Scrum Mastery

by Geoff Watts

The first stage is asking observational or objective questions, such as What happened? Who said what? When did it happen? The aim here is to gather some facts about the situation without interpreting or analysing them. The second stage is asking reflective questions such as How did that affect you? How do you feel about that? How do you think others were affected by that? The aim here is to learn about how the team feels about the situation. The third stage is to ask interpretive questions, such as Why do you think that happened? What do you think that means? How do you think that will affect you/them/the organisation? The aim here is to understand the meaning or significance of the situation. The fourth stage is to ask decisional questions, such as What are you going to do? How could you move this forward? What would you consider a positive outcome? The aim here is to help the team make some progress, or at least make a plan to make progress. After all of these types of questions, we come to the powerful questions. A powerful question is one that causes curiosity, intrigue and often touches a deep meaning. A powerful question usually requires a paradigm shift for it to be answered. You can usually notice when you have asked a powerful question because it is usually followed by one or more of the following: • A shift in body posture, perhaps a tilt of the head or a change in how they are sitting. • A period of silent contemplation, which you must be very careful not to fil...