Interview stakeholders who disagree

Two people run the business. They've each got a different website in their head, and each of them is right about something.

Take a fictional architecture studio with two partners. One says the studio does house extensions and the site should show them. The other says extensions pay the bills but the future is small commercial work, and the site should be for that. Both are telling the truth as they see it. Put them in one room and you'll get a polite version of the louder one's view.

So interview each person on their own, with the same core questions, so the answers line up when you compare them. Ask if you can record. If you use an AI tool to transcribe it or pull out quotes, check every quote against the recording, because a paraphrase can sneak in looking like someone's words. Keep the exact phrasing for anything that matters. And tell each person the other is being interviewed too, with the same questions, so nobody feels ambushed later.

Ask what someone wants and you get a wish. Ask what happened, and you get how the business actually works. 'Walk me through your last job, from the first message to the final invoice.' 'Where did your last three clients come from?' Past behavior is harder to dress up than plans. The partner who talks about commercial work may tell you the last three jobs were all extensions, and you'll both learn something.

Ask one more question in every interview: 'If I asked your partner the same thing, what would they say?' It tells you whether they know a disagreement exists, and how they'd describe the other side. Sometimes they describe it more fairly than the other person does. Sometimes they've no idea there's a disagreement at all, and that's worth knowing too.

You'll hear contradictions, sometimes inside a single interview. When you do, ask one neutral follow-up: 'Earlier you said most work comes from referrals. Where did this one come from?' Then stop. You need to know that the disagreement exists, how big it is, and what each person's evidence is. Deciding who's right comes later, and it may never be your call. Write down the exact words of both versions while they're fresh.

It's tempting to reassure people: 'Don't worry, we'll definitely show the commercial work.' Don't say it. A promise to one partner is a decision you've made for both of them, and the other partner will hear about it. Say 'that's useful, I'm writing it down', and write it down.

This is what comes out. Each person's position in their own words. The facts they both agree on, kept apart from the positions. Then the open question, phrased so it can be answered, and who has to answer it. Notice what's missing: any opinion of mine about which partner is right. That might come later, as a recommendation with reasons. It doesn't belong in the record. Keep the record as its own file next to the interview notes, so the brief can point to it.

The record feeds the brief. List every open disagreement near the top, because a brief that hides one falls apart at the first design review. Name who decides each one. Say what it blocks: you can wireframe the contact page while the partners argue about the homepage. And when they decide, get it in writing, with a date, so the decision becomes a source like anything else in the project.

Write the disagreement down. Settling it isn't your job.