Who they are

A CV survives on its own. What someone was actually like does not, unless somebody asks.

8 questions. There is no order you have to follow.

• Tell me who you are — not what you did in life, but who you really are.
• If you had to describe yourself in three words, what would they be?
• What mattered most to you in life?
• What moment were you most proud of yourself?
• If you had to sum up your philosophy of life in one sentence, what would it be?
• How do you think people close to you saw you?
• How did you change over the years? What stayed constant?
• If there were one thing in life you could undo — what would it be?

Using these

Start here, but do not linger. These are large questions, and large questions early tend to get careful answers. Ask two, then go to something specific and come back.

Asking about someone, rather than asking them

If the person is not here to answer, the same question has to change shape. “Where did you grow up?” is a cruel thing to ask about someone who has died, so each question also has a second wording, for asking someone who knew them.

• Tell me who they were — not what they did in life, but who they really were.
• If you had to describe them in three words, what would they be?
• What mattered most to them in life?
• What moment were they most proud of?
• If you had to sum up their philosophy of life in one sentence, what would it be?
• How do you think people close to them saw them?
• How did they change over the years? What stayed constant?
• If there were one thing in their life they could have undone — what do you think it would have been?

The other themes

• How they speak: Turns of phrase, filler words, how they open a conversation — the texture most interviews never ask about.
• Memories: Specific moments, not summaries of a decade.
• Personality: How they handle change, order, other people, and themselves.
• Relationships: The people who shaped them, and how they talked about them.
• Values and beliefs: What they thought was worth doing, and why.
• The harder questions: Failure, contradiction, regret. Ask these late, and only if you have earned them.
• Objects, songs and places: A photograph, a piece of music, a room — the fastest routes into a story.
• Everyday life: What an ordinary day actually looks like. The detail that vanishes first.