The Answer - Improve Your Life By Asking Better Questions

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Lindsay MDiv Tighe. The Answer - Improve Your Life By Asking Better Questions

The. ANSWER. Lindsay Tighe. THE ANSWER. Improve your Life by Asking Better Questions © Lindsay Tighe, 2011. First published 2009

All materials contained in this book are the copyrighted property of Lindsay Tighe. To reproduce, republish, post, modify, distribute or display material from this publication, you must first obtain written permission from the author at: info@betterquestionsaretheanswer.com. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Text design by Sunset Digital Pty Ltd, Brisbane. Cover design by Peter Reardon, Sunset Digital Pty Ltd. Printed in Australia by Griffin Press. Dedication

About the Author

Introduction. Better questions are the answer!

Being a student takes courage because by taking this path you are saying that you are willing to learn new skills. Many people go through life pretending that they have all the skills and knowledge that they need. While they may gain some measure of confidence from this, I believe that if we stop learning we might as well cease to exist, because every day brings us opportunities to learn, but only if we are willing to do so. So, thank you for having the courage to admit that you don’t have all the skills and knowledge you need (and if you are truthful it’s unlikely that you ever will!) I am still learning and know that I will continue to learn for the rest of my life. I do not pretend to be an expert who has all the answers. However, the intention of this book is to share some wisdom from my continuing journey that I trust will resonate with you and inspire you to realise new insights and make positive changes to enhance your life’s journey. My dream is to make a positive difference to the lives of millions of people. If by reading this book you are able to enhance your own life in some way, I feel privileged to have made a positive difference. We all want the world to be a better place and it is easy to say that individually we can’t make a difference. However, I believe strongly that change has to start with you. I love the quote ‘you should be the change you wish to see in the world’. If you change then the world changes and if I can be instrumental in inspiring you to change and at the same time make the world a better place then I am fulfilling my own dream and destiny. As you read this book, I ask two things. First, please be open to new ideas or ways of thinking. The biggest block to our learning is not being willing to look at things differently. If you are prepared to be open to new possibilities then you will get so much more from the experience of reading this book. There are learning opportunities and teachers around us every day, but often we are so busy that we don’t see them. I have been privileged to have some amazing -teachers during my life, but it has been my willingness to be the -student that has allowed me to gain wisdom. The second thing that I ask is that you take action as a result of the insights and learning contained in these pages. I do not know exactly what those actions will be as they will be different for each person who reads this book, but if you don’t do anything then you only store information in your head that makes you feel good about your knowledge on a subject. This is useless. The only advantage will be that it is good for you to be able to ‘regurgitate’ your knowledge to other people. This may enhance your ego but it will not make you a better person or improve your life. Whenever I speak publicly I always begin by sharing the ‘three C model’, which simply stands for: Conscious. Choice. Change. What this means is that by reading this book you are becoming Conscious (or aware) of yourself and some new ideas. However, if that is simply all you do then you will not achieve change because you have missed the essential middle step – Choice. Choice is about the opportunity to make different decisions and to take action, and that is the way you will achieve change. Therefore, I ask that you use the knowledge shared and questions asked to decide what choices you will make as a result of having read this book. When you make different choices and act upon them, the result is Change. My assumption is that no matter how good or successful we are, there is always an opportunity to be better. It all depends on choosing to be better. On a practical note, you will see that at the end of each chapter I have included a summary. This enables you to recall and reflect on key points, and to return to them at any time to remind yourself of the key themes and messages. In addition, some chapters provide reflective questions. When you read these please take time to reflect on and answer the questions. Also, ensure that you read the action-planning chapter so that you get the most out of the experience of reading this book. Whatever you choose to do means that things will be different and when things are different outcomes are better. If outcomes are better, then your life has improved. If your life has improved, this means that you are a better person – a better mum, dad, brother, sister, friend, aunt, uncle, grandparent, boss or colleague. If this happens then the world truly becomes a better place. As I ponder the idea of a better world, where people ask themselves and others better questions, I am excited that that world could be full of people who are:

All of this means that in the world there would be:

In bringing you this book, I trust that you will be one of the special people who help to achieve these outcomes and that you will spread the word about how simple it is to make the world a better place by asking yourself and others better questions. You are about to be taught an amazingly powerful life skill that has the power to transform lives – enjoy the journey! The following questions will help you to evaluate your readiness to get the most out of this book! Are you ready for the journey?

CHAPTER ONE. Questions? Big deal!

Socrates said, “I cannot teach you anything I can only make you stop and think”. Unfortunately, we seem to have developed a society of ‘tellers’ who are ready to advise us and tell us what to do, often without being asked! We have lost the art of questioning, which has resulted in the world being full of people who, rather than asking questions, are intent on ‘teaching’ or ‘telling’ others what they should or shouldn’t do. Each of us can be guilty of being a routine or lazy thinker. As soon as we encounter an issue or problem we immediately seek advice and input from others with a naïve willingness that potentially affords them ‘guru status’; we assume they know better than we do. This combination of ‘tellers’ and lazy thinkers creates a dangerous situation where we miss out on the opportunity of finding better answers. My intention in writing this book is to raise people’s awareness for asking better questions and for readers to see that this is an easily-learnt skill that will have profound results on people’s lives. I was not taught the skill of asking better questions at school or in any of my post-graduate studies and yet I have come to learn from experience that this is one of the greatest gifts I can bring to the table in conversations with people. In this book, you will come to understand why questions are so powerful. You will learn how to ask yourself and others better questions and you will become excited as you develop a skill that you can use in your life every day. The skill can be used in many ways – with your family, friends and work colleagues, for example – there are no limits to the conversations in which you can use the skill. If I can get you to become excited about the skill of asking questions, my hope is that you will share it with others and that we can create a ripple effect around the globe. Just imagine a world where people tap into their own wisdom and innate knowledge and are less reliant upon others for answers. A world where all people feel more confident about themselves and their ideas. Let me share an inspiring true story to get us started on the journey “I know what I really need, but what I want is impos-sible!” These are the exact words stated by my client who was talking to me about trying to manage his time more effectively. He was a senior doctor in a major hospital and was experiencing frustration because he didn’t feel that there was enough time to do his job properly. As well as being a practising doctor at the hospital, he was also responsible for managing some of the junior doctors and for undertaking research on behalf of the hospital. In addition, he was doing some part-time study and was involved with many hospital committees and groups. He had a young family that he loved dearly and so ‘work-life balance’ was something that was important to him. No wonder he was having a problem with his time, juggling all of these priorities! My client explained to me why his ideal solution of hiring a full-time personal assistant was impossible. He explained that there was a hierarchy of doctors within the hospital and that only senior doctors had full-time support. Indeed, doctors in more senior positions only warranted part-time and shared assistants, so he considered himself lucky that he did have the shared use of an assistant for one day each week. It was unheard of that anyone at his level would qualify for additional support, and despite his boss being aware of his challenges, no additional help was forthcoming. He also explained to me that even if he could justify having a full-time assistant, in the current hierarchy the hospital could not afford the additional costs involved. The hospital was struggling financially because it was publically funded and any expenditure, which he was adamant would not be forthcoming, would need the approval of the CEO. Indeed, he knew of a similar case in the hospital where funding had not been approved. I think it’s fair to say that his mind was made up. He was certain that the opportunity to have a full-time assistant was not an option worth considering any further. Therefore, he was ready to move on in our conversation to talk about other ways in which he could manage his time more effectively. I had a choice at this point – did I let him go on to explore other options or did I challenge what he had just shared with me in case there was a flaw in his argument? Most people would take the easier option of not challenging – particularly as they might fear how the other person would react if they did challenge. However, I know that most often the best gift I can give to people is to help them to consider another perspective or possibility. This would open up more options, so I decided that I would challenge my client. I went on to acknowledge and summarise what he had said to me and then I asked a powerful question: “If you believed it was possible to get yourself a full-time assistant, what would you do?” His immediate response was to advise me that it wasn’t possible. I acknowledged that I knew that he had said it wasn’t possible, but if for some reason it was, what would he do? His response was immediate and he explained to me how he would approach asking for an assistant. First, he would take some time to analyse how much time he was spending on his current tasks. In particular, he would pay attention to all the ‘wasted’ time on administrative duties that an assistant could easily manage. He would then endeavour to carefully cost each of these tasks. He could then use this information in a proposed business case. He went on to describe how he would also think about all the lost opportunities that were evident with the current arrangement – particularly in the field of medical research. He was confident that he could achieve much more in this field, which would not only help medical science, and potentially patients around the world, but would also bring enormous benefit to the hospital in terms of kudos and, eventually, financial gain. As he spoke to me, it was clear that he was becoming excited about the possibility of what action he might take in order to be given a full-time assistant. However, after sharing these insights he added that there was no point thinking about all of this because it wasn’t going to happen. Again, I had the choice of letting it go, or continuing with my challenge. I chose the latter. I assured him that I understood that he didn’t think it would happen, but again asked him if there was a possibility of it happening, what action would he take? His response was to reiterate what he’d said previously, but this time he added that he would build the best business case possible and would then present it to the CEO. He considered that he had a good relationship with the CEO and that the worst-case scenario was that the answer would be ‘no’. The more he talked, the more excited he became about the prospect of building the business case, and he became confident that it would be difficult for anyone to disregard his arguments. By the conclusion of our conversation, it became clear that he wanted to try to secure a full-time assistant. He decided that he had nothing to lose and lots to gain, and of all the options, he knew that this was the one that would achieve the outcome he was hoping for. I left him tasked with the action to build his business case and to organise a meeting with the CEO and we agreed to meet again in about three weeks time. I asked him to contact me if I could support him further, but my feelings were that he knew exactly what he wanted, and how to be successful in achieving the desired outcome. As agreed, I revisited my client three weeks later. A new desk was outside his office door, and a technician was working on the installation of a PC. As I entered his office my client invited me to sit down and immediately advised me that I wouldn’t believe what I was about to hear. He said that he had taken all of the actions that he had agreed to undertake and had met with the CEO during the previous week. During this meeting, the CEO had been so impressed with his business case that she immediately agreed to his request for a full-time assistant. In fact, the CEO was so understanding of his plight that she agreed to appoint someone temporarily into the role whilst he undertook a search to find a suitable candidate. My client sat back in quiet contentment, but also with a sense of disbelief at what had been achieved. He thanked me for helping him to achieve something that he didn’t think was possible. As I share this story with you, I am filled with a sense of pride in my client for being prepared to be open to challenge, and to successfully do something that he thought was impossible. In addition, I am in awe of the power of questions. Not once did I tell my client what to do or that he was wrong – instead, I used a questioning approach to our conversation that allowed him to gain new insights that meant he could move forward and take action to achieve the changes he wanted. I trust that you are starting to see that questions can be amazingly powerful in helping to make us more resourceful and to tap into our own wisdom and knowledge, and in finding better answers!

CHAPTER TWO. Why change?

