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Asking good questions can vastly improve our success at work and relationships with people. Good questions engage people, make them feel valued, build trust, cement relationships and foster joint ownership of decisions.
A popular key to success is having answers, SAYING something that has an impact on people. Asking questions pales by comparison. We didn't acquire all our expertise for nothing, so we want to impress people by sharing it with them. There are problems with relying on the ability to offer solutions however:
We don't value questions highly because we have a narrow view of them. Because we are in love with solutions, we see questions only as a way of showing our ignorance. This is a serious mistake.
Our solution-focus drives us to use analytical questions to gather information to make our own decisions. But, to avoid looking stupid, we avoid such questions unless they are absolutely necessary or unless we don't mind, or are unaware of, the risk of looking stupid. (Of course we don't mind asking "what happened" kinds of questions if we couldn't be expected to know the answers).
The key to achieving success through the use of good questions is to ask DIFFERENT kinds of questions.
The first step is to move beyond asking only information gathering questions. Factual questions are not only very limited, they devalue people by conveying the message that we aren’t interested in them or their views, just their information. We deceive ourselves that we’re genuinely involving people when we ask them for information, not realizing that analytical questions are inherently disengaging.
To analyze situations, solve problems or make decisions we ask the classic “W” questions: who, what, where, when and why, plus one “H” question: how.
Such questions are most disengaging when we give little explanation of why we want the information. Just asking for facts puts the interrogator in control, leaving others feeling excluded and devalued.
We major on analytical questions because we like to be self-sufficient and it saves time. At a deeper level, our very identity is wrapped up in thinking for ourselves and generating our own solutions. We get ahead at work by devising solutions that others miss. Our ability to come with good answers forms the basis of our confidence and self esteem.
Because our confidence rests so heavily on thinking for ourselves, we fear that asking questions will harm our credibility. We feel we should know everything without needing to ask. However, when someone makes a mistake, we ask questions in an aggressive tone. The stupidity of others pumps us up and we put them in their place by asking questions in a superior tone, thus revealing our own underlying self-doubt.
Engaging questions ask people to offer their ideas, thoughts, opinions, advice or suggestions, not just facts.
All engaging questions take the form of “What do you think?” Variations include: “What do you see as the issue?” And: “What do you see as options for dealing with it?” Asking such questions can make people feel involved in the solution, respected and valued. Better solutions may be generated as well.
However, we avoid engaging questions because we resent losing the power to think through issues for ourselves. We feel that we’re not making a genuine contribution if we are not coming up with answers. It’s like being on a sports team and never scoring any goals, just passing the ball to others all the time. To be more engaging, we need to overcome our fear of losing control, that options may arise that don’t meet our needs.
This issue is at the heart of personal identity; it’s like the classic problem of whether to be professionals or managers. The issue of doing the work versus delegating is about task accomplishment. But being analytical versus engaging is about mental work – solving problems and making decisions.
We deceive ourselves that we have moved from individual contributor to manager if we delegate a lot. But if we’re still doing all our own thinking and asking others mainly analytical questions, we’re still clinging onto our old individual contributor identity.
To engage people, it’s also essential to avoid shooting the messenger. If you argue with every suggestion people make or ridicule their ideas, you will shut them up. When people offer ineffective ideas, it’s vital to say what you like about their suggestion and then ask more questions, such as: “I like A, B and C of your proposal but what might be the risks of doing D and E?”
Tone of voice and body language are also important. You must appear to be supportive and encouraging, not skeptical if you want people to open up.
So far, we have discussed engaging questions to solve problems. But non-analytical questions can be used as an influencing tactic too.
A classic psychological experiment focused on negative attitudes toward the police. One group was asked to write essays on all the benefits police bring to society. When attitudes were surveyed a second time, this group changed their opinions the most. The moral of the story is that it is easier to influence people by getting them to state advantages in their own words than it is by trying to promote our own views.
Normally, being self-sufficient, we present arguments to people to convince them of the benefits of our proposals. We may vary our style by emphasizing different features for different audiences, by trying to be inspiring, by varying the medium or by repeating the message as often as we can.
The option is to ask questions such as:
Subtle flattery helps. Phrases like “what would you advise,” “excellent objections” and “in your experience” asked in a respectful tone can make resistant people feel valued.
Often people resist change precisely because they were not consulted and thus feel devalued. Their resistance is a way of asserting their importance. Arguing with them in a dismissive manner makes matters worse by conveying the impression that you really do see their views as unimportant.
We often try to influence people by stating our needs. For example, suppose your boss asks you to take on a project that you don’t have the time to do. Instead of telling your boss all your reasons why you can’t do this job, try asking questions like: “What is the priority on this job in comparison with everything else I’m doing?”
The idea is to involve your boss in deciding how best to allocate your time and energy while conveying the impression that your boss is your number one internal customer. Make it clear that, following the 80/20 rule, you need to focus on the 20% of priorities that will yield the highest return for your boss.
You can also ask questions about the flexibility of timing for each of your priorities, what other options there might be for getting some of your priorities done or what support might be available.
This is engaging because you’re involving your boss in deciding how you should best use your time in order to meet his or her needs. The key is to focus on your boss’s needs, not your own. This is just being customer-focused.
Managers are often criticized for failing to notice that someone is upset. This is not an easy skill to develop, but empathy questions are a reasonable substitute, such as:
Asking people how they feel on both sides of an issue, positive and negative, can prevent them from avoiding the issue. If you just ask how people are feeling, they might give you a bland answer: “OK.”
If you don’t notice when you annoy someone, you can’t make empathy statements. But, if your questions reveal annoyance, then you can apologize and say things like: “I can understand how you feel?” Then ask other empathy questions, such as:
These questions are meant to be examples only. There are hundreds of variations on the theme. The point is to compensate for not noticing when people are upset by regularly asking questions that encourage people to open up about their feelings. Avoid closed questions, those that can be answered with “yes” or “no”.
Questions can also be used to motivate people, such as:
Again, these are merely sample questions. The key is to involve people in deciding what to do, to draw solutions out of them instead of trying to sell them your solutions.
Normally we confront people by making strong statements. This can backfire if the other person becomes even angrier. Suppose someone is behaving in a bullying manner. Before asking engaging questions, make some empathy statements like: “You seem pretty determined to achieve this; it must be important to you.”
Then ask questions such as:
The point is to enlist the person’s help in deciding the best way forward instead of using a telling or selling approach and putting the person down. Confrontational questions should be asked in a supportive, empathetic manner. Even though you’re not shouting, you’re still confronting the issue with pertinent questions; you’re not avoiding it.
When asking any kind of question, it's important to avoid an aggressive tone of voice as it can make you sound like a police interrogator. A warmly sensitive question can come across as a genuine request for help, one that shows respect for the other person’s knowledge and experience.
Engaging questions can shift our identity from that of answer-giver, solution-generator and individual contributor to that of facilitator, catalyst and coach. Arguably, we will achieve more by working more effectively with and through people in this way than by trying to promote our own ideas exclusively.
Further, it is easier to base our confidence on the ability to ask engaging questions than it is on knowing the answers. The world is too fast changing and complex for any one person to know very much anyway.
Revised January 27, 2012 (first section down to "Uses for questions" was largely rewritten). For more examples of engaging questions, see More Engaging Questions.See also: Engage Yourself, Should You Always Play to Your Strengths?, The Post-heroic Manager, How's Your Confidence Today? Also, more recently: Collaborative Assertiveness.
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