Coaching Habit

Michael Stanier’s Coaching Habit describes 7 specific questions that reliably create comfortable conversation spaces aimed at resolving often unspoken concerns. Broadly, these questions all encourage one or more of the following 3 concepts:

1. Ditch the default
2. Cause Ownership
3. Learn things

1) Ditch the default

What’s on your mind? Hmmm… OK. And what else?

Many of us are short on time. When you are short on time, one strong defense mechanism is to give a brief, blunt, or closed answer i.e.

Things have been good … going the gym fairly often, enjoying work, glad the weather is finally warming up.

With three, short, unassuming details both parties have permission to return to the rest of their lives. By adding the follow-up question “And what else?” several things are accomplished:

• Permission is granted: The person asking the question makes it clear that they have interest in a deeper, more open-ended exploration
• A challenge is presented: The person answering the question is given the sense that their original answer was directionally not what the asker was looking for
• An opportunity is created: The person answering the question is encouraged to throw away their standard defense mechanisms and share information that they have not found a forum for sharing on a frequent basis

With 3 additional words “And what else?” you can provide someone with an opportunity, ask them to rise to a challenge, and give them permission to be honest.

2) Cause Ownership

What do you want? What is the real challenge for you here? What are you saying no to?

What do you want?

If someone thinks that you have made a poor choice, they may ask you “Why did you do that?”.

The tone of the question can vary substantially, but even if asked with a friendly lilt, the implication of a “Why?” question is that the person asking already attempted to make sense of your behavior, failed and now has to resort to asking you “Why?”.

Switching to a “What” question removes the judgement because it removes the assumption that you already tried.

“What were you trying to achieve there?” provides neutral ground for someone to explain what it is that they were trying to do. It also requires the person answering to take ownership of their reasoning.

Perhaps the reason why I didn’t go to a birthday party was because “I didn’t have enough time”. Which is pretty vague. But if I have to answer “What were you doing during the birthday party”, while I could say “I was tending to other obligations” it is more likely that I’ll give specific information about what I chose to do instead.

What is the real challenge for you here?

The question “What is the real challenge for you here?” has 4 distinct components that each add value, specifically:

• What… Framing with What? causes ownership
• Real… using Real is a reminder to ditch the default
• For you… further personalizes and encourages ownership
• Here. focuses the scope an reduces the likelihood of over generalizations

What are you saying “No.” to?

When people say “Yes”, their agreement has boundaries. When people say “No” they rarely think there is nothing of merit in the request.

Understanding what it is that someone is saying “No” to helps reveal what elements of a proposal someone has concerns with as well as what elements of the proposal or request they are willing to support. It additionally gives the person asking the question clarity about where the implicit value-add is not clear.

3) Learn things

What was most useful for you? How can I help?

As noted previously in Disfluency, people:

start learning [when they…],have a chance to recall and reflect on what just happened.

Asking “What was most useful for you?” and “How can I help?” can:

• Give you feedback
• Clarifiy that the discussion was about Learning but not about Judgement
• Remind people how useful you are to them
• Provide the person answering an opportunity to internalize their learnings