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Reasoning Inquiry: An Interview Approach to Surfacing Assumptions and
Reasoning

You Need More Discipline Than You May Think

Challenges on the road to information are varied, including the customer's own defenses, miscommunications, untested assumptions, and the issue of framing.
These challenges can significantly distort the information you acquire—usually unintentionally. Error rates of 25% or more are not uncommon.

The real "nuggets" in customer visit programs often come from unearthing business reasoning which customers take for granted (and therefore don't think to mention).

Background on Reasoning Inquiry

Reasoning Inquiry is an interview approach Research Boston has developed to improve the accuracy and depth of research interviews. The name, Reasoning Inquiry, comes from a focus on tacit reasoning patterns that underlie human communications and behavior.

Research shows that people act on the basis of theories they hold about customers, competitors, industry trends, etc.

Many of these theories are so ingrained they have become tacit, that is unrecognized by the user until they stop and reflect on the subject. Many of these theories are untested.

Gaps frequently arise between people's espoused theories (what they say they are doing) and their actual theories-in-use (theories supported by their behavior).
Reasoning Inquiry includes tools for surfacing people's theories and examining them in ways that minimize the defensiveness of the people involved. This workshop will focus on learning to recognize inferences and how to probe differences between theories-in-use and espoused theories.

Both the interviewer and the interviewee hold different theories about how to act, what to say and why. Sometimes, these theories can get in the way of an open dialogue.

How We Make Meaning—The Ladder of Inference

Inferences are the meanings people make from the words or actions of others. These meanings can be created from a number of sources, such as personal interpretations of words, body language, tone of voice, previous experiences, values, sense of time and space.

There are two basic kinds of inferences—those which are recognized—those where we are aware we have made an assumption based on incomplete information; and those which are blind—inferences made without being recog­nized. With stress, excitement, or unfamiliar subjects, this balance shifts markedly towards blind inferences.

The Ladder of Inference is a useful framework to show how we see actions, attribute meaning to the actions, and then base our own action on those meanings. (See Figure 1.)

How to Test an Inference

Workshop participants will practice, on each other, a 4-step process for testing inferences. Participants also will learn ways to recognize inferences in themselves.

Finally, participants will learn tools to test inferences being made by the interviewee, one of the greatest sources of distortion in communications.
Other Issues in Customer Visits and Interviews

A common issue in customer visits is finding ways to deal with potentially sensitive subjects such as costs, profit margins, or opinions, about the interviewee's company. The workshop will practice processes for surfacing such subjects and making them discussable without being intrusive.

Time also will be provided for discussions of how to get customers to invest the time for these visits, common interview courtesies, and effective follow-up to maximize the value from the effort.