Leading with Questions: How Leaders Find the Right Solutions by Knowing What to Ask

by Michael J. Marquardt

Questions wake people up. They prompt new ideas. They show people new places, new ways of doing things. They help us admit that we don't know all the answers. They help us become more confident communicators.

Too often, we ask questions that disempower rather than empower our subordinates. These questions cast blame; they are not genuine requests for information.

Questions have become essential for our success. Poor leaders rarely ask questions of themselves or others. Good leaders, on the other hand, ask many questions. Great leaders ask the great questions. And great questions can help you become a great leader!

What I came to realize is that solving others' problems is exhausting. It is much more effective to provide the opportunity for them to solve their own problems.”

“The easy way to lead, particularly if you are competent at your job, is to tell people how to do things in the way you have been successful.”

Groupthink is the term Irving Janis coined for this phenomenon: the kind of flawed group dynamics that lets bad ideas go unchallenged by questions and disagreement and that can sometimes yield disastrous outcomes.

John Kotter, the noted Harvard professor and author on leadership, writes that the key difference between leaders and managers is that leaders focus on getting to the right questions, whereas managers focus on finding solutions to those questions.

Peter Drucker found that effective executives all tended to follow the same nine practices: They asked, “What needs to be done?” They asked, “What is right for the enterprise?” They developed action plans. They took responsibility for decisions. They took responsibility for communicating. They were focused on opportunities rather than problems. They ran productive meetings. They thought and said “we” rather than “I.” They listened first, spoke last!14 Questions are at the heart of each of these practices.

The importance of asking questions was forcefully conveyed in 1843 when John Stuart Mill wrote The System of Logic, in which he noted the emptiness of a set of opinions accumulated without the help of strong-sense critical thinking. “He who knows only his side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may have been good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, he has no ground for preferring with opinion.”15

Questions and responses to those questions provide necessary and valuable information to solve problems faster and make better decisions. They give leaders the opportunity to gain unfiltered information. Through questions, leaders seek to learn not only what directly causes the problem or what solutions may work (which is single-loop learning), but also to seek to discover and learn what might be the underlying causes and solutions (double-loop learning) as well as the culture and mindset that create these causes and solutions (triple-loop learning).

Superb questions accomplish a number of wonderful results. So what constitutes a great question for the leader to ask? There is no single correct answer, of course, but most of us who have experience with great questions would agree that they can create the following benefits: Cause the person to focus and to stretch. Create deep reflection. Challenge taken-for-granted assumptions that prevent people from acting in new and forceful ways. Generate courage and strength. Lead to breakthrough thinking. Contain the keys that open the door to great solutions. Enable people to better view the situation. Open doors in the mind and get people to think more deeply. Test assumptions and cause individuals to explore why they act in the way that they do as well as why they choose to take action. Generate positive and powerful action.

Mark Harper, president of wholesale marketing for ConocoPhillips Petroleum, shared some of his favorite questions with me: What is a viable alternative? What are the advantages and disadvantages you see in this suggestion? Can you more fully describe your concerns? What are your goals? How would you describe the current reality? What are a few options for improvement? What will you commit to do by when?

Some why questions have such power to make us reflect and perhaps see things in fresh, unpredictable ways that they should be added to our collection of great questions to treasure and use often. Questions such as “Why do you think that?” or “Why did this work?” can help the group examine old issues in new, original ways. Here are some other examples of questions with a reliable power to produce rich responses: Can that be done in any other way? What other options can we think of? What resources have we never used? What do we expect to happen if we do that? What would happen if you did nothing at all? What other options do you have? What is stopping us? What happens if . . . ? Have we ever thought of . . . ?

