Ask an SME a general question and you’ll usually get a general answer.

That’s not necessarily a bad place to start. You need enough background to understand the issue from the expert’s perspective.

But then you need to take the conversation deeper.

Where does the standard answer stop working? What changes in the real world? What happens when a customer’s environment, priorities or constraints complicate the recommendation?

That next question is often what turns a useful interview into a revealing one.

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