Greg's Informational Interview Protocol

Greg's step-by-step process for requesting and conducting informational interviews. 

General Process

1. Find Interesting people

1. Searching LinkedIn, Angel.co, Crunchbase for interesting people and interesting businesses 

2. Add people/business to Info Interview tracking spreadsheet

3. Connect on LinkedIn + add message asking for their time

4. Schedule - be sure to offer specific days/times to make it easy on them, “are you free Tuesday or Wednesday morning?” 

5. Prep 

1. Specific questions for interviewee

2. Ask yourself, “how can i provide this person value?”

6. Hold interview 

1. F/u email with value you provide them (and next steps, if any)

General Interview Questions

1. what exactly are you doing? (what are you working on this week, what is your focus this quarter)

2. how did you get here?

3. what is your daily routine?

4. what is the culture like? values?

5. how do you learn and incorporate it into your job?

6. when in your job are you  by it?

7. what parts of it are a grind?

8. software tools/books/blog posts?

9. who else should I talk to if I wanted to learn more about this sort of job?

Wrap

1. Thanks so much for your time and insight

2. What is the best email to reach you on? I’ll follow up with [blog post, software recommendation, book] i mentioned

3. If there is any way I can be valuable to you, don’t hesitate to message me, happy to help

Follow-up email providing vale and saying thanks

1. Email providing value

1. Introduction

2. Book

3. Blog posts

4. etc...