Asking for advice or opinions can become the norm. We can develop an habitual response and a dependency on others to be there to help us work our way through life’s challenges. In fact, often we rely on certain people as being the fountain of all knowledge and unconsciously turn to them whenever we need help. I’m not saying that there is no validity in seeking advice from others; indeed there are many occasions when this is a great option and we become wiser and more knowledgeable as a result. There are times when we really don’t know the answer and need expertise and valid input in order for us to make an informed decision. However, many of us have a tendency to use this as our first option when looking for answers when, in many instances, there is another option readily available to each and every one of us – ourselves! Let’s explore what can happen when we involve others in our decision-making. Sometimes when we turn to others we are looking for a ‘good listener’ to enable us to verbalise our thoughts and to work through an issue so that we can find an answer. In my experience, this is rarely all we are offered. People are programmed, it seems, to offer wisdom, advice and opinions even when this form of help hasn’t been asked for. Because our thoughts become dominated by those of other well-intended people, we do not have the opportunity to fully tap into our own resourcefulness. Alternatively, we approach others because we lack confidence in our own ability to make an informed choice. We are bombarded with other people’s thoughts and ideas that may or may not be useful. In this process, we potentially allow our own ideas and thoughts to be diluted by the well-intended opinions of others, and in fact often lose the opportunity of getting a break-through idea because there simply wasn’t the space to find it. This process becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because we lose a sense of what we originally thought, and instead do what others suggest. The end result is that we lack confidence in our own ability to make a decision. It’s interesting that we frequently take actions that we think are going to help, but in fact our actions compound the problem and we end up doing the same thing and getting the same result. Clearly, this is a time when we need to consider taking another line with a view to getting a different result. Going to others for advice when we lack confidence in our own ability will not break the cycle. Sometimes we ask other people’s advice because we know that we have someone else to blame if things don’t work out. People who operate in this way are not always consciously aware that this is why they are behaving in such a manner. However, subconsciously they know that they don’t have to take full ownership or responsibility for the choices and decisions that they are making. Whilst some people would be horrified at the thought of living their lives in this way there are many others who see this as an easy and valid option because there is always someone else to blame. Some people make a lifestyle choice about operating in this way, in their workplace or in their lives generally. They then enrol others in their ‘blame game’ which helps to justify their actions in behaving in this way. The sad thing is that many people, who usually have good intentions, sustain the ‘blame game’ by offering sympathy and opinions that totally support the other person’s views and ways of behaving. Parents, as well as friends, are frequently very good at this, but sometimes this kind of support is the worst thing that you can do for the other person. I’d like now to turn this around a little to consider a different perspective. Instead of us considering the impact on the person who has the problem or issue, let’s now consider what primarily drives the need for an individual to solve other people’s problems for them. Be honest with yourself, if someone came to you right now with a problem, what is your most likely response? The majority of us will reply that we’d listen intently until we understood the problem. We may indeed ask a few questions in order to understand the problem in more detail, and then we’d process it through our own perceptions and suggest what we think is a valid response in terms of advice or even a solution. As we offer our ideas, we are likely to be feeling good about ourselves. Not only have we helped the other person, we have provided our own guidance and wisdom, which makes us feel good because it strokes our ego. Unfortunately, our ego, as we will learn, plays a problematic role in our ability to let go and to ask better questions of others. It seems that we are ‘hard-wired’ to believe that helping people means that we give them advice and answers whenever there is a problem. Indeed, this allows us to give ourselves a pat on the back for being such a good, generous and kind person. In reading the next sections of this book, I hope that you challenge that perspective and see that it is possible that your action may be considered in quite the opposite way. That is to say, by always providing the answer, you may be providing a disservice to the other person. The skill I am about to teach you will provide you with the opportunity of always being helpful. However, this may not mean that you give help in the traditional way with which you have become familiar. By way of additional background and to help you become more conscious of the issues involved with our own thinking, I am going to share an interesting statistic. Psychologists suggest that in a typical day most human beings have around 60,000 thoughts. When I heard how much thinking we do every day I was quite shocked as that number represents a huge amount of thoughts that are processed through our brains in a short space of time. Having reconciled in my mind the number of thoughts we have every day, I went on to read that we typically have 95 per cent of the same thoughts the following day. Again, I was quite shocked by this statistic and whilst the word ‘typically’ was used, I spent some time internally arguing with the data. I searched for evidence to indicate that I am not representative of this statistic. I concluded that I am not ‘typical’ because I am well educated, have an interesting life and am what I consider to be a reflective person. Given all of that, how could I be such a repetitive thinker? Upon further reflection, however, my routine way of thinking was obvious and I began to acknowledge that maybe I was even more ‘typical’ than I thought. I recognised that my ‘typical’ day began with my early morning alarm at 6 am – this was the signal for me to get out of bed and to undertake my early morning routine, which included some mundane tasks such as getting breakfast, showering and preparing lunch. Whilst working in the city I chose to catch public transport. Each day I greeted the same bus driver and saw many of the same passengers. When I left the bus I boarded a train bound for the city, and because it started its journey at my station I always had a choice of seats. Despite this ‘choice’ I sat in the same seat (unless someone had beaten me to it) on every journey, and watched familiar faces join the increasingly packed train until we arrived at our destination. I then proceeded to walk in the same direction as all the other passengers to exit the station and to find my familiar way into my office nearby. As most of my colleagues were also creatures of habit with routines of their own, I could predict who would be in the office before my arrival and who would arrive at different times later on. My work was far from boring, and with its many demands and responsibilities there wasn’t a normal routine throughout my day. However, despite this, the very nature of my work was the same each day and I would see the same faces almost every day. You are probably thinking by now that my journey home and the things I did in the evening were also habitual – then I would go to bed and start the routine all over again the next day. I hope you can see from my sharing this with you that for most of us the 95 per cent statistic regarding our daily thoughts is likely to be true, mainly because we do have set routines in our lives. This is not a criticism, as we need a routine to survive in our busy world. What is at issue here is that we have limited capacity, and apparently limited capability, to process new thoughts in our minds because of this ‘routineness’. Whilst for some this may not be a worry, personally I have great concern about this statistic playing out every day for me and I ask:

I realised that I had to start to do something different to facilitate new ideas and thinking, and due to my everyday routine, this wasn’t going to be easy. If I was serious about being the best I can be, and was going to learn and grow, there had to be something different that I could do. In addition, I knew that my routine conversations were not being of service to other people and that there had to be a way that I could help them to break out of their ‘sameness’. It was then that I discovered the power of questions, and a passion for developing this skill, and supporting others in developing it, was ignited

CHAPTER THREE. The trouble with reality!

During my late thirties, when I was undertaking training to become a professional life and workplace coach, I suddenly became aware of an amazing thing – beliefs may not be true. A fabulous insight that completely changed my world. Recognising that my reality is based upon what I think, and what I think may not be true, opened up a new world of possibilities for me. It’s worth exploring this subject further so that you may gain more insight into an understanding of your own thinking, and why questions become even more important. Therefore, I’d like to spend some time in developing an understanding about beliefs and where most of our beliefs come from. At an early age, we are exposed to influential people, and, given that our mind is like a sponge, we ‘soak up’ everything that we are told without question. We have no basis upon which to challenge or question, and most of our early beliefs come from our parents and close family members. To give you an example, I found myself telling someone that I didn’t like the word ‘belly’ and preferred to use ‘tummy’. When I was questioned about my reason for this preference, I found that I did not have a good reason other than that was the word my mum had always used. How often do you hear yourself speaking and realise it’s not you talking, instead it’s one of your parents? We have so many unconscious beliefs that are driving our lives, but we rarely stop to question whether they are something we want to believe, or choose to include in our own reality. In addition to beliefs being passed on to us, we are also influenced by other sources such as the media, our culture, workplaces, religion, and of course our own experiences. For example, if I put my finger in a flame then it will hurt and so I learn not to do this again. That said I used to believe that if I walked on hot coals I would burn my feet. Having undertaken a ‘fire walk’ several years ago without getting even the tiniest blister meant that this belief has been proven not to be true. Some of our beliefs are formed and influenced in a manipulative way. The advertising world is well aware of this and will use powerful and persuasive techniques to influence our decision-making without us even knowing it’s happening. The suggestion that something like two out of every five children’s first word is likely to be a brand name is of great concern. No longer do they say “mama” or “dada” but things like “Nike” or “McDonald’s” I’m sure as I mention this you will recognise how frequently this manipulation is happening. When we are watching TV or listening to the radio we are bombarded by advertisements. Similarly, when waiting at traffic lights or watching sporting events, advertising appears on billboards and on electronic advertising devices, particularly when it is known that we have nowhere else to cast our gaze. When I recently dried my hands under an electric hand dryer, as soon as I placed my hands under the dryer, an advertisement appeared directly under my eye line. What will they think of next? It can be quite concerning to become aware of how much our behaviour is driven by our beliefs. While travelling on a tram a few months ago a young girl aged about four years old and her mother sat near me. The little girl started to sing and it was beautiful to hear her voice. After a few minutes, a thought suddenly struck me – what would happen if I had started to sing? Whilst the very thought of it made me smile, as I don’t consider myself to be a good singer, I seriously thought about the consequences if I had begun to sing. Perhaps people would move to another seat, others might conclude that I was of a strange disposition, or that I was drunk. In any case, it is most unlikely that they would have appreciated my singing, and highly likely that I would be judged in a way that was not very positive. Although it doesn’t worry me too much that I held back from singing on the tram because of our societal norms, it does worry me that there are likely to be other aspects of my life where, if I’m giving advice from my own belief system, I may be holding myself, or indeed others, back. This is where being conscious through better questions is important because we can start to identify what influences us in the choices we make and the way in which we live. Knowing what is the root cause of our decision-making gives us somewhere to go, not only in understanding ourselves, but also in challenging and changing what is happening, if that seems to be a good thing to do. Not all beliefs are bad or limiting. Some beliefs will clearly support us and help us to be the successful people that we are today, so this isn’t about changing everything, this is about using questions to become aware of our limitations that we can choose to influence or change if we want to. By being conscious of the right choices for us, we start being more in control and in the driver’s seat of our lives – able to live from the ‘inside out’ rather than the ‘outside in’. Questions will make us more conscious. As previously mentioned, Socrates is known for his famous quote, “I cannot teach you anything, I can only make you stop and think.” His life was dedicated to making people more conscious of their thoughts with a view to supporting them to challenge their thinking and try to find the truth in an objective way. He did this through asking questions and even today, some people refer to a questioning technique as a ‘Socratic’ approach. Unfortunately, the people of Socrates’ time did not appreciate the fact that his questions were meant to help them become more self-aware and to challenge their own way of thinking. People misunderstood his intentions and thought that Socrates was trying to outsmart them or prove them wrong, and he was sentenced to death for being too threatening. I too have a passion for asking questions – it is about finding the truth and becoming more self-aware, it is not about proving someone else wrong. I trust by now that you are starting to understand why it is important to begin to ask ourselves better questions. If beliefs and ways of thinking go unchallenged, we will continue to think as we’ve always thought and as a result we will do what we’ve always done, and nothing will change. Somewhere along the line, we need to break the cycle and confront our perception of reality by challenging the way we think, if we want to change. Several years ago, I came across a verse that is an interesting, but potentially confronting, read in that it clearly says that our reality is totally subjective and driven by how we think. I have reproduced this with the permission of the author and it summarises the concerns I have shared so far very well. Enjoy. Reality is what we take to be true. What we take to be true is what we believe. What we believe is based upon our perceptions. What we perceive depends upon what we look for. What we look for depends upon what we think. What we think depends upon what we perceive. What we perceive determines what we believe. What we believe determines what we take to be true. What we take to be true is our reality. Gary Zukav, The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics, Harper Collins

CHAPTER FOUR. More about beliefs

I decided to talk about how to make a patchwork quilt as my sister was making one in her needlework classes at that time. I wrote out my speech on some cards and also decided to use some samples to show during my talk. I was physically prepared, but my emotional state was fragile. This was not something I looked forward to; I became more anxious as the day drew closer. I recall waking up and feeling nervous on the day of the talk. What if I dropped my cards, fainted or froze? All the possible worst-case scenarios were running through my mind. I remember feeling sick and refusing breakfast; despite my mum reassuring me I would be fine, I wasn’t convinced. The morning progressed until it was time for the English class to begin. The speakers were called up based on the alphabetical order of their surnames. The first two or three people delivered their speeches, but I have no recollection of them because I was now only focused on myself and my nerves. Eventually the teacher summoned me to the front; it was my turn. As I stood up, my knees turned to jelly and a wave of panic overcame me. Nevertheless, I made my way to the front of the class and stood rooted to the spot for the next three minutes. My mouth was dry, a horrible red rash began to cover my neck and my voice was suddenly high-pitched and quivering. I can recall that I did not look up once from my cards, I simply read out what I had written and at the appropriate moment, held up my sample of a quilt. The whole experience was nerve-wracking and at the end of it I gave a huge sigh of relief. The teacher remarked “Thank you Lindsay, please take a seat,” and then asked the next student to come to the front of the class. Interestingly, we draw conclusions from our experiences, and this is most often done at a subconscious level. Remember, if I put my finger in a flame and it hurts, then I learn not to put my finger in the flame again. It is interesting to examine my reflection on the experience I had in the English classroom. The experience for me was that I stood up and talked in front of a group of people for three minutes. I received no acknowledgement from my teacher and afterwards I was just relieved to get it over with, and I hoped that I would never have to do something like that again. So what conclusion did I draw? Given that I am a naturally pessimistic thinker I employed the worst-case scenario, that I was not good at public speaking. At this point, I acknowledge that this conclusion could have been quite different if I’d had a more optimistic outlook. However, this is what my thinking created as being true for me at that time. Because I thought that I was a poor public speaker my mind started to look for evidence that this thought was true. We do not like to be wrong about our thoughts and so our brain is excellent at filtering out information that doesn’t agree with our thinking, and also very good at finding evidence to prove us right. Thus, I was now searching for more evidence to prove me right and I didn’t have to wait long for it to appear. In my English class at school there was one student who was extremely clever, well behaved, popular, good at sport, and well liked by all the teachers. During the week following my talk, it was his turn to do his three‑minute speech and everyone expected him to do a good job because he always did. Bearing in mind that I tell you this story some 30 years later, I can still remember the topic of his talk; it was ‘How to put a spine on a book’. You may think that this is a boring topic, but this student had the knack of making everything sound interesting and in his speech he soon grabbed our attention. Of course his delivery was superb – good eye contact, use of humour, pitch and pace and at the end I remember the teacher telling him that he had done an ‘excellent job’ Poor me! The teacher hadn’t said that to me and of course there was good reason; my talk wasn’t very good, and I obviously wasn’t as good as my fellow student at public speaking. Indeed, I had now found more evidence to prove my thinking that I was hopeless at public speaking to be true, and over time, this thought became a belief that created my reality. I am sure over the years that there were many more occasions where I found evidence to maintain this belief. You can see then that our reality is inherently subjective. Indeed, it is suggested that more than 80 per cent of what is seen in the external world is a function of internal assumptions and beliefs. Interestingly, I now earn a living from public speaking, so please note that the following statement is absolutely true: A belief is nothing more than a thought that you continue to think is true. Many of our beliefs are subjective, based on our own biases and filters – what we are seeing is a version of reality, but not necessarily the truth. Better questions will help us get closer to the truth. Interestingly I used questions to first challenge, and then help change my belief that I was not good at public speaking. People who want to keep doing what they’ve always done, and keep getting what they’ve always got, will rarely be open to being asked better questions. They rely on the good opinion of others and develop lethargy around thinking for themselves. It’s so much easier to stick to our routine thoughts, not to challenge ourselves or our beliefs, and to stay in our comfort zone. It takes courage to be prepared to actively create new thoughts because who knows what possibilities may open up as a result of this new thinking? You have a choice as to whether you wish to be a routine thinker who becomes stuck in repetitive thought patterns, or whether you wish to be someone who is open to challenge and to new ideas and thoughts. I am asking you to consciously choose whom you wish to be because when we are conscious of our choices we can choose to act differently and thus achieve different results. Without awareness there is no choice, so consider carefully what your conscious choice is, otherwise we act at an unconscious level and do things out of habit, conditioning and limitations that may not even be true any more. The following parable is one I came across many years ago and is probably my most used resource. It provides us all with a powerful message upon which to reflect: Lesser primate committee thinking experiment

Whilst there are several possible interpretations and insights that we can draw from this parable, the most power-ful one is about unconscious conformity. The fact that the apes prevented each other from going for the banana even though they themselves didn’t know why they weren’t allowed to go for it is almost funny except that, if we are honest, most of us recognise similar patterns of behaviour in ourselves. Becoming conscious of when we are being ‘ape-like’ is a good starting point because at least we can then become conscious of whether we wish to continue with the behaviour or whether we want to make a different choice. Most of us adopt an ‘ape-like’ conformity to some extent, myself included. For our societies to work there has to be a level of ‘fitting in’ and those who find it hard to fit in will sometimes become loners or even end up in our prison system. The critical thing is for you to use questions to become more conscious of the thinking that sits behind certain behavioural patterns, with a view to making different choices when and where you need to make adjustments to aspects of your life. If we don’t ask questions we will not become conscious of our conformity and thus will find it impossible to make different choices. I invite you then to consider the tremendous potential from the power of questioning in your own life, and the lives of others. What is possible?