Other types of open-ended questions have a wide variety of uses. Specific types of open-ended questions include the following: Explorative questions open up new avenues and insights and lead to new explorations: Have you explored or thought of . . . ? Would such a source help . . . ? Affective questions invite members to share feelings about an issue: How do you feel about leaving this job? Reflective questions encourage more exploration and elaboration: You said there are difficulties with your manager; what do you think causes these difficulties? Probing questions invite the person or group to go more deeply into a particular issue, to examine thoroughly or to question closely. This is useful not only for getting more information, but also for getting people to be more open and expansive in their thinking; words such as describe, explain, clarify, elaborate, or expand get into more depth or breadth on a topic. For example: Can you elaborate on why this is happening? Fresh questions challenge basic assumptions: Why must it be that way? What do you always . . . ? Has this ever been tried? Questions that create connections establish a systems perspective: What are the consequences of these actions? Analytical questions examine causes and not just symptoms: Why has this happened? Clarifying questions help free us from ambiguity, but such questions are sometimes difficult to ask. When we hear a question, we tend to think we should know what the other person means, and that it...

Here are some examples of closed questions: How many people will be affected? Did you agree with this decision? When should we meet? What time is it? Do you prefer Plan A or Plan B? As noted, open-ended questions tend to explore possibilities, feelings, and reasons why. In contrast, closed questions tend to focus on facts: what, when, where. Because they call for specific responses, closed questions also tend to be quick and easy to answer.

Closed questions are useful at the beginning and end of conversations. As you start a conversation, asking a simple closed question makes it easy for people to answer and doesn't force them to reveal too much about themselves. For example, you might begin a conversation by asking, “Is this a good time for us to talk?” At the end of a conversation, closed questions can help you clarify or seek further understanding of the results of the discussion and reach closure on a decision or course of action. Salespeople often use closed questions when they move in to close the sale: “If I can deliver this tomorrow, will you sign for it now?”

Here are some examples of questions asked from the learner mindset, according to Adams: What's good or useful about this? What possibilities does this open up? What can we do about this? How can we stay on track? What can we learn from this? For contrast, here are some examples of judging questions: Why is this a failure? What's wrong with you? Whose fault is it? Why can't you get it right? By consciously adopting a learning mindset, we can become more open to new possibilities and ask questions more effectively.

Here are some specific suggestions that can help you coach others and adopt a learning attitude: Respond without judging the thoughts, feelings, or situations of other people. Consider yourself a beginner, regardless of experience. Avoid focusing on your own role (which can lead to a self-protective approach) and take the role of an outside observer, researcher, or reporter. Look at the situation from multiple perspectives, especially your respondents'. Look for win-win solutions. Be tolerant of yourself and of others. Ask clarifying questions. Accept change as constant, and embrace it.

It is best if the leader frames questions in a positive way, using what Cooperrider refers to as “appreciative inquiry.”2 Appreciative inquiry is “the study and exploration of what gives life to human systems when they function at their best.”3 This approach to personal and organizational change is based on the assumption that questions and dialogue about strengths, successes, values, hopes, and dreams are themselves transformational (for both the questioner and the person questioned). It is a relational process of inquiry, grounded in affirmation and appreciation.

The key to framing good questions, according to Kouzes and Posner, is to think about the “quest” in your questions.4 What do you want this person to think about? What do you want to learn? A questing mindset shows that you care about the other person. There's a popular saying about this: people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care.

Try to ask one question at a time. Too often we overwhelm or confuse people by asking several questions simultaneously. Allow for a response before asking the next question.

Peter Drucker and others have noted that the most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said. This obviously requires careful, good listening. Effective listening skills are critical if you wish to get the most out of questions.

I am reminded of [Stephen R.] Covey's habit number 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood. It is important that I listen empathically and try getting inside the other person's frame of reference so I can listen with one purpose: understanding. One cannot truly understand the other person's position without questions. I then work on ensuring, also through questions, that I have clearly communicated my thoughts and ideas.

How can a leader develop a questioning culture? Here are some strategies that can build a powerful learning and questioning culture: Start at the top. The questioning culture must begin with the most senior leaders, who model the frequent use of good questions. Create an environment that enables people to challenge the status quo, take risks, and ask more questions. Recognize that many standard practices, policies, and procedures are no longer valuable to the company—if they ever were. Connect the values and processes of the organization to the use of questions. Optimize the opportunities to ask questions by building questioning into every business activity, including formal and informal meetings, sales calls, conferences with clients, or presentations. Reward and appreciate questioners; promote risk taking and tolerate mistakes. Provide training for people to be better at and more comfortable with asking questions. Each of these strategies reinforces behavior connected to the six hallmarks of a questioning culture.