Screener

A screener is the set of questions people answer before they are accepted into a study. It asks about the things that make someone relevant (role, experience, behaviour) and quietly filters out those who are not. It matters because a study with the wrong participants produces confident, well-documented nonsense.

What it is for

Say you are testing a tool for accounts-payable clerks. Asking “do you work in finance?” will let in people who never touch an invoice. A better screener asks how often they process supplier invoices and in which software, and lets the answer decide. You are recruiting for what people do, not for a job title that sounds right.

Writing one that works

• Lead with behaviour and recent experience, not opinions or demographics.
• Disguise the right answer. If a question reveals what you want, some respondents will give it. Offer a list of options and let the qualifying choice sit among others.
• Keep it short, since every extra question loses applicants.
• Exclude people who work in design, research or for competitors, who tend to observe rather than behave naturally.

What goes wrong

The common mistake is screening for a persona description instead of the behaviour behind it. Another is an overlong list of criteria that nobody in the real world satisfies, so recruitment drags on and quality quietly drops. Decide which two or three criteria truly matter and be relaxed about the rest. Then follow the screener with a quick check at the start of the session, because people occasionally misreport to get the incentive.