CHAPTER FIVE. Getting excited about questions

To the best of my knowledge, the only people who are taught anything about questions are teachers, lawyers and people in ‘helping professions’ such as psychologists, counsellors and coaches. My dream is to change all of that and to encourage and provide opportunities to learn about questioning as a skill as part of our school curriculum, as well as in personal and professional development forums. Imagine if we all had the ability to use questions in our everyday conversations – the world would undoubtedly be a better place. I am pleased to say that as I have progressed on life’s journey I now realise that questions are fantastic as they have the power to create new or expanded thoughts that change emotions and behaviours, which can then transform situations … and ultimately bring about a change in someone’s life! Indeed, questions have the power to:

I invite you to read the list above again and try not to feel inspired or excited! Imagine if we all had the ability to achieve these outcomes in our daily lives – both within ourselves and with others – the world would undoubtedly be a better place and people would feel much more positive about themselves and their resourcefulness. I trust that by now I have given you some great reasons to inspire you to develop the skill of asking better questions and that you recognise the gift this will be, not only to yourself, but to everyone else you connect with. The potential to profoundly impact on lives in a positive way is huge. Recently I had a wonderful and rewarding experience with my teenage nephew Tom, who had emigrated to Australia the previous year and seemed to be lacking focus in his life (like lots of teenagers!). One day I asked him if I could sit down with him to see if I could support him in becoming clearer about what he might want to do, and he readily agreed. I planned our time together by thinking about some good questions I could ask him that would best relate to his life at that time. I will explore more with you about the types of questions to ask and the ways to ask them later in the book, but at this stage I will share with you that my questions focused on:

In our conversation, I asked him a number of questions that enabled him to start thinking about some ideas in relation to how he’d like his life to be and what he’d like to change over the coming six months. I encouraged him to establish a few goals and ideals for himself that he said he felt good about, which he then used as the focus for the next part of his life’s journey. He actually created a document that set out his goals and intended actions and used this to focus his efforts for the following months – with some great results! What touched my heart in all of this, even more than the actual experience itself, was the reflective comment that Tom made to me shortly after we’d had our conversation. Tom thanked me for helping him, and insightfully added: “You really don’t know what you think until you are asked the right questions!” WOW! That exactly summarises why questions are so powerful and why we need to ask ourselves and others better questions. Tom’s progress and achievements during the months after our ‘session’ made us both very proud. I feel confident that he wouldn’t have made such great progress if we hadn’t had the conversation to create the new thoughts – better questions really did help him to find better answers. The more experience I have in asking questions the more my passion for asking questions has grown. I have seen first-hand not only the impact they have had on my own life, but also on the people around me. It’s fantastic when you see someone’s face light up when they get that new idea or when you see them pondering a question you just asked because they had never had to think about the question before. It is so gratifying to witness that ‘light bulb’ moment when someone gets an insight that they haven’t had before or to hear them remark, “That’s a really good question, let me think about that.” Witnessing the impact of asking the question and challenging individuals to find better answers is only the first step. Imagine what it’s like knowing that as a result of you asking better questions people go on to do things differently and that those actions then make a positive difference to their lives. I know that asking better questions really is a gift to humankind and I’d like to now focus on the actual skill itself so you can learn the art of asking better questions

CHAPTER SIX. There are questions and there are questions!

As we already know, questions are more than just finding out information; they can act as educators, catalysts, tools, challenges and much more. Skilful questioning offers new perspectives for people and stimulates answers and possibilities that they never thought possible. It is not that people don’t have the answers to their dilemmas or challenges, it is simply that they often haven’t had the right questions to access those answers! An invaluable skill is knowing what types of questions to ask and how to ask them. The term ‘solution-focused’ is frequently used to describe questions that keep us focused on moving forward, so it is good to consider this in the big picture when we are using questions. Sometimes it is tempting to ask what I call ‘sticky beak’ or nosey questions – ones that are more about everyday chatter rather than helping the other person to be resourceful. It is important, therefore, to be clear at the outset about our intention, which is to support the other person in finding their own solution. We will be covering more about the actual technique of asking others better questions in a later chapter. The intention in asking a question is to elicit an answer as well as to make yourself or the other person stop and think. Closed questions that can be answered with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer will not be very useful in achieving these aims. So, wherever possible, start your question with words that will elicit an open-ended response – all open questions start with the words: Who. When. What. How. Which. Where. Why (more about this one later) In addition, phrases such as ‘Tell me more about …’ and ‘Please expand a little more,’ will be useful to gain more information that will help move you or the other person towards further exploration and/or an insight/answer. Try asking questions that start with these words or phrases in your everyday conversations and have some fun catching yourself out when you ask a closed question. Some of us have developed a habit that we aren’t even aware of in the form of asking closed questions, so please pay attention to see how well you currently carry out asking open questions. The good news is that no matter what our skill level is to start with we will get better at it by continued focus and practice. An open question that I suggest we avoid asking ourselves and others is one beginning with ‘Why’. There are two reasons for avoiding ‘Why’ questions. The first is that using ‘Why’ can sound accusatory and almost asks you or the other person to justify yourself/themselves. It can make people feel that their thoughts are wrong and this is never a good outcome. In addition, depending on what the intent of the question is, a ‘Why’ question will lead us to find a reason to stay in a fixed mindset and provides excuses rather than reasons to do something. Instead of asking “Why did you do that?”, it is far more effective to ask, “What results were you hoping to achieve from doing that?” Consequently, the overall recommendation is to use the ‘Why’ question with care and to soften it or use other words to start the question. Whilst open questions are good, I invite you to think deeper than simply creating an opportunity for yourself or the person to provide a more open and detailed response. It is important to focus on the intention of your question before deciding what is the best question to ask. Please notice how some questions direct your mind to a narrow focus and ask you to find an answer based on a constricted band of possibility. Other questions ask you to dig into your memory bank and find some stored information. Some questions ask you to expand your thinking and consider possibilities about the future. Be conscious of the kind of questions that create different responses and this will help you to develop the skill further. One thing that is interesting to note is how some questions keep us trapped inside the problem itself, whilst others really help us to move forward and find answers. Questions that help us understand the problem more may initially be useful, but we need to ensure that we are conscious of using a ‘solution-focused’ approach that provides and maintains a high-level intention for the conversation. If you recall from earlier chapters, some of the benefits of questions can be to:

The old saying ‘begin with the end in mind’ is appropriate here, because if we focus on what we are trying to achieve with the question then this can really help us to formulate a good question. Understanding what are we hoping to achieve by asking the question will help us to create the question in the first place. Let me share some examples of open questions and their uses: What can you learn from that?This is a great question for a person to gain insights or awareness from a situation. What can you do to move forward?This question is directly asking for an answer or new idea. What other ideas do you have?This question expands the thinking – it acknowledges the ideas already provided and challenges the person to think more deeply and to expand their thinking. How else can you see that situation?This question invites the person to consider another perspective, which when explored can also change feelings and, in turn, behaviours. What do you have control over here and how can you get more control?This question helps the person to recognise where they do have control and to develop ideas about what they can and can’t do to change the situation. What do you KNOW is the right answer?This is a powerful question that invites people to tap into their innate wisdom and knowledge. So, is it X or is it Y?Simple questions like this can be useful to clarify thinking and to help a person feel more certain about what they are thinking. What do you think or feel about that?This engages the other person and invites them to state their perspective, which makes them feel valued. It also enables them to become more aware of their thoughts and feelings, which is a good starting point towards change. All open questions will engage and empower people provided they use the right language and tone. There is more about how to achieve this in the next chapter. By asking questions rather than just thinking about the problem, or telling someone else what to do, the emphasis to find an answer immediately shifts to yourself or the other person to become resourceful. This is amazingly powerful. One extremely useful piece of advice that I was given early on in my quest to be a better questioner was that it can be really helpful to get you or the other person out of your/their own way of thinking and tap into the wisdom of others. Of course it is impossible to get into another person’s head to see what they really are thinking but there is nothing stopping us from using our imagination. One of the people I admire immensely in the world is Richard Branson. He seems to have been able to challenge so many of the paradigms and norms in our society and yet remain a nice guy who really cares about people. I have the utmost respect for the man. When I have a problem or issue that I really don’t seem to be able to move forward with, or where I know that I am stuck because of my own limited beliefs about what is possible, I simply ask myself a really powerful question, “What would Richard Branson advise me to do?” What is amazing with this type of question is that it really does enable you to think about what wisdom you would get from this person and then to consider this advice along with your own thoughts and ideas. Of course, we don’t know exactly what Richard Branson or anyone else would tell us, but it certainly makes us think about the issue from another perspective and that is a very healthy and creative thing to do. Please note that it is important when using this approach to think about naming a person who is significant, either to yourself if you are doing some self-reflection, or to the other person if you are asking someone else a question. It may be appropriate to choose a person you see as a mentor or guru, or maybe a favourite relative or boss. If you can’t think of anyone then questions such as “What would an expert in this field advise me/you to do?” or “What would a person advise me/you to do who has been in a similar situation and solved the problem?” are appropriate. The bottom line is: it is good to ask a question that enables someone to tap into any insights that they wouldn’t otherwise obtain from their own limited thinking. Another great skill to have when questioning either ourselves or others is the ability to challenge – in a nice way of course! The intention in making the challenge is not to prove you or the other person wrong, it is simply to make you/them really think about what was said to see if there are any other possibilities. Whilst there may be some reluctance to challenging, because it may be seen as confronting, remember that what everyone believes to be true may not be true and so we have a duty to make ourselves or others think about versions of reality. Remember the true story that I shared with you in the opening chapter of this book where I challenged someone’s belief about what was possible for them to achieve. There are many times when you ask yourself or others questions when you will generate an automatic response based on a version of reality that may or may not be true. Keeping an open mind is vital if you want to challenge yourself or others, otherwise you will fall into the trap of being stuck in a rigid mindset, not because things aren’t possible, but because your mind won’t consider the possibilities. It is important, therefore, that you recognise that most things you tell yourself, and other people tell themselves, are just a version of reality; they are not usually 100 per cent true. It is this fact that makes questions so powerful. Without the question there is no challenge to a fixed view of what is reality. In the movie Gandhi, a clergyman was preaching to some churchgoers and acknowledged Gandhi for making people question themselves about what was acceptable about political and social practices in South Africa (where he spent some of his earlier years). Several people walked out of the church because they were not ready to be challenged in their thinking and they shut out the possibility that there could be another way. For you and others to get the most out of the questions, therefore, it is fundamental that you are prepared to see a range of possibilities and approach everything with an open mind. This will be explored further in a later chapter. Great challenging questions to ask yourself or others are:

It is important to emphasise that the art of asking skilful questions evolves over time – it takes time to develop your skills and to learn to trust your intuition. Be patient and remember, it is a learning process. I can recall a time in my life when I really benefited from asking myself some challenging questions in order to deal with an interesting situation. I had started a new role where I was an administration manager looking after a team of about 50 people. I was fortunate that the lady who had previously been in the role had agreed to a handover period of two weeks before she moved on to a new role, so I spent as much time with her as I possibly could to ‘learn the ropes’ During our second week together, she gave me some insights into what it was like working for the Managing Director (MD) of the business. She advised me that he was an interesting man and that despite having worked with him for the past four years she had never been able to get him to change his mind or see her point of view. In fact, she boldly stated that no-one could ever get him to change his mind and so it wasn’t worth even trying. Indeed, everyone in the company shared this view and so she was giving me a head start by letting me know this information. Of course, I listened intently and noted what she had shared with me. About a week later, after my predecessor had left, one of my team leaders told me that the MD had a dislike of women wearing the colour red. He explained that the MD felt that it looked unprofessional. The team leader wanted to warn me himself, rather than see me embarrassed by being called into the MD’s office to be advised of this. I noted his insight with interest and thanked him for taking the time to share this information with me. Shortly after this event, another team member visited my office. He also had something important he wanted to share with me. He advised me that he wasn’t sure if I already knew, but the MD really disliked people who smoked. Whilst everyone knew that I was a non-smoker, he wanted to make sure that I was aware that there were a few smokers in my team and that it was well-known that if any of my team was caught by the MD taking an unofficial smoke break I would be called into the MD’s office for a ‘chat’. They were concerned that I may get into trouble if I was unaware of this fact and suggested that I had a quiet word with the smokers in my team so that they were discreet about their smoking. Again, I thanked the person for taking the time to update me and noted the comments with interest. Having had these interesting pieces of ‘advice’ provided to me I had a choice about what I did with them. The questions I asked myself became about whether I accepted them and acted accordingly or if I confronted the situations? Asking myself some challenging questions helped me to work out that I was dealing with the perceptions of other people and that these perceptions were not necessarily based on the truth. On this basis I decided to work out my own version of reality. As the months passed in my new role, it was an interesting time for me. Yes, it was apparent that the MD didn’t particularly like to be challenged or to change his mind; however, this didn’t stop me challenging him on a regular basis and managing to get him to change his mind on many occasions. True, he didn’t like people taking time out to smoke at work. That didn’t stop me sitting down with him to work out an official smoke break policy that he could tolerate without anyone having to be called into his office. As for wearing red, I was the proud owner of two red jackets at that time and often wore them, always with the expectation that I would be called in to see him. Interestingly, this never happened and one day he asked me whether I had ever been told a ‘story’ that he didn’t like women to wear red. I told him that I had heard this, but had chosen to ignore it. He smiled and told me that he had heard a rumour that this was what was being said, but that he had decided to do nothing about it to test out how people reacted! My time at that company was, as I said, an interesting one and I learnt lots about myself as well as how to manage some challenging relationships. I will always be grateful for my ability to ask myself better questions at that time, so that I could create my own version of reality rather than buy into one that others had bought into – one that created resentment and fear

