Asking the Best Questions

Asking the Best Questions:
A Comprehensive Interviewing Handbook for Journalists, Podcasters, Bloggers, Vloggers, Influencers, and Anyone Who Asks Questions Under Pressure

By Paul McLaughlin

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Interviewing is more complex than just asking questions. A successful interview involves multiple skills, including active listening, commitment to a line of questions, and the ability to adapt to whatever unfolds throughout the process.

Paul McLaughlin has spent decades studying the art of the interview as a working journalist, interviewing coach, and educator. Using personal examples and anecdotes involving other journalists, this comprehensive handbook offers easy-to-read, practical tips for professional questioners in any field — whether in the newsroom, the boardroom, or a podcast studio.

Asking the Best Questions offers insights for every step of the process: researching and securing an interview, building trust and rapport, developing empathy, overcoming your fears, and creating strategies to navigate conversations about complex and traumatic issues. Along the way, McLaughlin shows you how to deal with difficult guests, intimidating topics and unexpected twists and turns.

McLaughlin shares the invaluable tools he carries with him into every interview. And he answers the question everyone wants to know: what to do when the interview doesn’t go as planned?

Asking the Best Questions is a unique and indispensable resource for:

  • Journalists
  • Podcasters
  • Bloggers
  • Vloggers
  • Influencers
  • Anyone who asks questions under pressure

About the Author

Paul McLaughlin is a leading interviewing expert and the author of Asking Questions: The Art of the Media Interview (1986). A former interviewing trainer for CBC Radio and TV, he has had a long career as a freelance journalist for both broadcast and print.  He has also taught journalism at Algonquin College and Carleton University in Ottawa, and Ryerson University and (currently) York University, in Toronto.

paulmclaughlin.ca