely surprise, Andrew. Thank you a lot for this post. It will hopefully help the YS Journal project to reach many more teenagers.
I really enjoyed your idea of showing the backside of the tapestry. It is interesting to see how information was processed and to try to guess why some bits of it were woven to the fabric of the text and others were not. In your case, however, the metaphor of the separation of wheat from the chaff does not apply. Why?
First, because the content of your e-mail is almost entirely “quotable”. The passage in which you compare bad interviews to fishing expeditions, for instance, is worth a title 😉 But sadly the part dedicated to the preparation was already too long, so I decided to use your contributions in the remaining parts of the piece.
Second, I received your valuable comments when the text was already structured (and lengthy!). It led me to try to figure out what aspects you touched on that were absent in my text. In other words, I decided to use the criterion of complementarity.
I noticed that my text failed both to mention both the idea of building trust and the importance of asking the magic final question (‘Is there anything you would like to add?’). And this was what determined my decision to stitch A rather than B or C to the final text. My only solace in word embroidery is that we can always use the threads left in future texts. **
Thanks Andréia – you are very kind. I must disagree with you in turn though and defend the wheat and chaff metaphor – although I’m afraid I need to contort myself a little to do so.
Typically when talking to a journalist, there’s the information I convey, and the information they can/want to use. The two don’t coincide perfectly, so there is always some “wastage” – stuff that doesn’t fit in with the particular story being told. This is my “chaff” – it’s good when there isn’t so much of it, but typically the “wheat” to “chaff’ ratio is only a few percent! And as you point out, the stuff that isn’t used is not necessarily bad, it just doesn’t fit at that time and place. But it may well come in useful later.
Of course this analogy only works in the context of today’s green mindset, where there is no waste, just stuff that can be used for other purposes. Although I suspect that even the most accomplished journalist would be hard pressed to recycle some of my chaff at times 🙂
[PS – love how you weave your screen name “bordado ingles” through your comments with the embroidery theme:-) ]
@Andréia – first, I wanted to say how much I liked your Young Scientists piece too – registration login was enough of a disincentive for me not to comment there though.
@Andrew – interesting to learn your approach to interviews. Naturally I can’t help but tut tut a bit when you say the question most likely to throw you is ‘what is nanotechnology’ – that key message should come rolling off your tongue in your sleep by now. Also interesting that you get more relaxed as the interview proceeds. I tend to become more self conscious the longer I hear myself droning on, or used to, anyway.
With my big agency background, I of course think that you should be prepared for – and able to anticipate – pretty much every question a journalist asks you – none of them should appear to come out of left field, because a proper interview prep will have anticipated both the question and the answer. I once had to prepare a client for a radio interview (done over the phone) in her second language. Although she was fluent in her second language, she was nervous about the translation of terminology. Her preparation included not only a Q&A, but translation as well. And there were no surprise questions.
That question at the end, ‘Is there anything else you’d like to say?’ is the journalist’s gift to you. It’s the chance to mention the important things you’ve forgotten and your opportunity to take control of the interview if you haven’t already done so. Of course, if you’re properly prepared for an interview (and why shouldn’t you be, since now that Andréia’s provided her tips a whole new generation of budding journalists will be properly prepared), you should be repeating yourself by the time you get to the gift question.
One note: television interviews can be a very different experience. Sometimes the interviewer’s had no time at all to do prep (depending on schedules and who’s available to go out in the field to conduct the interview), and they’re looking for succinct soundbites. They’ll often do an on-camera pre-interview to get themselves up to speed, and then do a second ‘take.’ This can serve as a rehearsal for the interviewee and help them appear more polished in the interview that airs. (There’s nothing quite like bright lights and a microphone in your face to make even the calmest interview subject’s adrenalin start flowing.) And speaking of polished – if you’re being interviewed for television – take the makeup! Otherwise you’re going to look like a burn victim with bad skin grafts as the TV studio lights bounce off the planes and angles of your face.
Now how did I know these comments were from you Ruth before I saw who the author was 🙂
I must confess I was being rather honest here, and looking at interviewing from the journalist’s perspective. Of course I have my media training-instilled mental map installed and (when I’m being disciplined) can deliver the message irrespective of the questions (actually, that should have been a warning to young journalists to learn to play the game where the interviewer wants to ensure you convey their message, whatever your aims are). But there are times when I struggle with giving trite answers to open ended questions that really demand more exploration – “what is nanotechnology?” is one of those, and on a bad day strikes me as marginally harder to answer well than “what is happiness?”
Now if I’d been asked how scientists should approach an interview, that would have been a different matter… I’d refer the questioner to you 🙂
When I did an unedited half hour podcast a year or so ago I was appalled by one of my own final statements and the analogy I used to say, basically, that many clients are so caught up in their own enterprises they just assume it’s front-page news and their expectations need to be managed – it was something like, ‘if you’ve just invented a new furnace, don’t expect it to be front-page news unless it blows up.’ I’m still cringing at how callous and tactless that sounds. Hence the need for preparation each and every time.
Don’t get me wrong – I’ve always said no interview should consist merely of a recitation of key messages. This is an area where people can actually learn quite a bit from – believe it or not – good telemarketers and customer service reps, i.e. how to stay on script and still sound natural without going off track too much.
P.S. You have bad days? I would never have guessed. 😉
Bad days? The rather ill-advised phrase “guinea pigs” comes to mind – not one that I would recommend using in an interview about consumer products and emerging technologies with hindsight!