CHAPTER SEVEN. How to ask yourself better questions

Fundamental to your success in finding better answers is that you approach asking yourself better questions with the best mindset possible. We have already explored that our state of mind plays a critical role in creating our reality and this is the platform upon which the answers you are looking for will come. Being open-minded, therefore, is critical as you endeavour to find better answers and this is a pre-requisite for you being able to ask yourself a better question. It is fair to point out that adopting an open-minded approach is easy to say, but it is not as easy to do in practice. One way to describe open-mindedness is the willingness to search actively for ideas or evidence that go against one’s usual beliefs, plans or goals – in other words, internal counter-arguments. Research and personal experience suggests that the way in which an idea is presented can affect how open-minded someone is when considering the idea. For example, a method of assessing open-mindedness in a scientific setting would be to ask a participant to list arguments on both sides of a complicated issue (e.g., on the death penalty, abortion, animal testing). What often happens is that individuals are able to list far more arguments for their favoured side. However, if the researcher then encourages the participant to come up with more arguments on the opposing side, most people are able to do so without too much difficulty. It seems that people have these counter-arguments stored in their memory, but they don’t draw on them when first asked. So, what we can learn here is that our first thoughts may not be our best, and being open-minded about considering other possibilities enables us to access more of our innate wisdom than if we simply go with our first responses. When asking ourselves better questions we need to ensure that, whatever answers we come up with, we take time to invite ourselves to consider other options. Whilst this will be more time-consuming, it will ensure that we are challenging our pre‑programmed and often unconscious thoughts. By asking ourselves other simple questions such as “How else can I see this?” or “What else could this mean?” we provide ourselves with the opportunity to search for alternatives and to appreciate other points of view. I personally have a tendency to be a little negative in my thinking and quite often can interpret events in a pessimistic way (remember my public speaking story!). Having become aware of this I now recognise that there is a real gift in asking myself questions to challenge my automatic responses and I find that I am able to find alternative answers very easily; answers that give me more options to move forward. Indeed, I know that using better questions in this way has supported me to develop a more optimistic outlook on life and helped me to become a more positive person overall. Let me share an example of how this can work in practice. When I was invited to be interviewed on a local radio show, my immediate answer (inwardly) to the invitation was that I couldn’t do it. I had never been on radio before and the thought of it was scary for me. I managed to create an opportunity to delay giving an immediate response to the person who invited me on the show to speak, so that I could ask myself some better questions. Having learnt to be a more open-minded person I was prepared to challenge my initial answer, and I asked myself how else I could see the invitation to appear on the show. I was soon able to develop an opposing view to my natural responses. This gave me all the good reasons why it would be a great opportunity for me to go on the show. I called the person back and gladly accepted their invitation. Using better questions to challenge our initial responses, therefore, can be a very powerful technique in finding better answers and it is our preparedness to be open-minded that is a prerequisite for using them. As mentioned earlier, to be able to demonstrate open-mindedness we need to ensure that we have the time and space to reflect upon the questions and we don’t want to put ourselves under pressure for an instant answer. One failing of modern society is that we appear to be programmed to want everything to happen ‘now’ and rarely do we give ourselves enough space to think and ponder on things. There is more about allowing time to access answers in Chapter 10 on finding better answers. Another key factor in your success in finding better answers will be the questions themselves and how they are asked. So far in this book, we have explored the fundamental issues about why we need to ask better questions and what better questions to ask, so it is now important that I introduce you to the methodology of asking better questions. Typically, most of us use questioning at an unconscious level. This manifests as internal, negative ‘self-talk’ where we frequently end up in what I call the ‘self-beaters club’. Usually this means that we ask ourselves questions that do not move us forward; instead, the questions typically regurgitate the issue in a way that keeps us in a familiar rigid frame of mind and feeling bad about a situation. For example, we might berate ourselves for making stupid decisions and ask ourselves why we didn’t do something better. Our questions have negative connotations that keep us mulling over the issue. As a consequence, we make ourselves feel worse. The key, therefore, is to be conscious of the questions we are asking and using the knowledge I have shared with you so far will help you to formulate good questions. It becomes of paramount importance that we make a conscious choice to stop the ‘self-beating’ record playing in our minds and to take control of our thoughts. This means that we need to start to be more conscious of what is going on in our mind and focus our attention on asking better questions. Throughout this book, there are a number of questions and techniques that will enable you to do this and I have developed a comprehensive toolkit of better questions you can ask yourself or others. More questions are provided later in this book and there are many resources that you can download from: www.betterquestionsaretheanswer.com. Whilst using resources such as the toolkit of questions I have provided to get you started, it is important to go with the flow and trust where your questions are taking you. If while answering the questions you come up with your own line of questioning, then definitely follow it. It is important to remember that you are the expert here. You know yourself and the situation better than anyone else, so if a good question comes up that seems to be a better fit than the ones provided to you then it is important that you run with it. It is amazing how our intuition works. If our inner voice formulates an even better question to ask ourselves it is important to listen to it. Take note of where your mind takes you and be open and willing to be flexible with the questions – you can come back to the scripted questions at any point, so you have nothing to lose. The way in which we ask ourselves the questions will also be important to our success – we can often be our own worst enemy when it comes to negative ‘self-talk’, as we have already heard! Your tonality is, therefore, very important and it is essential that you don’t ask yourself questions with a judgmental tone. Remember, they are not accusations and there is no need to defend yourself; they are simply questions to help you discover better answers. Being kind to ourselves is an important part of the process. This is meant to be an enjoyable experience where we can gain insight and wisdom. It is no good if we make ourselves feel bad by constantly criticising and being negative. One way to be kind to yourself is to be aware of how easy it is to go too much into the ‘story’ of a situation, which can generate strong negative emotions. It is important to be aware of how your mind can easily wander into a cycle of negative ‘self-talk’. Having the discipline to bring yourself back on track will ensure success. The idea of the questions is to keep you focused on moving forward, not fixed exclusively on the problem itself. If you remain vigilant and conscious of your thinking processes you will create the right focus for finding better answers. The second you stop doing this it is likely you will revert to your old unconscious habits of unresourceful thinking. Not only does our mindset have to be one of openness and curiosity, and our line of questioning flexible and focused, we also need to ensure that we are patient and persistent with our questioning. It is easy for us all to become lazy with our thinking and just because an answer doesn’t pop into our minds straight away we assume that we don’t know an answer. The following quote says it all! Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think. Martin Luther King, Jr. We need to be persistent in our approach and trust that an answer will eventually come to us. If we trust in the belief that we do have wisdom and we are far more resourceful than we will ever know then persistence and patience become a lot easier to put into practice. So enjoy the space of allowing yourself time to access and find better answers! There is more information on this in Chapter 10. Sometimes there are things we discover about ourselves through asking better questions that will make us smile! Recently I was filling my car with petrol. For some reason I was watching the person next to me filling up their car with petrol and noticed that as soon as the petrol pump cut out they immediately put the nozzle back onto the pump and went in to pay the cashier. At that moment, I stopped and reflected on my own practice of filling up the car and smiled to myself. What I realised was that I had always adopted the habit of filling up the car so that the cost of the petrol was rounded up to the nearest dollar. This practice always took me a few more seconds to do as I had to be careful not to go over the rounded dollar amount. When I thought about this habit I realised that it had started when I first owned a car because I always used to pay for my petrol in cash and so it was easier to pay in round amounts. However, during the last few years I have always paid for my petrol on credit card and so it doesn’t matter whether the total price is in round figures or not, the process of paying is still the same. How interesting that I hadn’t changed the habit of this rounding up simply because I’d never consciously thought about what I did. As soon as I asked myself a better question to understand what made me fill my car up with petrol in a certain way I was able to make a conscious choice to do something different! Now every time I fill my car with petrol I smile to myself, first because of the powerful lesson I gained from the experience of becoming conscious, and second because I feel more in control and free now that I have made a choice to do things a different way. Whilst I recognise that putting petrol in my car is a trivial event in my life, this anecdote illustrates the power of asking ourselves better questions!

CHAPTER EIGHT. How to ask others better questions

It is important to remember that the purpose of asking someone else a question is to enable them to find a better answer and that we are assuming that they are the expert here, not you. I often say that when you are having these conversations you should imagine that the other person is wearing a hat with a sign on it that says ‘expert at finding my own solutions’. That way you remember that most people don’t want to be told what to do; they want to discover the answers for themselves. If we can keep this purpose in mind it will help us remain focused and disciplined to ask and not tell. The following verse (reprinted with permission) is beautiful in that it reminds us about the need to let go of our way and to focus on helping the other person to find their own answers. You may wish to keep a copy of this in a prominent place to help you maintain the best focus and mindset to asking others better questions. The Student’s Prayer

