The 451 Alliance strives to collect reliable data on trends in IT and enterprise business, and surveys aren’t the only way we do that.
In addition to our quantitative surveys, we also interview enterprise IT professionals about various topics. Interviews are roughly 30-minute discussions by phone, scheduled for a date and time convenient for the interviewee. Covering a variety of technology subjects, these talks help us to gain an understanding of the challenges faced by IT professionals. Not only do we ask about technologies evaluated and solutions implemented, but we also gather opinions about technology direction, organizational dynamics, workload decisions and more.
We do these calls with voice only – no video, no Zoom. It’s old school. We have those collaborative tools, of course, but we don’t use them for this.
Why go old school? One word: anonymity.
We promise confidentiality and anonymity to our commentators. A conversation held face to face, even virtually, can seem less private. Facial expressions add a great deal to the conversation, but that could also translate to being too revealing at times. We want our commentators to feel as comfortable as possible, so we stay off-screen, to add one more layer of privacy.
And sometimes we interview commentators during their commute – easy to do with voice communication, not nearly as feasible if a facial image is required. Or commentators might have relocated to a quiet place for our conversation, and it’s not always an office or conference room. It might be an outside space, or their car, or a quiet corner in the building – perfectly fine for a chat but not conducive to video.
So, no apologies for the old school phone conversations. IT professionals can share their stories with us in comfort, convenience and confidence.
If you’d like to get involved, sign up to participate in an interview with me or one of our experts. Hope to speak to you soon, the old fashion way.
