Generate an Interview Guide

What you’ll learn

How to generate a structured customer interview guide tailored to your specific business model and its riskiest assumption.

Before you start

You need a completed stress-test assessment with at least one identified risk. If you haven’t done that yet, run your first stress-test.

Steps

Step 1 — Start from your assessment

Open your canvas chat where your assessment results are visible. The interview guide builds directly on what the stress-test surfaced.

Step 2 — Ask LEANSpark to generate an interview guide

Type something like “generate an interview guide” or “help me validate my riskiest assumption.” LEANSpark will create a guide based on your top risk.

Step 3 — Review the questions

The guide includes three sections:

• Opening questions — Build rapport and understand context without leading the interviewee.
• Probing questions — Dig into the specific assumption you’re testing. These are the core of the interview.
• Closing questions — Capture anything you missed and leave the door open for follow-up.

Step 4 — Understand the structure

Each question is designed to avoid confirmation bias. Notice how they’re open-ended, not leading. They ask about past behavior, not hypothetical futures.

What to look for

• Questions map to your specific risk. If your top risk is Customer Segment, the questions focus on understanding who actually has the problem. If it’s Viability, they probe willingness to pay.
• What good answers sound like. LEANSpark includes notes on what to listen for — signals that validate or invalidate your assumption.
• The anti-pattern. If you find yourself wanting to “explain your product” during the interview, you’re selling, not learning. The guide is designed to prevent this.

What’s next

Ready to explore alternative directions? Continue to Compare Business Model Variants.