This comes from Spiritual Intelligence, The Ultimate Intelligence by Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall, Bloomsbury Publishing. Preparation is important for these conversations, although the more practised you become the easier you will find it is to bring your new skills into your everyday conversations. To become prepared you have to make a mental shift in choosing to be a questioner and a listener and not a ‘teller’ or adviser. It may also be worthwhile to plan the types of questions you may wish to use in advance and write some down to help you prepare – this is assuming that you know the likely topic and focus of the conversation. In addition, you may wish to give some thought to the physical environment where you will be holding the conversation because you will want to avoid interruptions and distractions if you are going to enable the other person to get the most out of the conversation. Take action to do whatever is required to enable you to be fully focused on this conversation. If your mind is feeling full or cluttered it may be useful to write some things down before you start the conversation. Show up as calm and ‘uncluttered’ as you can be and you will then be in the best possible state to help the other person by asking better questions. Thought also needs to be given to the person with whom you are going to have the conversation and what they may need to know before the conversation takes place. If it is taking place in a more formal setting, such as at work, it may be wise to give people some context for the conversation and also to prepare them for the way the conversation will be conducted. Allowing them some mental preparation will then facilitate the flow of the conversation and their expectations can be managed in advance. For people to feel they trust you they need to feel connected with you. If you already have a good relationship with them you do not need to worry about this step. However, if you don’t know them very well you will need to build rapport with them. This means that you need to converse with them, ask general questions and use open and positive body language. Remember that the more they feel you are like them the more they will feel a sense of connection with you. So be prepared to talk about things that you have in common and use similar language to theirs. Once you have this sense of connection, the other person will feel much more comfortable in answering your questions. The primary purpose of you asking questions is to help the other person find answers and also to get to know and understand them. Once you have built rapport, your primary focus for the conversation is them and not you. Indeed, ideally you should aim to talk for up to only 20 per cent of the time. Remember that your role is in seeking to understand – not to be understood or to advise. Your input to the answers should only be done as a last resort and even then this should be kept to a minimum. This means that you need to let go of your own opinions, judgments, wisdom and ideas wherever possible. We have already covered what types of questions to ask. As a reminder, ask good questions starting with ‘Who’, ‘What’, ‘When’, ‘Where’, ‘How’ and ‘Which’. Please remember that questions starting with ‘Why’ are not always the best to use as they can sound judgmental and often have a backward focus. However, note that the ‘Why’ questions can be useful when helping us to overcome limiting thoughts by finding positive reasons to do something. More information on this technique is provided in Chapter 10, Finding better answers. It is important to think about how you will ask the question as this will influence the way in which the person will answer. The tone of your voice becomes very important. My suggestion is to use a ‘curious’ tone, which genuinely shows interest and desire for the other person to seek an answer. Remember not to ask questions with a judgmental tone. This is not an interrogation; it is important to ensure that the person to whom you are speaking feels comfortable. In addition, try wherever possible not to have an answer in mind before you ask the question. This is an easy trap to fall into, particularly if you know the person or situation, as the process then becomes about the questioner guessing answers until they get to the ‘right answer’, which then of course is your answer. The person to whom you have asked the question will quickly recognise that you have the ‘correct’ answer in your mind so they will simply state a series of answers until they find your preferred answer, rather then trying to be resourceful and find their own answer. This is easy to say and not quite so easy to do in practice, so it takes discipline in your mind to stop this from happening. The way I deal with this is to be clear in my own mind that I will probably have ideas about certain questions, but then remember that this is about them and not me, so that helps me to let go of my ‘correct’ response. A strong word of caution here: sometimes when we think we have the right answer we disguise the advice in a question. For example, you might say something like “Do you think you should talk to your partner about that?” This kind of leading question is what I call a ‘quegesstion’ – a suggestion disguised as a question. Whilst we can argue that we are still allowing them to decide what is best to do it is far better to ask a broader and higher level question such as “What do you think you can do about that?” The way the actual question is phrased becomes important in facilitating the process of finding better answers. We need to be as clear and specific as possible and to take care not to ask too many questions at once. The ideal question is brief, specific and unambiguous about what is required and this helps the other person to be clear about what to focus on in their response. It is easy to fall into the trap of asking long-winded questions or even asking two or three questions at the same time, which causes confusion. Some good advice is to ask the question (not questions!) and then shut up, rather than to ask the question and to then keep talking, which sometimes leads people to an answer. Sometimes we try to clarify the question and then confuse the person when the question was clear in the first place. Remember, in using better questions you want the other person to be responsible and resourceful in finding a better answer. In many settings we have a tendency to use the word ‘we’ when we talk about situations and finding solutions as this is more inclusive and appears to be more helpful. For your questioning to be effective it is essential that you use the word ‘you’ instead of the word ‘we.’ A question such as “What can you do about that?” rather than “What can we do about that?” is a good form of questioning. This ensures that the onus for finding an answer is clear and helps to keep you focused on remembering that it is up to the other person to find the answer. The intention in asking better questions is to help people to help themselves and there is no ‘we’ in this process. If you find this difficult to do, remember that we can always ask a question such as “What can I do to support you?” This still shows that you want to help, but it is clear who is responsible for finding answers and carrying out actions. Sometimes people are reluctant to answer questions. They fear taking ownership; occasionally they may not trust you with the answer; at times they are just being lazy and don’t want to take time to think. If this is the case, the potential response that you will get when asking a question is “I don’t know” or “I’m not sure”. It can be tempting to use this as an excuse for you to provide an answer – indeed it is much quicker to simply provide advice than to sit with someone who has the apparent inability to find an answer. The greatest challenge here is to work out if there is an answer there, but is the person being lazy, reluctant or hesitant in providing it? This may occur for several reasons, which are explored further in the next chapter. Suffice to say, our ability to be resourceful, as well as patient and persistent with our questioning, then becomes vitally important. In my experience, it is rarely true that people do not know the answer (especially when it comes to issues that involve themselves) – it is that initially there is a reluctance on their part to provide one. Techniques you can use to be patient and persistent are simply to ask the question again, rephrase the question and/or allow the person more time to answer by inviting them to think about it. One technique that uses a reverse psychology approach (and actually works) is to say, “I know you said you don’t know, but if you did know, what would you do?” I have consistently been amazed how this question taps into the resourcefulness of the other person and they are able to find a better answer. One other consideration you need to make if the other person seems reluctant to answer is that they may not be feeling safe with you or may not trust you. If you feel that this is the case you will need to focus on what you can do to build more rapport and trust with them before you proceed further with the questions. People think much faster than they speak so rarely have they ‘talked out’ all of their thoughts. In fact, I once read that we typically speak at 150–200 words a minute. However, we are thinking closer to 500 words a minute. This means that we think far more than we actually say. When someone stops speaking in everyday conversation we usually see this as a sign to start talking ourselves. When questioning, you are encouraged to leave a brief gap of silence. If the other person really has finished what they are saying, you can then proceed to ask the next question. However, you will find that in many instances the other person uses this silence to start talking again. Often this can be when they really start tapping into their deeper and more creative thoughts. If you keep quiet, in the majority of cases the person will start talking again and usually this is where ‘magic’ happens. They are accessing ‘hidden’ thoughts and by being silent you allow this to happen. As we know, most of the time people know the answer; they just need time to get there and silence is one of the most powerful ways to make this happen. Indeed, my top tip to asking better questions is to ‘shut up and listen’, so please remember this powerful, albeit blunt, advice! You’ll be amazed at what you hear. I recall once having a conversation with my lovely husband, who wanted to talk through the format and content for a workshop he was planning. I asked him a few questions at the beginning and then proceeded with a few encouraging noises and nods until he reached a point where he knew exactly what he needed to do. Amazingly, all he needed was to talk it through to work out what he needed to do – he didn’t need any input from me at all. This is the power and magic of silence at work! Chapter 6 referred to asking questions to challenge beliefs, and also to techniques to use to allow a person to go beyond their own thoughts and articulate their ideas. By challenging a person through questions it is possible for them to rethink their beliefs and also to be more resourceful by thinking outside their normal routine way. Please refamiliarise yourself with these techniques when asking others better questions. When challenging someone it will be useful to build on a response that you have been given. By this, I mean acknowledge the answer you’ve been given but always invite and challenge them to provide more answers. By asking for additional responses you are inviting creativity and more resourcefulness and it is quite possible that this is where a breakthrough thought or idea lies. A simple question such as “What else can you do?” enables this and challenges the person to dig deeper. At the end of the conversation it is important to help the person to obtain a clear view about what their subsequent actions will be. There is more on action planning in Chapter 11. At this point, it is good to just acknowledge that a component of asking yourself and others better questions includes asking questions that lead to action being taken. Whilst the conversation on its own will be powerful it is usually the action taken as a result of the awareness that creates a transformation. When I first started out on my questioning journey I was guilty of not asking questions very well – which isn’t surprising given that there are lots of things to think about. The good news is that, as with any skill, the more you practice the better you become – so it’s important to remain conscious of what you are doing until you feel you have mastered the techniques discussed. In particular, I often used we instead of you in my questions because I had been programmed to think about the team and a broader perspective and found using you very challenging and even confronting. However, having practised it for a while I started to see how powerful it was when this one word was changed and it really did focus the person on becoming clearer about what they thought. I also found myself developing an unconscious bad habit of asking questions with my solution in mind. It was only when I repeatedly caught myself asking the person, “What else?” that I became aware that I was asking this in order to get them to my answer and not to help them generate new ideas themselves. None of us is perfect – we all make mistakes. Therefore, at the outset I suggest that you use some way to measure how you perform when asking others better questions. I have devised the following simple checklist to remind us of the things we need to focus on in our questioning technique. If you use this as a reflective tool on your questioning journey it will help you to stay focused, apply the skills and support you to keep improving as you go!

Powerful questions to use with others

CHAPTER NINE. Listening to enable better answers

Most of us understand the basics of being a good listener. We know that we need to be active in a conversation by having good eye contact, that we should demonstrate open body language and pay full attention. Although we are generally familiar with these things, how many times do we actually carry them out in practice? Keep in mind that most of us have incredibly busy lives and very active minds, all of which results in many of us being poor listeners. Indeed, if we are honest, most of us pretend that we are listening even when we aren’t, as we try to multi-task or become distracted. We can usually tell when someone isn’t listening to us and when this is the case it is easy for us to feel that we are unimportant or even boring and we will quite easily give up trying to communicate with a person if they aren’t really listening. It’s interesting that most of us treat others that way and yet don’t like being treated that way ourselves, so please think about the impact you are having the next time you are tempted to be distracted and then stop listening. I have learnt that it is much easier to tell someone that you are busy and make a time to catch up with them later, rather than to pretend to be listening. I confess that I have some bad habits with my listening, like most people, but I make a conscious effort to listen more carefully when I have decided that this will result in better answers. This means that once I decide to use better questions it also means that I put on my ‘listener’s hat’ and really step into being a listener. It helps me to focus and to pay full attention to the conversation. Another thing that really helps me is, wherever possible, I make a conscious choice to leave superfluous thoughts ‘at the door’. In other words, whatever else is mulling around in my brain I park it and tell myself I’ll come back to it later. Again, it can be useful to write things down so you don’t forget them. When you have done this, the focus moves to the way that we listen. As well as the active listening points listed earlier, we can also use paraphrasing as a good way to demonstrate that we are listening. Paraphrasing is giving a summary of what has been said and can be powerful in making the other person feel as if they are being heard and understood because it reflects things back to them. In addition, we need to show empathy with the other person as this is another way to demonstrate great listening and understanding. There are many definitions of empathy, but one that I really like is ‘the ability to let someone know how they are feeling without them telling you’. In other words, we listen with our hearts as well as our ears. I once met a lady for the first time and over coffee was sharing with her a big dream of mine that really motivates me and brings tears to my eyes when I talk about it. At the moment of sharing this with her, she started to laugh. Seeing the look of shock on my face, she immediately apologised and went on to explain that she was laughing at me because she felt that it would be impossible for me to achieve that dream in my lifetime. Not only did she fail to demonstrate empathy with me, she also formed a judgment of what she thought was and wasn’t possible for me – despite the fact that she had only known me for 15 minutes! It would have been amazingly powerful had she demonstrated empathy at the moment that I had tears in my eyes because it would have built a great connection between us. To do this, all that she needed to have said was something simple such as “I can see how important that dream is to you”, and the understanding and bond between us would have been there. Empathy, then, is about being able to put yourself into the shoes of others and to understand how they are feeling. Listening at this level enables us to build a connection and trust that will support the other person to find better answers from our questions. The ability to listen in order to help someone find better answers demands even more of you, and what I am about to share will probably be the most challenging aspect of being able to listen to enable better answers. I will share with you some bad habits most of us have when listening and that way you can highlight what needs to change. The first bad habit is that we listen from the perspective of our own story. We are always looking for links to our own experiences from what the person is sharing with us so that we can then relate our own story when the other person stops speaking. Or, if we are being extremely rude, we may not even wait for the person to stop talking; as soon as they draw breath we may even interrupt them. Usually we are so keen for our story to be told that we stop listening to their story and are really focused on making our story more interesting than theirs. Although in everyday conversations telling our own story is not a bad thing – indeed this helps conversations flow – when we are listening to enable better answers, we need to let go of this habit. We need to let go for two reasons. The first is obvious; once we start formulating our story in our minds we are diluting our level of listening and will not be fully attentive to the conversation. The second is fundamental. If we start sharing our story in the conversation we are switching the focus back onto ourselves when the conversation and focus need to stay on the other person. We have to remember that the conversation is about them and it doesn’t matter about our story – even though our egos won’t like this! The only time that our story can be told is if it is definitely relevant to supporting the other person to find better answers. Exercise caution here because this is about them tapping into their innate wisdom, being resourceful and taking responsibility for finding their own answers. There may be occasions when our personal story will facilitate this, but my suggestion is to use this rarely, as the focus of the conversation can easily switch back to you, which is not where it should be! The second bad habit that I wish to highlight is what I call ‘listening from the perspective of your own meaning’. Here we are putting our own meaning and interpretation on what is being said and react accordingly. We use our own perceptions to assume, judge, provide opinions and advice; this rarely adds value. Let’s use an example to illustrate the point. If I tell someone that I am going to divorce my husband, they will immediately access their own experiences and opinions on the subject and respond accordingly. Examples of typical responses may range from it being ‘terrible’, ‘sad’, ‘joyous’ or even ‘blasphemous’, depending on the other person’s point of view. Whilst there is nothing wrong with having an opinion or judgment it is important that we recognise the impact of expressing it. Again, in everyday conversations, people expect us to express ourselves and this can lead to healthy arguments or debates. However, when we are listening to enable the other person to find their own answers, expressing opinions or judgments can be quite prohibitive, particularly if they oppose how the other person thinks or feels. Going back to the divorce example, if someone advised me that they thought it was a ‘terrible’ thing to do and I was actually feeling quite happy and excited about it, it would be difficult for me to continue a meaningful conversation with that person if the purpose of the conversation was to enable me to find better answers. Trust and rapport can be broken very quickly and now the other person will find it hard to express themselves for fear of being judged. The best advice I was ever given to help me become a great listener who can facilitate others finding better answers was to ‘listen as though you do not exist’. When this is done well it is extremely powerful in its impact but I find that people find it difficult to carry this out in practice. The biggest challenge to being able to do this is our own ego, because we become more interested when the conversation is about ourselves. We love to share stories, give advice, talk about experiences, give opinions and generally have a focus on ourselves (often because we believe this to be most helpful!) It will be challenging when you ask a question and the person responds with what you believe is the ‘wrong’ answer. It is very tempting when this happens to stop your questioning and to jump right back into giving advice. I need to reiterate the need therefore to listen as though you do not exist and to let go of your way and enable them to find those better answers themselves. The only time you should be telling someone that they are wrong is if you know it is illegal, life threatening or of danger to others – remember that there are many versions of a right answer. The overall challenge, therefore, is for us all to become more conscious of what is the most helpful way to act in different situations and to choose the best response in the circumstances. Given that we are there to enable the other person to find better answers, this is a perfect time to get ourselves out of the way and really be there to listen. From experience, I can tell you that this type of listening takes time and practice, but when you see the results that are achieved in terms of the other person being so much more resourceful it encourages us to start doing more of it. It really is quite magical!

