An informational interview is a short, low-pressure conversation where you ask someone about their work, their path, and their field, and you are explicitly not asking for a job. You get one by sending a specific, easy-to-say-yes-to message: name why you picked this person, ask for fifteen to twenty minutes, propose a call, and make clear you want their perspective, not a favor. Done well, it turns a stranger into someone who knows your name, your goals, and your work, which is exactly the relationship that produces referrals later.
The mindset
It is a conversation, not a covert job application
The reason informational interviews feel awkward is that most people treat them as a job application in disguise. They ask for a "quick chat," then spend twenty minutes angling for an opening, and the person on the other side can feel it. The whole thing curdles. The fix is to actually mean the thing you are asking for: you want to understand this person's work, their path, and their read on the field, and you are not asking them to hire you or refer you today.
That is not a soft-hearted stance, it is the effective one. People are generous with their perspective and stingy with their favors. When you ask for perspective, you are asking for something they enjoy giving, which is why the reply rate is so much higher than a cold "are you hiring." And the job leads still come, they just come later and unprompted, because someone who has spent twenty minutes helping you now has a stake in you and remembers you when a role opens.
So set the frame honestly from the first message. You are a person trying to make a good decision about your own career, and you have picked a small number of people whose experience would sharpen that decision. Everything below is built on that frame. Break it and the tactics stop working.
The list
Who to ask, in order
You do not need famous people. You need relevant ones, and the best targets are closer than you think.
Warm
Second-degree contacts
People one hop away: a friend of a friend, a former colleague of a colleague. A shared connection who can introduce you is the single highest-yield source, because the introduction does the trust-building for you.
Alumni
People from your school or program
A shared school is a real, specific reason to reach out, and alumni reply because they were once where you are. It is the most reliable cold outreach that does not feel cold.
Role model
People one or two steps ahead
Not the executive twenty years up. The person who has the job you want to have in two years remembers the path vividly and has time to talk. Their advice is also more current and more usable.
Company
People at a place you admire
If a specific company keeps coming up in your research, find someone doing the work you would do and ask about the day-to-day. You learn whether you actually want in before you ever apply.
Public
People whose work you can point to
Someone who wrote the post, gave the talk, or shipped the project you learned from. Referencing the specific thing they made is a genuine reason to reach out and an easy conversation starter.
Careful
The people to skip
Skip anyone you are secretly hoping will just hand you a job, and skip people so senior the ask is really a favor. Match the size of the request to how close the relationship is.
The ask
How to ask so people say yes
The message is the whole game. Short, specific, and low-pressure beats long and flattering every time. Here is the shape that works.
Say why them, specifically.
Open with the real reason you picked this person: a post they wrote, a path they took, a company they are at. "I read your piece on switching from design to product and it is exactly the move I am weighing" tells them this is not a mass blast.
Name what you want in one line.
Be direct about the ask and about what it is not. "I am not job hunting at you, I would just love your perspective on the switch" removes the suspicion that makes people go quiet.
Make the time cost tiny.
Ask for fifteen or twenty minutes, not "a chat." A small, bounded number is easy to fit in and easy to agree to. The lower the number, the faster the yes.
Propose the logistics for them.
Offer a call or a video chat and suggest you work around their calendar. "A fifteen-minute call whenever suits you, I am happy to work around your week" is far easier to answer than "let me know if you are ever free."
Keep the whole thing under six sentences.
A wall of text reads as work. If the person can grasp the entire request in one glance on a phone, you have made saying yes almost effortless. Here is a full example: "Hi Sam, I read your post on moving from agency to in-house design and it maps almost exactly onto the jump I am trying to make. I am not asking you to hire me or refer me, I would just really value fifteen minutes of your perspective on how you thought about it. Would a short call sometime in the next couple of weeks work? I am glad to fit around your calendar. Thanks either way for the post, it already helped."
The questions
The questions that actually get people talking
The failure mode inside the conversation is asking things you could have looked up. "What does a product manager do" wastes the one resource you came for, which is their judgment. Ask instead about the choices they made, the tradeoffs they see, and the things that are true but not written down anywhere. People light up when you ask about their actual decisions rather than their job description.
