Are You Asking the Right Questions?

You have probably observed the following truisms over the years:

• CEOs generally ask better questions than Vice Presidents
• Vice Presidents generally ask better questions than Managers
• Managers generally ask better questions than the front-liners

And so on.

The principle that seems to apply is that more successful people ask better questions than “less successful” ones. Countless times over the years, after coming out of meetings in which a CEO or senior leader participated, I have heard my associates (and myself) say “he really asked some good questions … why haven’t those been asked before?”

But, why do they ask better questions? Are they smarter? Often they are not. Rather, they learned how to ask good questions, even great questions, when they found out that the answers you get depend on the questions you ask. I submit that they are successful because they ask better questions, not the other way around.

I have been blessed with the talent of asking good questions for years, because I learned early in life that better questions gave me better information. Many of my associates have indicated time and time again that they wish they had thought of a question I had asked, and I know for a fact that many of them are a good bit smarter than me. So, you can learn how to ask good questions.

And, here’s the most powerful point about developing this talent: it applies to all areas of your life, not just to your business life. For example, instead of asking yourself the question “what’s wrong with me,” a better set of questions to ask would include the following:

• What can I do to improve my personal life? Business life? Spiritual life?
• What am I doing that is not giving me the results I want and why am I doing it?
• Who would I like to be more like? Why?
• How can I be more happy?
• How can I be more organized?
• … and so on …

A simple step to internalizing how to ask better questions is to become conscious of each question you ask, and then ask yourself “Is this really the right question?” That’s how I learned to ask better questions, so I know it works and I know that it is a simple thing to do.

The more you do this, and the more you follow-up your original question with a better one (or two or three), the closer you become to internalizing (making a habit of) asking good questions.

What are your thoughts on this? Any other tips for all of us on how we can ask the best questions?