CHAPTER TEN. Finding better answers

Many of the questions provided in this book are for you to ask yourself, but some people find it beneficial to talk through the questions with a partner and in this way to find a better answer. In fact, some people actually think aloud. Recognising that this is their preferred way of operating is important because this will be your key to finding a better answer. It is possible that you can simply speak aloud in your own company, if you feel comfortable and are able to do this. Alternatively, it means that you will need to find a trustworthy person who is willing to work with you and who is a good listener! This is not about seeking advice from someone else – you need to ask them to allow you the space to develop and find your own answer. I know from experience that they will be tempted to provide opinions, but as we have already learnt, accessing your own innate wisdom is likely to provide you with better answers. By all means invite someone to support you in asking better questions, but I suggest that they read the chapter on asking others questions first (or at least the summary of it) so that they allow you the time and space to find your own answers. Another option to find better answers is to write down or journal your ideas and thoughts. The benefit of this is that you are allowing yourself more time to ponder the question and it can sometimes be surprising what you write down. Things will come up in the process that you were not aware were in your mind, so it can be a powerful way of accessing deeper ideas and wisdom. Please use whatever resources work best for you. Some people like to use proper journals and notepads, others are happy to use recycled paper or notebooks. Alternatively, you can save responses into a file on your computer and record your responses in this way. The main thing is to remember that this is about you and for you, so do whatever works! Even if writing things down is not your preferred approach to finding a better answer, you are encouraged to give it a try as it may be that a different approach will work more effectively for you than relying on your often hurried way of thinking. Personally I have found this to be an effective way to make me ponder rather than rush through questions. It makes me slow down, which is a good thing! Another way to formulate new ideas is to make a collage to get the creative juices flowing. You may not know what you think, but cutting out pictures and/or words from magazines can be a way for you to gain more clarity about what it is that you are trying to discover. This activity certainly won’t work for everyone and may not be appropriate for certain questions, but it’s a way to have fun and at the same time become more creative and clearer in your thinking. When answering a question, general responses will only give you an outline of the situation. The questions are designed to help you to be specific; remember that the more precise your answers, the more clarity you will have to move forward. This in turn will lead to them having more impact on your life and you’ll have a much clearer picture of ways to move forward. Previously, we explored the need for an open mind when answering questions and I’d also like to emphasise the need for total honesty with yourself. Honesty leads to true awareness, but it requires courage and a willingness to look at yourself in the mirror, particularly if you don’t like what you see. It is sometimes the courage and willingness to face up to your fears or things you find difficult to accept that make the difference. When you summon the courage to take ownership of your actions, thoughts and feelings you will discover a more empowered sense to find better answers and to move forward. My suggestion to help you to be more honest is to get in touch with your feelings when answering the questions. If you feel anxious or awkward about answering a question, or dismiss it quickly, it is likely that there is something in the question that demands a greater level of honesty from you. My experience tells me that if you don’t work at this level your answers won’t be the best ones and you will end up revisiting the issue, so it’s far better to be honest in the first place. We have talked briefly about the need for patience when asking questions and I’d like to go back to this. Immediate answers are not always the best answers, despite most of us wanting the instant gratification of finding an answer straight away. There are times when, by deliberately taking our time to ponder, the quality of the answer is much better and insightful and is likely to come from our innate wisdom or intuition. I am not suggesting that all answers we produce quickly are wrong, but they are not likely to be well thought out and often come from those 60,000 thoughts that we have every day that are largely regurgitated from the previous day. If you are going to give yourself the gift of asking a better question, also allow yourself the gift of time to find an answer. Usually I know immediately that my answer is a better answer by whether I have had the idea before. If it’s a breakthrough thought it means that it gives me new insight and awareness that I haven’t had before. That said, if I come up with an answer that I have had before this doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t a better answer. It is possible that it is still a good answer and the issue becomes more about the fact that I’ve done nothing with the answer, rather than the answer itself. A thought that I’ve had before can still elicit a better answer, provided that I now take action and do something with it. Remember your mind contains an amazing wealth of untapped information. By posing questions, it will be working at a subconscious level to find answers, so pay attention to random thoughts that you have or even dreams that you experience. Answers may be found in unusual ways so listen to what is being provided. I can recall many times feeling stuck and not being able to come up with an answer to my question. However, I have learnt to be patient and to start to notice synchronistic events that happen that provide me with the right information at the right time. In addition, I have been amazed at what information is revealed to me in dreams, particularly when I have focused on my question immediately before going to sleep at night. I am very good at recalling my dreams the following day and when I go through the meaning of my dream I am astonished to find an answer in there somewhere that makes sense to me and gives me new insights. Some people find meditation very powerful in helping them find better answers. Whilst one form of meditation is about completely clearing the mind of thoughts, another way to meditate is to focus on a question with the idea of acquiring insights and awareness. Both forms of meditation – clearing the mind and focusing the mind – can be recommended when seeking better answers. There will be times when you feel frustrated that, try as you might, you can’t find an answer, especially when it becomes obvious that no answer exists – or so we think! Telling ourselves that we don’t know the answer immediately implants this message in our brains and we will stop searching for the answer. There are many reasons why we think we don’t know an answer and I’d like to address each of them in turn. We have already explored the fact that we can become set in patterns of lazy thinking. These are unconscious, repetitive thoughts that on the positive side help us get through the challenges of our day, but on the negative side mean we don’t become conscious of what we are thinking or allow ourselves to create ‘quality’ thoughts. This style of thinking is likely to generate an answer of “I don’t know” if no immediate answer comes to mind. This is unlikely to mean that you actually don’t know the answer; it simply means that you need to think about it further. In this case you need to give yourself more time to think it through, and if you still don’t know then that is a good time to either ask for advice, seek expert help or even allow yourself longer to ponder the question. The right way to proceed will depend on the nature of the question. If it is something technical or factual that you need to know, continuing to ask yourself may prove to be futile, so asking someone else may be the best option. However, if the question is about you and your life and decisions that impact on you, it’s much better to spend more time assessing the question as you are likely to be the best source for the answer. The next reason why some people don’t want to answer a question is when it is difficult for them to accept something that is true about themselves. The reluctance to answer comes from not wanting to take ownership or responsibility for the answer because if they do, then they have no one else to blame but themselves for the results or consequences that arise. This is quite confronting to consider and admit to, but it is one of the primary reasons why people ask others for an answer rather than looking for their own. The first step in dealing with this problem is to acknowledge what is true, and once you do that you are powerfully positioned to change the situation. To make changes, you will need to be honest with yourself about recognising what is holding you back from taking responsibility, and what you are afraid of. Sometimes it is a lack of confidence, in which case you may want to start by reaching your own conclusions and then by talking to a trusted person who will help you work through your answer. Sometimes it is about developing a pattern of blaming others, and when we recognise this, we can simply make conscious choices to stop behaving this way. On other occasions, it can be about fearing the consequences of taking responsibility. Maybe we feel we will get into trouble with someone or even ‘beat up’ on ourselves if we take ownership and things go wrong, and consequently we avoid responsibility because of this fear. If this is the case, the best solution is to work out what is the worst-case scenario for you and to come up with strategies of how you will deal with it. This usually enables you to feel differently about the prospect of taking responsibility and enables you to move forward. My final strategy to share with you in finding better answers is to bring you back to asking the ‘Why’ question. You will recall that earlier when we explored what types of questions to ask, it was suggested that ‘Why’ is not always a good way to start a question as it can appear judgmental as well as make you look for the negative reasons why you are stuck or can’t do something. However, there is a positive way that we can use ‘Why’ to help us find better answers. Often when we are trying to move forward with something we have two conversations going on in our minds – the voice that is positive and the negative voice or ‘saboteur’ that gives us all the reasons why we can’t do something. Rather than ignoring or trying to quieten that little voice, allow it an airing and ask what it’s saying to you. It’s likely to be stating some of your limiting beliefs that are most likely not true. However, despite this, we often give power to this voice over the one that is positive and so we fail to move forward. When you’ve asked what the voice is saying, try arguing with the issues by using a ‘Why’ question. Let’s use an example so that you are clear about what you need to do. Imagine that I say that one of the reasons that I won’t be able to achieve something is that I believe that I don’t have enough time. By asking the question “Why do I know I will have enough time?” or “What are all the reasons why I know I will have enough time?” I am inviting my brain to find me many positive reasons why I can overcome this negative belief. When I find these reasons, they can then outweigh the lone negative voice that is telling me something that isn’t true, and in this way we find answers to help us to move forward. Once you find the positive reasons to overcome the issue that is holding you back, keep asking yourself the ‘Why’ question; this will ‘reprogram’ your brain to find the positive response rather than the negative, limiting response. This is a simple yet powerful technique and works in helping us find better answers. Overall, the most important thing is for you to enjoy having the questions as a resource. Don’t get stressed and anxious about having to find answers as this will block your creative genius. In addition, be willing to experience and explore new thoughts even if they initially sound silly or illogical. By ignoring our initial judgments and allowing ourselves to be open to new possibilities it is far easier to find better answers than it is by only allowing answers to flow that fit our usual restricted view of the world. Being conscious of our reluctance to answer questions is a powerful way to stop the lazy response that “I don’t know” and allow ourselves the gift of pondering the question to find a better answer

CHAPTER ELEVEN. Taking action

Action planning becomes paramount to the success you can obtain from finding better answers. Simply having an awareness will not cut it, even if the mental and emotional part to any goal will play a significant part for you to successfully achieve it. It takes more than just this! Remember the ‘Three C model’, which stands for Conscious, Choice, Change? This chapter is about the middle C: making choices and taking action. We will also consider keeping motivated and on track to achieve the desired outcome. If we are asking ourselves or others better questions, at the end of the process we need to focus on deciding what we are going to do with the awareness, insight and better answers we have found. Simply asking a few more questions will facilitate this process and my suggestions are:

In the second point above, ideally we need to be aiming to score our commitment as an 8, 9 or 10 out of 10. This measure of our commitment on the scale is a good indicator of our intention to take action, and so if it is less than an 8 it is worth going back over the questions to work out what has to happen for it to be a 10 out of 10. The key is to be clear about what we are going to do and when we are going to do it, and to have made a commitment to undertake this. If we are working with someone else to assist us in finding better answers, setting a time to review our actions will be a powerful motivator and this will help us be accountable for taking action. It’s surprising how quickly we will let ourselves down, but not others. We only have to think about our failure to carry out our New Year’s resolutions to see this play out in practice! Given this, instead of working on our own it can sometimes be very powerful to involve others in some way in our action planning. This will vary depending on our individual preferences, but some ideas are to:

Carefully choose the people you work with, as you only want those who will encourage and motivate you. You do not need the advice of people who will give you all the reasons why you can’t achieve something or who constantly offer you their opinions. Unfortunately, some people have a pessimistic attitude and will try to shatter your dream if you allow them to do so. Another powerful way to turn action plans into reality is to make them visual and write them down. This can be as simple as a written goal statement, for example:

If you do this, it is important to make it a visual aid on which you can easily focus (my bathroom mirror tends to be a great place for me as it often catches my attention) Another, more creative, way to make the goal and planned actions more motivating is to create a collage and put it in a place where you can easily see it. Have fun by creating something that gives you great pleasure when you look at it – include pictures, words, photos – anything that represents your goal, gets you excited and helps to keep you on track towards achieving your goal. It is vital that we work out a reason for achieving the goal, and make this reason so compelling and meaningful that we will keep on track no matter what. The reason has to have a positive emotional charge and should be something that will change our internal ‘self‑talk’. If we can identify our own reason and make it very powerful for ourselves, then we will keep focused, on track and be successful no matter what challenges we are faced with. Let me share an example. When I don’t feel like going to the gym, I remember that without my health I can’t achieve my dream to make a profound difference in the world and that gives me the motivation to go. In addition, finding all the positive impacts that achieving our goal will have on our lives will also add weight to our ability to stay on track. Take time to explore what these positives are and be sure to write them down and make them visible. Think about different areas of your life and write down what the positive impacts on it will be if the goal is successfully achieved. The areas to focus on are:

Not all of these categories will necessarily apply to all of our goals, but if we focus on as many as we can this will be a key to keeping motivated and on track. My final recommendation to facilitate your taking action is to focus on the answers to the positive ‘Why’ questions that we introduced in an earlier chapter. Our internal, limited ‘self-talk’ will try to take us off track by telling us all the reasons why our goals and dreams are unachievable. The positive ‘Why’ questions help us to find the reasons to overcome these issues and are ideal at keeping our minds focused on success and moving forward. Writing our reasons down and making them visible will keep our minds focused on them, and will remind us in times of doubt (which inevitably there will be) of the reasons why we will succeed and achieve our desired outcomes. To conclude this chapter, I have included three abridged modules from my website: www.betterquestionsaretheanswer.com. They are totally related to this chapter on action planning. My intention in including these modules is to use your answers to help you become focused, clear, disciplined and committed in using what you have learnt to take action now, and in the future. Have fun with the questions! Better questions to set better goals

Better questions to get things done!

