Leadership Skill: Master Your Questions

Leaders are called to find answers to problems and difficulties, one of the best ways to find them is asking questions. The right questions can help you move towards your goals faster than you think. A good question can give you the answers you’re looking for, but in order to formulate that question you have to know how to formulate them.

There are two kind of questions, open ended questions, and close ended questions. Of course, each type is used for a different reason. Let’s take a look at them.

OPEN ENDED QUESTIONS

These kind of questions are used to encourage people to talk about the things that are relevant to them. Questions like these help you to establish a connection (rapport), increase understanding, and gather information. The good thing about these questions is that they are an invitation for others to show you their points of view about the subject you’re dealing with. You let them express themselves in the conversation. Open ended questions are ment to be used everytime you want a deeper understanding of a subject or you want to let your counterpart to express their feelings, emotions, understanding, or point of view about it.

You have to bear in mind, that sometimes people don’t want to further explain their points of view, or express their feelings, so you have to be curteous and polite when asking these questions, you have to build rapport talking about some things before going into the hard points of the conversation.

Examples of open ended questions are:

Why?
How would you describe your relationship with your parents?
Can you further explain that?

CLOSE ENDED QUESTIONS

They are used to get definite answers on the topic you’re dealing with. They help to move your talk towards a single point or decision. They’re usually answered with a Yes or a No. To formulate close ended questions you have to start them with a verb. For example: “Are,” “Will,” “Is,” “Have,” “Did,” you can also use the negative forms “Aren’t,” “Didn’t”, and others as well.

Good examples of these kind of questions are:
Are you ready to start?
Will you move tonight?
Did we have the necessary funding before starting the project?
As you can see, all the previous three questions can be answered with a yes or a no.

OPEN ENDED VS CLOSE ENDED

What kind of questions should you ask? Both of them. The thing is when and how. Remember, the goal of each type of question is different. And as we always say, you have to know where you’re headed in order to know what kind of question to ask. Remember, your choice of the form of the questions you ask can give you rich or poor information. The challenge here is to pick the proper questions at the right time.

One more tip, when asking close ended questions be sure to be warm and friendly, even use a curious tone of voice. Sometimes these kind of questions are not easy to answer, so you have to be courteous, caring and concerned.

LEADERSHIP ACTIONS

Every time you’re talking to someone you have think about why you’re talking with them and what is the goal of the conversation. With that in your mind, you’ll start to pick the right questions. Practice will make you a master, and in less time than you think you’ll be getting the information you’re looking for from the people you talk to. So start your practice.

Remember Be Alert, Be A Leader