The Power of What

“You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.” –Naguib Mahfouz (Nobel Prize Winner)

Our brains love questions. They have the power to engage and shift our mindsets. They drive knowledge and growth, and fuel both creativity and critical thinking. As coaches we all recognise that one of the key skills we must use is to ask good questions. However, therein lies a problem, your brain is ahead of you — even before you ask the question your brain starts working out the answer and keeps working on it in the background. Of course we all know what happens next; instead of that nicely worded open question, all you can think of is the answer, and that lovely open question suddenly becomes a not so nicely worded closed question.

I was vividly reminded of this the other day in a practice coaching session for new (and very keen) coaches. The person being coached was responding to the questions with 4 or 5 word answers and the coach, becoming more and more frustrated resorted to longer and longer closed questions. Lo and behold the answers got even shorter — culminating in simple yes and no’s.

I called a time out.

We reviewed the questions and no surprise, there was a predominance of ‘Could you….’, ‘Can you’… ‘Are you….’ all followed by suggestions from the coach. The recognition in the group was obvious but the solution to the problem of how to avoid slipping into suggestive closed questions less so. The group asked me, and of course whilst I was tempted to say ‘What do you think?’ (and did later on in the session) I thought it was time for a quick input, and luckily The Power of What sprung to mind.

The Power of What is not new, it’s not rocket science and its perhaps not for experienced coaches. It is however a very simple way of suddenly jolting you into using open questions. As I explained to the group, when you find yourself slipping into closed questions, raise your awareness and change your mindset by simply thinking of The Power of What.

That’s Rule 1.

Rule 2 (even simpler) try to make your question as short as possible. I am not suggesting that all open questions have to be What, nor I am suggesting that closed questions do not have a place, of course they do. However for inexperienced coaches this exercise works well…

I got the group to write down three closed questions, some from the coaching session I had witnessed and stand in a circle, then using my infamous juggling ball off we went.

The juggling ball keeps it fast, so when the delegates receive the ball, they say out loud one of their closed questions.

‘Can you send an email outlining your concerns?’

All I have to say is think of The Power of What and as if by magic they change it into an effective open question.

‘What could you do about your concerns?’

It works pretty much every time. Rule 2, is really useful to stop that annoying follow on to a good open question such as ‘What could you do about your concerns, could you send an email or talk to your manager?’

SIMPLES! 

When we ask good questions, we are more likely to get responses that contain valuable information, BUT only if you are good at listening — that’s next time — Silent Running.

Alex Ede
PRISM Brain Mapping