Asking Good Questions: A Real Power Tool

When you listen attentively, you make an incredible discovery. Sometimes, the person is not delivering the information you need. The chief tool of the good listener is a good question. Questions are marvelous tools for stimulating, drawing out, and guiding communication.
Asking a good question is a learned skill requiring years of training. The foundation of good question-asking is knowing what information you want to obtain. Here are seven handy guidelines for asking better questions — questions that are likely to get to the meat of things:

• Plan your questions in advance. Prepare what you’re going to ask about but don’t memorize the exact wording, or you’ll sound artificial. A script is too restrictive to flow naturally into the conversation. However, it pays to outline your purpose and a sequence of related questions. If you plan ahead, you can follow the speaker’s train of thought and harvest much more information. Pretty soon, the speaker is comfortably divulging information. The question-and-answer format can act as an aid to good communication rather than a block.
• Ask with a purpose. Every question you ask should have one of two basic purposes: to get facts or to get opinions (see Table 8-1 for examples of each). Know which is your goal and go for it, but don’t confuse the two concepts.
• Tailor your question to your listener. Relate questions to the listener’s frame of reference and background. If the listener is a farmer, use farming examples. If the listener is your teenager, make references to school life, dating, or other areas that will hit home. Be sure to use words and phrases the listener understands. Don’t try to dazzle your 5-year-old with your vast vocabulary or slip computer jargon in on your technologically handicapped, unenlightened boss.
• Follow general questions with more specific ones. These specific inquiries, called follow-up questions, generally get you past the fluff and into more of the meat-and-potatoes information. This progression is also the way that most people think, so you are leading them down a natural path. Never doubt how effective the follow-up question can be. It’s so powerful that most presidents of the United States do not allow reporters to ask them. Pay attention during the next White House news conference. Usually, one reporter asks one question, and then the president calls on the next reporter to avoid a follow-up question from the first reporter. The follow-up question is the one that ferrets out the facts.
• Keep questions short and clear — cover only one subject. Again, this tip helps you shape your questioning technique to the way the mind really works. People have to process your question. This is no time to show off. Ask simple questions. Questions are just a way to lead people into telling you what you want to know. If you really want to know two different things, ask two different questions. You’re the one who wants the information; you’re the one who should do the work. Crafting short questions takes more energy, but the effort is worth it. Pretty soon, the other party is talking to you about the subject, and you can drop the questioning all together.
• Make transitions between their answers and your questions. Listen to the answer to your first question. Use something in the answer to frame your next question. Even if this takes you off the path for a while, it leads to rich rewards because of the comfort level it provides to the person you are questioning. This approach also sounds more conversational and therefore less threatening. This is one reason why I urge you to plan your questions, not to memorize them.
• Don’t interrupt; let the other person answer the question! You’re askinthe questions to get answers, so it almost goes without saying that you need to stop talking and listen.

The film The Silence of the Lambs is an excellent example of each of the above elements of the question-and-answer dynamic. In one of the film’s pivotal scenes, FBI agent Clarice Starling questions the sinister Dr. Hannibal Lecter in his dungeon-like holding cell. She wants clues about a serial killer on the loose. Lecter offers to provide her with clues if she provides him with stories of her past. Watch how Starling quietly listens to Lecter’s questions and how she asks for the clues to help her find the killer. Both parties ask direct and tailored questions planned in advance. Watch the question-and-answer scenes in the film for a lesson not only in how to ask questions, but also in how to wait patiently for the answer.

How big’s your pocket?

I wish I could say that I always eliminated the confusions that occur when vague terms are used. The truth is that people think that they don’t have time to do so. Sometimes, you just want to get out of a conversational situation, and the last thing you want to do is prolong things by making absolutely sure that you have all the details correct. Other times, being specific just doesn’t seem that important. Rarely do any of these “reasons” outweigh the benefits of getting specific information.
I recently had a meeting with a wealthy investor. When we were finished discussing the subject of our meeting, he mentioned that he had given “pocket money” to one of my clients. I took that, quite literally, as a small amount of reimbursement for nonspecific expenses. I thought, “Oh, that’s nice” and said as much. In the South, we call that kind of money “walking around money.” Later, I learned that he had written a check for $100,000 and was annoyed and frustrated with my client at the way the money was being spent. He was also unhappy with me for not rectifying the situation after he had informed me about it. Needless to say, I was shocked to learn all of this from a trusted friend whom the investor and I had in common. Fortunately, we were able to remedy the problem right away.
If his comment had been the subject of the meeting, I would have sought clarification at the moment. As it was, I didn’t give the comment much thought, and his annoyance continued to simmer until I heard the complaint clearly two weeks later and was able to fix it. This story is a happy one because I learned the details fairly quickly. The situation could have smoldered and seriously damaged my client’s and (unfairly) my own relationship with that investor. And why? Lack of clarity. When my client explained carefully and completely how the money was being spent, the investor was not only satisfied, he advanced more money. Some of the best time you can spend in almost any situation is that extra moment it takes to make sure that everyone is communicating clearly.