The importance of asking the right questions

“Quality questions create a quality life. Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.”

— Tony Robbins

How do you build a relationship with a senior person or a stakeholder? How do you show them that you are aligned with their objectives and understand where they’re coming from? Do you become an extreme people pleaser and try to respond to all their demands and requests? Do you try to make them feel like royalty by speaking to them with extreme respect? Or do you go in guns blazing to demand respect?

None of the above work but they are all about YOU and not the person you are trying to build a relationship with. Whether you adopt the action of being a people pleaser or on the other end of the scale, you go in guns blazing, they make you feel like you’ve done something to build the relationship but it’s done absolutely nothing for the other person.

The key to starting to build a strong relationship is to ask the right questions to trigger in their mind a thought or an idea that wouldn’t have come up or asking questions that show that you understand their perspectives. But it’s not just asking bland run of the mill questions like “how are you doing”. It’s about asking targeted questions with a particular style and substance. Here are the key rules to follow.

RULE 1: LESS IS MORE

This should be fairly straight forward but when you are nervous and an introvert, sometimes it’s hard to recognise when you’re actually rambling. Ask the question and then stop and wait for an answer.

I remember in one of my previous roles, we had a senior person from the consulting firm PwC who was interviewing our Chief Risk Officer as part of a review on risk management. He would ask a question and before anybody could answer, he would spend five minutes explaining and expanding upon his answer. It got to the point where there were so many sub-questions within his question that everyone had forgotten what his original question was. He did this so many times during the meeting that the CRO started to stop him at the end of each question so that she could answer.

So make sure you embed this mindset. You want to hear the answer from the other person. Therefore, ask the question and then stop and wait for an answer. Be comfortable with a brief silence or worst case scenario, if the other person looks confused, then offer to rephrase. But wait for a reaction or a response first.

Remember, senior people like to think before they respond. So let them think and be comfortable with a brief silence.

RULE 2: DON’T PRETEND TO BE A KNOW-IT-ALL

If you don’t understand the answer that’s been given or in some cases if the answer doesn’t relate to what you’ve asked then it’s OK to ask for a clarification. Don’t sit there and nod your head and pretend to understand. Why? Because the other person will know that you didn’t understand (e.g. a particular acronym you’re not used to) and you can’t build on the answer to carry on the conversation. This leads to the dreaded awkward silence or worse, you try to fill the silence with a really stupid question.

RULE 3: ASK OPEN ENDED QUESTIONS

Again, this is one of those golden rules that has been told to us time and again. But we always forget. If you want to be remembered and keep a conversation going, then you have to ask questions that keep the conversation going. The key to doing that is asking open ended questions such as: what, why, how, who, when. Think about it, which is more likely to keep the conversation going:

• What do you find most exciting about your job?

• Is action x the most exciting part of your job?

The first is more likely to cause the respondent to think and draw out a longer answer with more information that allows you to ask further questions. The second will likely draw an answer of yes or no. Not much to go on from there.

RULE 4: SUMMARISE AND REPHRASE

This is highly counter intuitive and a little uncomfortable to do. But nothing gives a person more confidence that they have been heard than to hear their answer rephrased back to them correctly. Senior people have lots of tiny, insignificant questions asked of them throughout the day. They are used to assuming that nobody is actually listening to their answers from the chit chat they are forced to endure. Most people just want to talk to be noticed.

By rephrasing back correctly, it shows that you’re genuinely listening and care enough to want to check that you understood the answer. Even if what you’ve rephrased is incorrect, they will correct you and think that you cared enough to double check your understanding.

RULE 5: BE HUMBLE AND ADMIT WHEN YOU’RE WRONG

None of us are perfect and from time to time, questions leave our mouths, and the moment they’ve left, our brain suddenly recognises how stupid the question was. Or in my case, I suddenly realised that I’ve asked the exact same question a few minutes ago.

So don’t be embarrassed. When you’ve realised you’ve asked a dumb question (or wrong question) then just say so and move on. Laugh at it and learn from it.

Photo by Buro Millennial from Pexels