Discovery Interview Prep
Design a customer discovery interview plan with the right methodology, questions, and bias guardrails — calibrated to your research goal, segment, and constraints via 4 adaptive questions.
You have a two-week deadline, 5 interviews scheduled, and you're about to ask "Would you use this if we built it?" — which produces exactly zero usable insight. Good interviews aren't about scripts. They're about matching methodology to goal, then asking only about past behavior.
Who it's for: PMs running customer discovery, UX researchers designing interview studies, founders validating early problem hypotheses, PMMs investigating competitive switching, Heads of CS running churn investigations, anyone about to bias 10 interviews
Example
"I need to interview 5 enterprise customers about why they churned in the last 90 days" → Q1 retention/churn + Q2 recent churners + Q3 limited access + Q4 switch interviews → Full interview guide with 5 questions, 5 biases to avoid, 5 success criteria, and a recruiting plan
CLAUDE.md Template
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npx ccplaybooks add discovery-interview-prep# Discovery Interview Prep
Guide product managers through preparing for customer discovery interviews by asking adaptive questions about **research goals**, **customer segments**, **constraints**, and **methodologies**. Output: a tailored interview plan with methodology, question framework, and success criteria.
This is not a script generator—it's a strategic prep process that ensures interviews yield actionable insights rather than confirmation bias or surface-level feedback.
## The Discovery Interview Prep Flow
1. Gather product/problem context
2. Define research goals (what you're trying to learn)
3. Identify target customer segment and access constraints
4. Recommend interview methodology (JTBD, problem validation, switch interviews, etc.)Get new playbooks like this one
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What This Does
Walks through 4 adaptive questions — research goal, target segment, constraints, methodology — and produces a tailored interview plan: opening/core/closing questions, biases to avoid, success criteria, and recruiting logistics. Matches methodology (Mom Test, JTBD, switch interviews, journey mapping) to your specific situation.
Not a script generator. A strategic prep process.
Quick Start
mkdir -p ~/Documents/DiscoveryPrep
mv ~/Downloads/CLAUDE.md ~/Documents/DiscoveryPrep/
cd ~/Documents/DiscoveryPrep
claude
Provide your problem hypothesis, target segment (if known), existing research (support tickets, churn data), and constraints. Claude runs the 4 questions and delivers the plan.
Four Methodology Options
- Problem validation (Mom Test style) — Past behavior for new product ideas
- Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD) — Motivations and switching behavior for strategy
- Switch interviews — Push/pull analysis for competitive positioning
- Timeline/journey mapping — Chronological walkthrough for full context
The Five Biases to Avoid
- Confirmation bias — "Don't you think X is a problem?" → "Tell me about your experience with X."
- Leading questions — "Would you use this?" → "What have you tried? Why did it work/fail?"
- Hypothetical questions — "If we built Y, would you pay?" → "What do you currently pay for? Why?"
- Pitching disguised as research — "We're building Z to solve X" → "I'm researching X."
- Yes/no questions — "Is invoicing hard?" → "Walk me through your invoicing process."
Success Criteria
- Specific stories, not generic complaints ("Last Tuesday, I spent 3 hours..." vs. "Invoicing is annoying")
- Past behavior, not hypothetical wishes
- Patterns across 3+ interviews (same pain points emerge independently)
- Surprises (if everything confirms assumptions, you're leading)
- Verbatim customer quotes
Tips & Best Practices
- Record with consent. Memory fades; verbatim quotes are gold.
- Max 2–3 interviews per day. Synthesis time matters as much as interview time.
- Reach out to 3× your target. 33% response rate is typical for cold outreach.
- Don't pitch. Don't mention your solution until the last 5 minutes, if at all.
- Interview 5–10 minimum. Stop at saturation (same patterns across 3+), not at convenience.
Common Pitfalls
- Asking what customers want (gets feature requests, not problems)
- Pitching instead of listening (polite obligation, not honest feedback)
- Interviewing friends/family/non-sufferers (polite feedback, no insight)
- Stopping at 1–2 interviews (confirmation bias, tiny sample)
- Not recording or synthesizing immediately (details lost, patterns missed)