# Question Craft: Getting Truth Instead of Politeness

Interviewees want to be nice. Discovery questions must be engineered against niceness — every principle here exists because the polite answer is worthless.

## The five rules

1. **Past behaviour, never hypotheticals.** "Would you use…?" invites kindness; "walk me through the last time you…" retrieves facts. Any question containing *would* is rewritable.
2. **Their story, not your pitch.** The moment you explain your idea, every subsequent answer is contaminated. Idea description goes last, if at all.
3. **Specifics unlock memory.** "Tell me about your workflow" gets an idealised summary; "open your screen — what did you actually do Tuesday?" gets reality. Anchor to a specific recent instance every time.
4. **Follow the emotion, not the script.** When their voice changes — frustration, pride, embarrassment — the script pauses. "You sighed just then — what's behind that?" outperforms any planned question.
5. **Silence is a question.** After they answer, count three beats before speaking. The sentence after the silence is routinely the honest one.

## Rewrite gallery

| Contaminated | Clean |
|---|---|
| "Would this save you time?" | "What did the last one cost you — walk me through it?" |
| "Do you find X frustrating?" | "Tell me about the last time X happened. Then what?" |
| "How much would you pay?" | "What do you spend today — tools, time, people — on this?" |
| "Is reporting important to you?" | "Show me the last report you actually made. Who asked for it?" |
| "What features do you want?" | "What have you tried already? What made you stop?" |

## Money questions that work

Willingness-to-pay can't be asked directly, but spending *behaviour* can: current tools and their cost, hours × who, what they've cancelled and why, budget owner. "Have you looked for a solution? What happened?" separates a real problem (they searched) from a conversational one (they never bothered).

## The closing pair

Always end with: "What should I have asked that I didn't?" and "Who else lives this problem?" The first surfaces the topic your guide missed; the second is recruitment plus a severity signal (people refer others for real problems, not mild ones).