Better questions to keep motivated

CHAPTER TWELVE. Using questions to manage our emotions

Most people do not accept responsibility for their emotional responses to situations and are very good at blaming others for their feelings. Typical expressions we use are: “She made me feel …”, “If that didn’t happen I wouldn’t feel this way”. What we don’t realise is that if we use these statements we are giving our power away to the situation or other person and there is an assumption that there is nothing that can be done about it. Real intelligence then is in taking responsibility for our feelings and making choices to help manage ourselves and situations in a more empowered way. It was an enlightening moment in my life when I realised that only I can control my emotions and the way I feel about something. Of course, knowing something is all very well but being able to carry it out in practice is often challenging. Sometimes people wish they didn’t know any better; at least if they are ignorant they don’t have to work on changing anything! The fact that you are reading this book shows that you are not of that mindset and exploring how questions can help us manage our emotions more effectively will be useful to reflect upon. If we accept that ultimately we are in control of our emotions, good questions will be a useful tool in helping us become more conscious of proactively changing them. One thing that I must point out here is that every emotion is valid, and is never wrong. This is not about not feeling a certain way, or making it wrong to feel a certain way. What can be wrong is the behaviour that follows the emotion, but the emotion itself is always valid. That said, the intelligence about our emotions comes into play when we look at our ability to recognise an emotion, understand what triggered it and then take appropriate action to manage it. Clearly if you are experiencing joy and happiness, long may it continue – the intelligence then becomes about understanding what makes you feel that way and ensuring you do more of it rather than trying to change anything. Questions can be a powerful tool in instigating us to change our emotions. They help us to become conscious of the source of the emotion and when we think about the question that has been posed our emotions can change rapidly. Generally, just thinking about the question has the power to alter emotions, so by using questions we can change the way we think and feel about something. Imagine that your partner is late home from work and that this is unusual behaviour. There could be many possibilities as to why they are late, but we usually lock in one potential explanation and base our feelings on that situation. So, if we think they have been in an accident we are likely to feel worried and upset. If we think that they have chosen to go for a drink after work with their mates, we will probably feel frustrated or angry. If we think they are having an affair we will probably feel jealous and upset. The thought will generate the emotion we are experiencing and often this is done unconsciously. If we become conscious of the feeling and ask ourselves a better question, then it may be possible to shift the feeling quickly. A question such as “What is the most likely reason that this has happened?” will help us to carry out a reality check on our version of events. Maybe a question such as, “What else could have possibly happened?” may invite us to look for more positive possibilities. For example, the person who is late may have stopped off to buy you a gift on the way home from work. Einstein famously said: “The way we see the problem, is the problem.” Questions can invite us to confront a problem in a different way; what seemed like an unsolvable predicament suddenly unravels and becomes clear. There was no problem at all! When we change, things change. Since I have become aware of using questions to help me manage my emotions more effectively I have had amazing success at being able to shift some long-held unconscious patterns of response that emotionally were not very intelligent. Let me share with you one powerful example to show how it is possible for you to change. Since I emigrated to Australia more than a decade ago, I have been given a hard time about my northern English accent – always in a fun and jovial way I might add. This has occurred most often in work situations when I have pronounced the vowels in words such as ‘fun’ or ‘push’. Because my accent was poles apart from the local accent, I stood out as being different to everyone else. Whilst the teasing was in jest, I found myself taking it personally. I joined in with the laughter, but internally I found myself feeling upset, annoyed and sometimes angry that this ‘ribbing’ was happening. Some of you will be familiar with the classical conditioning experiment that Nobel prize-winner Ivan Pavlov carried out on his dog. The dog learned that every time a bell rang it would get food, so its conditioned response was to salivate every time it heard the bell. Emotions are much the same. A situation takes place and our emotion kicks in almost automatically, with no real conscious thought about our response. Research suggests there is only something like 0.2 of a second before an emotion kicks in after the event, so there is little time for someone to choose a response. However, there is a process of questioning that I use to help me manage this situation more effectively. I will now share it with you, initially at a theoretical level and then on a practical level by showing how I actually carried it out. The first powerful question that needs to be asked will help us become more conscious of what is going on, so asking the question “How am I feeling?” is a great way to get started. Once this has been identified, the next question is “What caused me to feel this way?” What we are trying to identify here is the triggering event or situation that created the feeling. This may not always be obvious as sometimes there are a number of events that build up that cause us to overreact to a trivial event. Please take time to explore this to uncover what is the root cause of the feeling. Once we have identified this, the next powerful question to ask ourselves is “How am I choosing to see or interpret this situation?” This question helps us to become conscious of the frame or version of reality in which we see a situation and is usually identifiable from becoming aware of our internal ‘self-talk’. It is interesting to note that the words and tone we use influence the way we feel about what we are telling ourselves. Having become aware of this interpretation, the opportunity to move forward comes from the next question, which is “How else can I interpret or see this situation?” This question provides us with an opportunity to take another look at what is happening to see if there is a more positive, healthy or less intense version of events that we can consider. To be effective you are invited to have an open mind and a willingness to be flexible about what is actually true, otherwise you will be locked into the same inflexible patterns of perceptions of reality. The next step happens almost like magic. As soon as you see a different version of reality, one that is more positive and less intense, amazingly the feelings shift almost as quickly as they appeared. You will recall the example I gave earlier of how you might interpret a situation where your partner is late home from work. You can see how powerful this technique is. A negative thought creates a negative feeling. A positive thought creates a positive feeling. Thus, the final question becomes “How do I feel now that I have put a different interpretation on this?” Acknowledging that the feeling has shifted is powerful in itself. Let’s go back to my real life example of when I was teased about my accent, this time using the questions to see how they work in practice. I have posed the question below and then provided my answers based on my reality at that time: How am I feeling?Very upset, hurt, insulted and even angry that people can be so cruel and offensive. What caused me to feel this way?It was obviously the teasing that created the feeling and it happened as soon as the teasing started. How am I choosing to see or interpret this situation?My interpretation at this time was that they were insulting and belittling me and putting me down. This meant that they were being rude and nasty and were picking on me. How else can I interpret or see this situation?It was possible that they were simply having fun and engaging in some team banter. It may mean that they actually liked me because they felt comfortable to have a joke with me and that I was accepted as part of the team. It could also mean that this was a typical cultural way of behaving in the workplace and that there was no harm meant by any of it. How do I feel now that I have put a different interpretation on this?Analysing these different non-threatening interpretations immediately made me feel better. When I realised that it was just about having fun and that actually it meant that people liked me I felt so much better. The bottom line here is that the more conscious we are of our feelings and what caused them, the more opportunity there is to take control and consciously change them, if we choose to. Whilst this process sounds easy to do, in practice it takes a conscious, maintained effort to create sustained results, particularly with issues that you have been reacting to with the same intensity for a number of years. In this particular situation, I had felt upset, hurt and angry for about five years before I even became conscious that I could do anything about it. When I started to work through the questioning method above it really helped, but I needed to carry out the process for some time until I created a new response that I had chosen myself rather than go down the habitual response pattern route. Neuroscientists have proven that it is possible for the mind to ‘rewire’ the brain and its circuits. In other words, we will have unconscious, instinctual reactions to certain situations because the brain is programmed to work this way from an early age. If these situations or feelings remain at an unconscious level, they might play out the same way for the rest of our lives. However, if we allow our mind to consciously think differently this will facilitate the forming of a new pathway. When practised consistently, this can become the norm and the good news is that eventually the new emotional response doesn’t require conscious thought at all. I am still teased about my accent quite often, despite living in this beautiful country for many years! I am pleased to say that as soon as it happens now my reaction is to smile and embrace the moment with the person as being fun and good humoured. In fact, I even make a joke about it. It is such an amazing feeling when we take control of our negative emotions in this way, especially when the result is that we break habitual patterns of thinking and feeling simply by using a questioning approach. The final point that I wish to make here is that sometimes the best response is not to work on changing your response to situations, but to work on changing the situation. The required skills are outside the scope of this chapter, although on my website you will find modules that can help you to do this. (For example, the modules Better questions to be assertive and Better questions to be more confident) The following poem is simple and yet profound in its message. The verses represent the various stages of unconscious thinking and feeling: becoming conscious, practising a new way of thinking and feeling, and eventually learning the new way so that it is ingrained and develops into an unconscious habit. Enjoy! Portia Nelson’s poem, Autobiography in Five Short Chapters:

Copyright © 1993, by Portia Nelson, from the book There’s a Hole in My Sidewalk. Reprinted with permission from Beyond Words Publishing, Hillsboro, Oregon

CHAPTER THIRTEEN. Using questions in your parenting

I believe that we should use a questioning approach in our parenting role, and start when a child is young. I must stress that there will be limitations here in that there are times where you clearly need to be the person providing wisdom, knowledge, guidance, boundaries and life skills. Using questions with younger children helps them to think for themselves and to gain confidence in arriving at answers, which has to be a good thing to prepare them for adulthood. However, I want to emphasise how powerful using a questioning technique can be with teenagers and this chapter is focused on giving you some ideas to support you in doing this. The content is aimed at parents who want to create better communication and improved relationships with their teenage children. One of the biggest complaints teenagers have is that their parents don’t understand them. One of the greatest challenges for parents is finding effective ways to communicate with their children and to encourage them to create focus and meaning in their own lives. The suggested process I will share with you enables your teenagers to become clearer about what they want and to articulate this in a way that is non-judgmental and allows them be heard. As a parent, you are invited to participate in a process of questioning and listening to facilitate a road map for your teenagers that will leave them feeling empowered, excited and understood! Fundamental to any success in using this approach will be the way you act when you ask the questions. Being in the mindset of a typical parent will not produce success in this process. What I mean by ‘typical parent’ is someone who believes it is their role to be the expert and guide for their children – someone who knows best all of the time. Whilst I acknowledge that in many situations this description is true, for this process to work you need to imagine that your child is wearing a hat with a sign on it that says ‘expert’– which means you treat them as though they are the ones who have the answers. There are endless possibilities for the topics of parentchild discussions; however, for the purpose of this illustration I will employ the content that I used with my teenage nephew Tom, which related to establishing some goals and a sense of direction for his life over six to twelve months. It is assumed here that you have a healthy relationship with your child and that they will be open to having these conversations with you. If this is not the case, you may like to try asking questions in a less formal way to start building more trust before you use the approach suggested below. Some of the points discussed below have been covered previously in the book; however, I invite you to read these specific instructions in order to facilitate this questioning process with your teenager: Initial discussion

Take a break from the conversation and write down the responses in a document that summarises the questions asked and the responses to them – a sample is provided on the next page. Use the teenager’s own words as much as possible. EXAMPLE OF HOW YOU CAN SUMMARISE YOUR DISCUSSION. Vision for period ending ___________________________. For ____________________________________________

Action planning

Progress review session

Ongoing process. Keep this process going for as long as your teenager enjoys these conversations and benefits from them. The topics and questions can be varied to suit different circumstances. At the end of the chapter I have included some additional topics and related questions that you will find useful at different stages of your teenager’s life. It is important to note that you do not always need to use this technique in a formal setting. Any time that your teenager has a challenge or issue with which they are dealing, instead of responding to them with a ‘parent’ hat on and providing advice and answers, please remember that you can simply respond by asking a question. A lady who attended a series of workshops that we were running shared with us an inspiring story that had the audience in tears as she explained her progress when using the technique of asking questions instead of telling her daughter what to do. She described her relationship with her daughter prior to attending the workshop as being very tense and she felt that they were ‘head to head’ in arguments nearly every time they tried to have a conversation. It seemed it was impossible for them to agree on anything. They had even reached a point where it seemed easier to avoid talking to each other. During the workshop, she realised that she was adopting the role of a mum who ‘always knows best’ and that she consistently told her daughter what to do. She genuinely believed that she was right and that this was the way to be a good parent. Whilst in some instances this may have been the case, she recognised that if their relationship was to improve, and if she was going to allow her daughter to mature, start thinking for herself and take responsibility for her own ideas and actions, then she was going to have to start to reassess herself and the way she was interacting with her child. During the follow-up workshop that she attended with me, she explained to the group how, after the first workshop, she had returned home with the knowledge that she needed to change and to put what she had learned into practice. She began using the techniques that have been shared with you in this book and became a questioner and listener rather than a teller. She was amazed how positively her daughter responded and was shocked to find that their first conversation lasted a good 45 minutes. Previously their conversations had been brief and usually ended up with voices being raised and yet, magically, by using the techniques learned she had created a different outcome. She went on to report that during the weeks since the first workshop her relationship with her daughter had been totally transformed and she felt that they had re-established a healthy and loving mother-daughter bond. For me this report was very moving because it demonstrated that not only has this wonderful mum been prepared to be open-minded about herself and recognise some limitations in her approach, she has also put into action what she had learned to amazing effect. The philosophy behind achieving this outcome is simple. She has demonstrated beautifully that with openness and willingness to do things differently, using questions can transform your relationship with your teenagers. If you are wondering at what age you should start using questions with your kids, my response is that there never is a given age; the answer depends on the individuals involved. Recently, I was inspired when I reconnected with a lady who had attended a workshop that I had run to teach these skills. She told me that she had been using questions with her five-year-old daughter, to great effect. She described how her daughter wanted to do time-consuming activities just before bedtime. She would always have to tell her daughter that she couldn’t do them because it was too late and that she would get too tired. This usually resulted in her daughter becoming upset and frustrated. Once the lady had learnt about asking better questions she responded to her daughter’s requests by asking the question “What do you think will happen if you do that now?” Her daughter’s reply was interesting. She said she would get tired, so the lady then asked her to think of a better time when she would be able to do the things she wanted. This time her daughter said that it would be better to do the activities the following day. This interaction changed things considerably as the daughter was coming up with her own solutions and was thinking about things differently, which in turn meant that she was happier. Of course, her mum was amazed at her daughter’s reaction to the gentle questioning. In the past, mum had felt rather guilty for always saying ‘no’ to her child’s requests but she now felt much better because she no longer had to tell her tearful child what to do all of the time. In summary, as a parent you can use better questions to develop better relationships with your kids and at the same time teach them the skills to think for themselves and to take responsibility for their actions. By broadening your scope to include the skill of asking better questions you will undoubtedly be a better parent! Following are some more questions that you can ask your teenagers. The questions relate to different situations your teenagers may face – enjoy asking the questions! Better questions to help your teen plan a trip

