## 🎙️ Moderate User Interviews > User interviews are essential when we need to **deeply understand our users’ motivations and frustrations**. --- *👇 A case study with* ![[Africa_Logo-min.png]] ## The Take Away ### Problem Statement Sub-Saharan Africa is the least developed region in the world in terms of education. **How to create a service related to education in Sub-Saharan Africa, bringing a positive impact in terms of development?** ![[Africa_Problematic-min.png]] ### Solution **Workshops** that provide access to knowledge for all citizens in Sub-Saharan Africa ![[Africa_Solution-min.png]] ### Roles We conducted general research to understand the needs and challenges of the local education system, then gathered and analysed insights from local individuals with the **semi-structured qualitative interview method**. ![[Africa_Roles-min.png]] ## Conducting Semi-Structured Qualitative Interviews ### Preparing for a User Interview We started by **brainstorming** a list of problems related to education in Sub-Saharan Africa. The only thing is, we never went here and we didn't had the time or money to go for an observational study either. ![[Purpose.jpeg]] We then decided to conduct **semi-structured qualitative interviews** with participants who lived there to get a higher realistic understanding of their educational environment. ![[Africa_Goal-min.png]] Resource constraints played a big role in deciding how many participants we end up recruiting. But practicability is essential: we needed to home in on a **localised area** and take things from there. ![[Africa_Localisation-min.png]] We narrowed down the focus of our project and refrain from following up on all potentially interesting themes in our research, and we finally managed to recruit **2 sub-saharan participants** : Fadima from Mali and Sala from Mauritania. ![[Africa_Recruitment-min.png]] We structured our interview with a guide. The purpose of our [[interview guide 📃]] was to help the interviewer stay focused and on track during the interview, and to ensure that **all relevant topics are covered**. ![[Africa_InterviewGuide-min.png]] ### Moderating a User Interview The first interview was facilitated with Ismail leading the conversation and myself taking notes. This collaborative approach was useful because Ismail was focused on **establishing a rapport** with Salah and guiding the conversation, while I was responsible for **recording key points and themes** that emerge during the interview. ![[Africa_Interview-min.png]] ![[Interview Audio - Salah.mp3]] ### Performing a Thematic Analysis of User Interviews After the interviews, we wanted to identify and organize common themes or patterns that emerge across the data. The **thematic analysis** is a great method to understand how these themes relate to one another and to the research question or problem being addressed. A proper analysis ensure to go through our data in a systematic and thorough manner. I already took notes and it was a great start, but not sufficient. Based on the record of the conversation, I then have transcribed a [[written record of the Interview 📝]].  We started marking **preliminary ideas for codes** that can describe the interview content.   ![[Africa_InitialCodes-min.png]] As we searched for **specific words or phrases** that are repeated across the data, we began to identify initial codes. ![[Africa_InitialCodes-img-min.png]] We began organizing and grouping these codes in a logical way: we tried to **group codes that are related** or have similar meanings. ![[Africa_GroupCodes-min.png]] Themes began to emerge. We wrote short descriptions of each theme, and gave for each a **clear and concise label**. ![[Africa_GroupCodes-img-min.png]] We sorted and **grouped the themes** that have emerged. Themes that are closely related or have similar meanings were grouped together. ![[Africa_GroupThemes-min.png]] This final step allows us to make sense of the data that we have collected, and helps us to **identify key patterns and insights** that inspired our solution. ![[Africa_GroupThemes-img-min.png]] --- ## Annexes - [[🎞️ Keynote - Implementing an educational service in Sub-Saharan Africa]]