How To Ask Better Questions

Someone once said to me: “questions are the answer to better thinking” and as an expression, it is burned in my mind. However, as I reflect on the challenges my clients face to drive value, manage stakeholders against competing priorities and get the job done, there is a profound need to level up the quality of questions we ask.

What’s the evidence for that?

All too often I hear my clients saying (a) there are too many meetings in my calendar (b) we’re not moving fast enough (c) there is too much consensus decision-making, and (d) the conclusion of this meeting is… another meeting.

Asking better questions is about the mindset of wanting to serve the conversation, add value, seek clarity, secure decisions and get to action. In addition, and when we ask them, we need to be crisp, clear, strategic, and then stop talking and listen.

Better questions are ones which:

• We’ve thought about in advance of speaking (versus simultaneously articulating our train of thought and wandering around the topic).
• Are singular (just one question versus stacking multiple questions one after the next before allowing the person to answer).
• Avoid ‘ask and answer’ tactics, which is a question followed by an opinion. This is extremely problematic because it contradicts meaningfully wanting to understand the other person.
• Are strategic: by which I mean we use open questions to understand, encourage creativity, expansion of thought and possibilities. Closed questions drive priorities, decisions, accountability, and ownership.
• Drive better conversations, better decisions, better actions… all because the questions made us think.