Journalism 101: Grammar Girl on Interviewing

If you are a journalist, or want to be one, you should probably be listening to Grammar Girl’s podcast anyway, but this week should be of special interest to journalists, because she’s talking about her interview technique.

I do most of the same stuff already, and it’s amusing that we both use the “Big Dummy” technique, which works great, although sometimes at the expense of your dignity. And she also does an outgrowth of that technique that I’ve used ever since I realized how often I don’t know as much as I ought to about my interview subjects:

And finally, I’m going to share with you my secret weapons for interviewing and getting story ideas. My last interview question is always, “Is there anything I haven’t asked you that you think is important or worth talking about?” I always asked that question no matter how much preparation I did for an interview, and about a third of the time it got me something I hadn’t anticipated.

Her audiobook, available at Amazon and in iTunes, is also worth checking out for anyone who writes for a living, even if it’s just company e-mails.

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