Interview six working parents about school-lunch chaos and rank their pains

A founder assumes parents want healthier lunchboxes. Your job is to hear what really hurts on a school morning, which may be time, fussy eating or packing, and rank those pains by evidence rather than by the founder's hope.

• Which six parents can you reach, and do they cover different jobs, ages of child and family set-ups?
• How will you get each parent to walk through yesterday morning before you mention any problem?
• What counts as a pain raised unprompted, compared with one you led them to?
• How will you judge the effort a parent already spends on a workaround?

Six short interview summaries with exact strong phrases, a ranked list where each pain shows how many parents raised it unprompted and what they already do about it, and a clear first pain to solve.

Ranking by how vivid a story was. One upset parent can sound like a trend. Rank by how many parents raised it without prompting and how much effort they already spend on it.

• Notes from six working parents walking through yesterday morning, with exact phrases that show feeling
• For each parent, the workarounds they already use, such as cooking the night before or buying snacks
• Consent from each parent and a plan to replace names with Parent A to F

AI must not create quotes, fill in a parent's routine or add pains no parent mentioned. Every ranked pain needs at least two real quotes behind it.

1. 3.1 Prepare a morning walk-through guideCLAUDE CHAT

   Why this tool: Claude helps you order questions so the problem talk comes after the story, not before it.

   Draft your guide with the walk-through first and problem questions last, then ask for a check.

   Prompt to copy · fill in the [brackets]Copy

   I am interviewing working parents about school mornings. My guide is:
   [paste your guide]
   Check that the first part only asks them to describe yesterday morning step by step, that nothing mentions food quality or a lunch service, and that every question is open. Point out any line that leads them.

2. 3.2 Write one summary file per parentCLAUDE PROJECTS

   Why this tool: A Project holds all six anonymised summaries so later chats compare them fairly.

   After each interview, write a short summary in your own words plus the exact strong phrases, label it Parent A to F, and add it to the Project.

3. 3.3 Tabulate pains across the six filesCLAUDE WORKING ON YOUR FILES (FORMERLY COWORK)

   Why this tool: Working across the six files at once gives a first pain table faster than reading back and forth.

   Put the six anonymised summaries in one folder and ask for a table: pains as rows, parents as columns, with the quote that shows each pain and whether it was raised unprompted.

   Prompt to copy · fill in the [brackets]Copy

   Read the six parent files in this folder about [the topic, e.g. school mornings]. Make a draft table with each pain as a row and Parent A to F as columns. In each cell put the exact quote from that file, or leave it empty. Add a column saying whether the parent raised it before I asked about problems. Then list any pain you are unsure about, and do not add any pain that has no quote.

   Before you let it act: Before it starts, check the folder holds only the six anonymised summaries with no names or phone numbers, and that you asked for a draft table, not edits to the files.

4. 3.4 Rank the pains and choose oneCLAUDE CHAT

   Why this tool: Asking Claude to challenge your ranking tests it before you commit.

   Rank the pains yourself by unprompted mentions and workaround effort. Then ask Claude to argue for a different first pain and answer it from your table.

• Every quote in the table appears in that parent's summary
• Each ranked pain is backed by at least two parents
• Unprompted and prompted mentions are counted separately
• Your first pain is the one the evidence supports, even if it is not about nutrition
• Read a sample of raw answers yourself before trusting any grouping
• Say how many people or observations the finding rests on

AI working on interview notes tends to smooth quotes into neater sentences and may slip in a pain that sounds typical. Delete any row you cannot trace to a real file.

• Six anonymised summaries
• A pain table with quotes
• A ranked list with the evidence for each pain
• A clear statement of which pain to solve first
• No names, schools or workplaces

Two pages: the ranked list with evidence on page one, the six summaries on page two. Put the chosen pain in a box at the top.

Explain how the evidence moved the founder's focus, and show the quote that convinced you most.