Open with the story, because it is easy and it warms them up: "How did you end up doing what you do now?" and "What did the path actually look like, versus how it reads on a resume?" Then move to the field: "What is changing in this work right now that people outside it do not see yet?" and "What is a skill that turned out to matter far more than you expected?" These pull out the current, insider read you cannot find in an article.
Then get specific to you. "If you were making the jump I am making today, what would you do first?" and "Looking at where I am, what is the gap you would close before anyone else?" invite direct, personal advice, which is the gold of the whole exchange. Close with two questions that keep the door open: "Is there anyone else you think I should talk to?" and "Is it alright if I follow up in a month with how it is going?" The first grows your list, the second turns one chat into a relationship. Throughout, listen more than you talk, take notes, and never let the conversation drift into a pitch. You are here to learn, and being genuinely interested is the most persuasive thing you can do.
The difference
A message that gets ignored vs one that gets a yes
Same goal, opposite outcome. The gap is almost always in how much work you are quietly asking the other person to do.
| Capability | Folio | The message that gets ignored |
|---|---|---|
| The opener | A specific reason you chose them, in the first line | Generic flattery that could be pasted to anyone |
| The ask | Explicitly not a job request, just perspective | A vague "chat" everyone reads as job hunting |
| The time | Fifteen to twenty minutes, clearly bounded | An open-ended "grab coffee sometime" |
| The logistics | You propose a call and work around their calendar | You leave all the planning to them |
| The length | Under six sentences, readable at a glance | Three dense paragraphs that read as work |
None of this is about being slick. It is about respecting the other person's time so visibly that saying yes is the easy choice.
The follow-up
The part almost everyone skips
The conversation is not the finish line, it is the start of a relationship, and the follow-up is what decides whether that relationship exists at all. Send a thank-you the same day, while the chat is fresh for both of you. Make it specific: name the one piece of advice that landed and say what you are going to do with it. "You said to build a small project in the space before applying, so that is my next month" proves you listened and that their time paid off.
Then actually do the thing, and close the loop a few weeks later. The single most underused move in any job search is going back to the people who helped and telling them what happened. "You suggested I talk to the design side before deciding, I did, and it changed my mind, here is where I landed" is a message people love to receive, because it shows their advice mattered. It also gives you a natural, non-awkward reason to be back in their inbox, which is precisely when a referral tends to surface on its own.
Give this a home outside your memory. A personal website with a clear pitch and your work in one place means every one of these conversations can end with a single link instead of a scramble of attachments, and the person you just met can see exactly who you are and what you are aiming at. Do the outreach well, ask real questions, and follow up like you mean it, and a handful of fifteen-minute chats becomes the most durable asset in your career: a small group of people who know your name, your goals, and your work, and who think of you when it counts.
Frequently asked questions
What is an informational interview?
An informational interview is a short, low-pressure conversation where you ask someone about their work, their career path, and their field, and you are explicitly not asking them for a job. The goal is perspective and connection, and it usually runs fifteen to twenty minutes over a call or coffee.
How do you ask for an informational interview?
Send a short, specific message. Open with the real reason you picked this person, make clear you are asking for their perspective and not a job, request just fifteen or twenty minutes, and propose a call while offering to work around their calendar. Keep the whole thing under six sentences so it is easy to say yes to.
What questions should I ask in an informational interview?
Ask about their choices and their read on the field, not things you could search. Good ones: how they actually got to where they are, what is changing in the work that outsiders do not see, what skill mattered more than expected, and what they would do first if they were in your position. Close by asking who else you should talk to.
What is the difference between a coffee chat and an informational interview?
They are essentially the same thing, and "coffee chat" is just the more casual name for it. Both are informal, low-pressure conversations to learn from someone rather than to interview for a role. The label matters less than the frame: you are there for perspective, not to pitch yourself for a job.
How do you follow up after an informational interview?
Send a specific thank-you the same day that names the advice that landed and what you plan to do with it. Then follow up a few weeks later to report what happened. Closing the loop is what turns a single conversation into an ongoing relationship, and it is often when a referral appears on its own.