Better questions to help your teen make choices about their studies

Better questions to help your teen make choices about their work

CHAPTER FOURTEEN. Asking better questions in the workplace

Let’s imagine that a team member – we’ll call her Jane – has a problem and approaches a manager or colleague for help and that the outcome of their communication is that the problem is soon resolved by the manager telling her what to do. In isolation, it can be interpreted that there is nothing wrong with that. In fact, one perspective is that this is a good outcome in that Jane achieved a resolution to her problem and can now get on with her work while the person in charge has proved their capability and usefulness by being helpful. Whilst there are obvious benefits to this approach there are also potential concerns, particularly if this becomes the ‘norm’ in terms of how Jane’s day-to-day problems or challenges are handled. Let’s expand on this to ensure that it is fully understood. One issue is that Jane is not thinking for herself. Some people get into a pattern of becoming reliant upon another person and as soon as they have a problem, will immediately refer to this person without necessarily thinking things through for themselves. Most people do have ideas to help resolve a problem; however, rarely do they consciously stop to think about it as they have a habit of always resorting to others for help. If asked, it is highly likely that Jane will have some ideas of how to resolve the problem, but if nobody asks her, Jane’s solutions will not usually be forthcoming. Dependency on others can be perceived in two ways. From the perspective of the person in authority who is being asked the questions, they can feel significant, in control and enjoy the ‘power’ of being needed. Indeed, I have met many people who are afraid to let go of this feeling because they believe it gives them more security in their roles – their organisations simply could not cope without them (or so they like to think!). If they believe that they have become indispensible to their team they can justify their position and why they are paid more than their colleagues or team members. The main problem with this dependency is that the person in charge will tend to have a queue of people at their door and will find it hard to get any of their own work done! Managers or experts who operate in this way usually find it hard to take leave from their job and dread being away from their desk because they know there will be lots of people seeking them out when they get back. Whilst most people in this position will frequently complain about their inability to take leave, they rarely stop to think about what generates the problem and, if they do, their need for control and power often overrides the desire to do anything about changing it. Occasionally there will be staff members who deliberately seek out their manager’s advice in every situation because they are reluctant to take any responsibility in finding an answer for themselves. These people tend to have a ‘victim’ mentality; not only do they avoid taking responsibility, they enjoy blaming others whenever anything goes wrong. People who adopt this position can be quite challenging to work with, particularly when you start to question them. The exciting thing about asking questions is that when people respond to the question they begin to take responsibility. However, those who are entrenched in a ‘victim’ mindset will recognise this and will evade a question just to avoid taking responsibility. One of the most common mistakes managers make with these people is to capitulate and take on the responsibility. A typical response from a ‘victim’ is that it really isn’t their responsibility to find an answer. Given this reaction, a manager will feel pressured to respond because they feel that they are letting their team members down if they don’t ‘help’, or they buy into the belief that it really is the manager’s role to solve problems. Be wary! This is a trap that can easily be fallen into and it is important that you consciously think about your response to a staff member in these situations. There is no standard response to these situations. Everyone is different and it is up to the questioner to decide upon the best response at any given time, given the unique dynamics of each person. That said, it is important to recognise what is creating the person’s ‘victim’ mentality in the first instance. I have worked with people for many years and have a good sense of their mindsets and what drives their behaviour. It is apparent that there are really two types of ‘victims’ – the ‘situational’ ones who behave in a certain way in specific situations and the entrenched ‘victims’ who always behave in the same way no matter what the circumstances. Rather than operating in a normal fashion, in my experience those who adopt a situational ‘victim’ mentality in the workplace do so in response to their manager’s style and the workplace culture. I have worked in various organisations where it has been evident that people have learnt to operate in ‘victim’ mode in response to the previous manager’s style. Let me share some details about when I was the manager of a team of about 35 people. Interestingly, I was working in an area where I had very little technical knowledge – indeed, I’d sold myself at the interview on my ability to be a good manager and leader for the team, and not on my expertise in the field. It was clear to me early on that I had inherited a team mostly made up of ‘victims’ who had previously relied on their manager for answers, and who had willingly assumed responsibility and accountability. What proved to be challenging for me, as well as for the team, was that when they would ask me for help, often I wasn’t able to assist them because I didn’t have the technical knowledge necessary to address the issue. It was amazing to see how this situation unfolded because over time they realised that if they came to me they were going to be asked questions and invited to think for themselves and this resulted in the majority of the team beginning to take more ownership and responsibility. It was clear that these people had responded to the previous management style by becoming situational victims and as soon as the situation changed they changed. Another issue with a manager solving all of the workplace problems is that it quickly becomes a culture of ‘others always know best’, and new ideas and inputs are not welcomed, and indeed are not forthcoming. People quickly learn that this is the ‘way we do things around here’ and without overt encouragement will settle into a routine of doing tasks in a certain way. Whilst there may be some merit in this in that they are following a proven and set process, the challenge has to be made as to whether this is the best routine or process that is possible. A colleague once shared with me details of a cartoon strip that they had seen. The first illustration shows a man on his way to work. In the second illustration, the man is arriving at work and clocking in. The next shows the man opening up his chest and hanging up his heart and then he opens up his head and hangs up his brain. In the final illustration, he is seen walking into his workplace. Whilst this may seem an exaggeration there are many workplace cultures where this happens. There are managers who treat their team members as though they have little intelligence or feelings and will insist on them fitting in, conforming and doing things the way that is demanded of them. Some managers have been known to advise their team members that they are ‘not paid to think’. Workplaces such as this will come up with typical replies to innovative suggestions; responses such as “That wouldn’t work here” or “This is how we’ve always done it” or even “If it isn’t broken, why bother fixing it!” People quickly learn that they either fit in or they’ll be labelled as a ‘misfit’ and given that our human nature cries out for acceptance, the conforming option becomes the easiest and most comfortable one to take. Managers have to be prepared to look at themselves and question what sort of culture they are creating. Do they want to be seen as the expert who always has the answers and, if so, what are the consequences to this approach? There is no doubt that there is some comfort to be gained by being in control and having things done in a manner that fits with their way of doing things, but it is also good to be aware of the cost, not only to themselves, but also in the failure to utilise the potential of their team members. So, by asking instead of telling, there are opportunities for staff members to think for themselves and to learn and grow in the process. Even if they don’t know an answer, a discussion where they are involved in finding a solution helps them to become familiar with the thinking process that is being worked through. In other words, it allows and encourages them to start thinking for themselves. Remember, when a person has an idea or insight, chemical neurotransmitters (such as adrenaline) are released. This means they feel more energised and enthusiastic about an idea. Most of us can relate to having had a great thought or idea that immediately makes us feel good – that is exactly the process that happens when people are allowed to think for themselves. The bottom line is that if you as a manager or expert always answer people’s questions you are denying them the opportunity to think for themselves. People need to contribute, add value, be creative, challenge the way things are done, take responsibility – to learn and grow. Consequently, think carefully before you answer another question. Asking a question is likely to elicit a better response! By participating in a process of questioning and listening in the workplace you will:

I’d like to share an inspiring story of how using better questions in our workplace can create amazing results. Dr John was a medical doctor who worked in one of the major hospitals in the city where I live. I was working with him because he was new to his leadership position and was looking for support to grow and develop within his role. He shared with me his frustration at his team’s lack of ability to show initiative and to think for themselves. He went on to describe a typical scenario where he undertook the ward rounds when his team would show a distinct lack of initiative. The usual routine was that the junior doctors would arrive on the ward and wait passively for Dr John to arrive to undertake the round. Once the doctor arrived they would walk around with him while he perused case notes, expecting to be advised about the treatment each patient would receive. The junior doctors routinely followed Dr John, they took appropriate notes, occasionally asked questions and did what they were told to do. This process continued for a number of weeks until Dr John began to feel frustrated. When I questioned him about the process he was adopting with his staff, Dr John confessed that perhaps he was the one who needed to alter the way things were being done in order to facilitate a change in the attitude of the junior doctors. He had an idea he hoped would change the situation and encourage his team members to think for themselves. The following week when he went to the ward to begin the rounds, as usual the junior doctors were awaiting his arrival. He began the ward round as he always had done and read the patient notes aloud. However, this time he did something radically different. Instead of simply telling the junior doctors how they needed to treat each patient, he asked a question: “What do you think needs to be done with this patient?” His team members were shocked! They did not understand Dr John’s behaviour. No one was sure what was going on because Dr John had never asked a question before! Once they had recovered from the shock of being asked a question the junior doctors began to discuss among themselves what treatment should be carried out on the patient and for the other patients until the ward round was complete. For the remainder of the week Dr John consistently used a questioning approach, and this method engaged his team members. On the face of it, this change was rather subtle but it transformed the dynamics in the workplace environment. The following week when Dr John arrived at the ward to start his rounds, his team was not passively waiting for his arrival; they were deep in discussion among themselves. When he arrived he was immediately greeted with the words “Good morning Dr John, we thought that we’d make a start on the round today and have already looked at the notes for this first patient. We have had a meeting and would now like to discuss with you our recommendations for the patient’s treatment.” Dr John’s was shocked that his team were starting to think for themselves and were using their initiative. His questions had enabled them to start on a journey of more resourcefulness, and they had demonstrated that they were more than ready to do this by responding in a different way. The issue clearly wasn’t their lack of desire or ability to think for themselves. The core issue was that Dr John had not been allowing the team to tap into their potential. He quickly learnt that when he changed the way he did things his team also changed. What is so refreshing about this true story is Dr John’s preparedness to change the way he did things. It is easy to blame others for their lack of ability or resourcefulness, but when we reflect on what we do it is possible to see that things can be done differently and this will lead to spectacular results. The interesting thing here is that when Dr John was telling me about the fabulous result that he had achieved he reflected that the reason he did the ward rounds in the previous manner was because that was the way that it was done when he was a junior doctor. It was only when I asked him a better question that he was able to become conscious of his current routines, to find a better answer and then make a conscious choice to change, in order to achieve a better result. Very inspiring!

CHAPTER FIFTEEN. Q&As to better questions. What if I really don’t know the answer?

The bottom line is, there may be occasions when you seek an answer where you don’t have the required knowledge or information to answer the question, in which case seek out expert advice. However, there are many situations where you do know the answer and the reason you are saying that you don’t may result from a lack of confidence or reluctance to take responsibility. What if I’m dumb? I don’t consider myself to have innate wisdom. Nobody is dumb – we have different levels of ability. But we all have innate wisdom, particularly when it comes to making decisions and finding answers about ourselves. If we continue to label ourselves as stupid we are potentially limiting out ability to tap into that wisdom. Self-talk is very powerful, particularly if we begin to believe it. If we tell ourselves that we are wise and do have the answers the results will be amazing! When is it OK to ask for advice or to tell someone what to do? When asking others better questions it is best if we assume that there is a possibility that they know the answer or at least that they have some ideas. Once we tell someone the answer we can’t undo what has been said and our response will likely influence the other person’s opinion and judgment. It is far better to ask a question and if after an appropriate time the other person really doesn’t know the answer to your questions then you may offer suggestions and wisdom. That said, remember the skills of patience and persistence that have been discussed in this book and also the fact that, even when we make suggestions, we should always allow the other person to make the final call about what they think is the best answer. When asking yourself better questions you have to make a judgment call as to when you need to seek advice. Usually you know if you are unable to answer a particular question but it is important that you be honest with yourself about this, rather than use it as an excuse not to ponder the question or not to take responsibility. If you need a quick response to something and you are finding it difficult to arrive at an answer in the required timeframe, by all means ask for advice and opinions. It is possible that the wisdom imparted by the other person will trigger further thoughts and ideas within you, which you can use to build on and develop your own answer. The key thing for you to avoid here is a reliance on others for advice, especially when you take this advice without giving any further thought to it and without working out whether it really is good advice at all. How do I know what is the next best question to ask myself or others? Using scripted questions similar to those provided in this book and on our website is a great way for you to start using better questions. That said, if when you are asking the questions you come up with your own line of questioning, then definitely follow it. You are the one involved in the conversation. It is often said that the clue to the next best question lies in the answer that has just been provided, so use your listening skills and intuition to decide the next best question to ask. This applies equally to whether you are asking yourself the question or asking questions of others. As you develop these skills further you can use your intuition and skills to develop the questions so that they flow on to support finding better answers. You will find that you develop the habit of asking better questions and you can learn from using the process consistently. If you trust that you will work out the next best question, it will surely be asked! What if someone is reluctant to answer my question? Sometimes when asking others better questions they will be reluctant to answer. Usually this is not because the other person is unable to answer but because there is a lack of rapport between you; perhaps the person doesn’t yet feel comfortable. If you focus on building rapport by using the techniques shared earlier you will find that their reluctance to answer will be overcome. However, if the reluctance seems to be more fundamental as a result of the person avoiding responsibility or lacking in confidence then we need to think about some alternative ways that enable us to move forward. Taking a more encouraging or nurturing approach will help the other person to feel comfortable when sharing their answers. Ask them to make a guess, or to take a little longer to answer a question. It may feel as if you are talking to a child, but some people haven’t learnt the art of finding better answers, therefore they need assistance until they become comfortable when answering questions. Occasionally, confronting the person by pointing out that they seem to be reluctant to take responsibility for finding answers for themselves can help them to move forward. They may not have recognised this pattern within themselves and it may assist if you talk it through to enable them to make some changes to this habit. If the person will not take that ownership, and continues to ask you to provide answers, you will have to decide if you wish to continue to do this for them. Remember, every time we answer for them we are disempowering them and perpetuating that ‘victim’ mentality we discussed earlier, so perhaps the greatest gift you can give them is to stop playing the rescuer role in their lives. Taking time out to explain and explore why better questions are the answer may help. Invite them to see how they can personally benefit from answering questions and give them some space to reflect on their decisions. How do I build rapport with someone in order to get them to trust me? Building rapport is a skill and most of us do it unconsciously and are quite successful at it. If you are more of a ‘people person’ it is likely that you already have this skill and don’t need to do anything differently. However, if you struggle to build rapport there are a few things you can do:

CHAPTER SIXTEEN. More questions for your toolkit

Better questions to challenge myself

Better questions to develop wisdom

Better questions to improve my self awareness

Better questions to be happy

Better questions to reflect on my life

Better questions to be more reflective

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•less judgment

•less command and control

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