An interview guide template for Notion, from first draft to transcript

See inside the Interview Guide & Fieldwork Studio

The problem it solves

Most interview guides are written once, in a document, and never checked against the research questions they are meant to answer. Then the supervisor's comments arrive: "this question is leading", "this one asks two things at once", "which of these answers RQ2?"

The pilot makes it harder. You change the guide after the practice interview, which is what a pilot is for (Kallio et al., 2016). Six months later, writing your methods chapter, you cannot remember what changed or why.

Then there is fieldwork. Who has consented? Which transcripts have you checked against the audio, and which are anonymised? For most students it lives in their head and an email thread. This studio keeps it in one place, and flags consent, anonymisation and withdrawal problems before you use the data.

How it works: Ask → Test → Track

1. Ask

   Write main questions and follow-up probes, and link each one to the research question it serves. A coverage check shows any research question your guide does not yet reach.

2. Test

   Tick a four-point wording checklist with a peer or supervisor: open, single issue, neutral, plain language. After the pilot, retire questions as Replaced or Dropped, with the decision that changed them.

3. Track

   Move each participant across a board from Contacted to Ready to code. Each row shows its next step, and an ethics flag if something is missing.

What the studio checks for you

Each question, each research question and each participant carries a plain-language status, worked out by formulas from what you have entered and ticked. These are the main labels.

Question check, per interview question

• ⚪ Not reviewed yet: tick the four wording checks: active, but nobody has checked the wording.
• 🔴 Leading: rewrite: the reviewer left Neutral unticked.
• 🟡 Revise wording: neutral, but another check failed, for example a closed question.
• 🟠 Add probes / 🟠 Link the probe to its RQ: a main question with no active probe, or a probe not linked to its research question. Similar prompts cover other missing links.
• ✅ Ready: all four checks pass and every link is in place. Retired questions read ⚪ Not in use.

Coverage, per research question

• ⚪ No questions yet: link a main question: nothing is linked yet.
• 🔴 Uncovered: no active main question: only retired questions or probes reach it.
• 🟠 No probes: add a follow-up probe: a main question reaches it, but no probe does.
• 🟡 Check wording: covered, but a linked question still needs revising.
• ✅ Covered: main questions and probes, all with wording that passes.

Ethics flag, per participant

• 🔴 No consent on file: at Consented or later, with no consent recorded.
• 🔴 Not anonymised / 🟠 Transcript not checked: the stage has moved on before the data work was done.
• 🔴 Withdrawn: remove data: a withdrawn participant whose data is still there.
• ✅ OK: nothing missing for the stage reached. A row with no stage reads ⚪ Set a stage.

The wording checks are a reviewer's judgement. The formula only adds up what was ticked; it cannot read a question. A 🔴 means "decide and justify", not "forbidden".

The worked example

Fictional study

The studio opens with a fictional example: the Newly Diagnosed study of young adults recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, with the same participants as the Qualitative Coding Studio. It has 2 research questions, 18 interview questions (15 active, 3 retired after the pilot), 10 participants and 4 decisions. Two problems are planted. One probe, "Do you feel more independent now?", is closed, so it reads 🟡 Revise wording and RQ1 reads 🟡 Check wording. The pilot interview reads 🔴 No consent on file, because the protocol needs a signed form that is not yet filed. Clearing the example takes about two minutes.

Method and sources

The studio follows the five phases for developing a semi-structured interview guide from Kallio, Pietilä, Johnson & Kangasniemi (2016), in GradSummit's own words. The four wording checks are general good practice, consistent with Kvale & Brinkmann (2009) and McGrath, Palmgren & Liljedahl (2019).

A fieldwork and ethics checklist covers consent in the form your ethics approval specifies (written, electronic or recorded), transcript checks, pseudonyms with the key kept apart, and withdrawal.

What the studio does not do

• It does not detect leading or closed questions by itself. The checks reflect what you and your reviewer tick.
• It does not replace your ethics approval or your institution's data-protection rules, and it is not legal or ethics advice.
• It does not record or store interviews. Keep audio and identifiable transcripts out of any workspace you share; use pseudonyms.
• It does not analyse your data. Notion cannot move a row between databases, so you copy a participant who is Ready to code into your coding workspace yourself.

What you get

• A one-page PDF with your link, sent by Gumroad when you click Get it free and enter your email. Click it, then Duplicate, and the studio is in your own Notion workspace, yours to keep.
• Simple mode: three steps, one small table each, with a plain instruction above every table. You can start in Notion for the first time today.
• A research question coverage table, your active guide in running order, questions to fix, a guide history, a fieldwork board with ethics flags, and a decision log.
• Export views that turn your interview guide, participant log and decision log into clean CSV tables for an appendix.
• A Start here page, a method guide with full references, and a worked fictional example you can clear in a few minutes.
• Works on Notion's Free plan. No charts, no paid features and no Notion AI needed.

Related guides and templates

• Interview Guide Builder

  draft a semi-structured guide in your browser, then bring it here

• How to conduct research interviews

  semi-structured interviews, step by step

• Interview & Focus Group Kit

  48 fillable PDF templates for interviews and focus groups

• The Interview and Focus Group Workbook

  designing, piloting and running research interviews

Other research studios

• Qualitative Coding Studio

  Free. Code interviews, build themes and back every claim with quotes.

• Ethics Application Tracker

  Track document versions and keep your ethics approval clean. $12.

• Research Question Lab

  Free. Score each draft research question and revise the weakest part.