ACTivity/ Questions to Lead

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Manila, 18 November 2020 — Questioning in three challenges.

In #Grow3Leaders, we are exploring the leadership practice of asking questions this month, with the theme that leaders use the power of questions.

Earlier, we already worked on the Three Question Traps and the art of Asking Good Questions. Today, let’s move on to recognizing three challenges for questioners.

In dealing with any challenge, problem, or issue, leaders know that finding an effective solution, or contributing to that solution, will always start by questioning yourself. That’s what TransformationFirst is all about, and it starts with gaining the necessary awareness to understand and the situation you’re in.

Here are three challenges for you to take on: to question your situation, to question your audience, and to question your day. 

1. Question Your Situation

Years ago I learned from Brett Thomas, one of my mentors, how to ask questions to help me decide on my most helpful action in any situation. Brett is an executive coach with a track record of helping CEOs to turn their companies into conscious businesses that serve an important purpose in society. 

I learned from Brett how to question myself about what’s really going on in a situation, what’s most important and needed, and what’s the most helpful action I can take. You can read more about these three meta-questions here.

The answers you give to these three questions will depend a lot on the progress you made in developing your self-awareness and situational awareness skills. Using a Buddhist term, Brett refers to developing your skillful means to navigate your way through life’s complexity and take the right action in any situation. 

As you develop your leadership skills and engage with effective behaviors more often, your answers to Brett’s three meta-questions will get better and better, turning you into a better leader with a more diverse toolbox of skills. It’s a great challenge to get started on right away, today or tomorrow.

2. Question Your Audience

After deciding on your most helpful action in the situation you’re in (your response to the third meta-question), you will be communicating with your audience, whether that’s in a 1:1 conversation, in a team meeting, or as you present to a larger number of people.

Having worked out what’s really happening, and what’s most important and needed, you are now in a better position to take your action by speaking in their language for maximum effect and asking questions in their language too.

Leaders working with me use the Work In All Colors method to do this, and they follow in the footsteps of Nelson Mandela and countless other leaders in business, government, and civil society around the world who have discovered the benefit of this method in reaching out to their audiences.

Learning to speak and ask questions to your audience in their language, translating your message into their worldview, is an essential skill to help you grow into a more influential leader.

3. Question Your Day

The third challenge is one to take up at the end of your working day when leaders make some quality time to reflect on what they have accomplished during the day and what they have learned from the day’s experiences.

You can use several methods to do this, each with a different and complementary focus. The first method I recommend is to ask yourself about your Daily Wins and to go ahead and celebrate them. 

The second method is to check-in with yourself if and how you have embodied the three leadership mandates of the Three Worlds Model where you learn to see leadership as an inside job in your Personal World, a contact sport in your Social World, and playing a bigger game in your Observed World. 

The third method uses a set of the Daily Questions and was introduced by Marshall Goldsmith, a leading executive coach. He learned from his daughter, a psychologist at Yale University, to ask himself active questions every day.  Read how Marshall explains here how to ask yourself six or more questions at the end of your day.

Active questions are more powerful than questions about achievement, because your daily outcomes will result from actions that you and others take, in a context. You, on the other hand, are always in charge of the effort you make each day for your own priority behaviors as a leader. That’s why the Daily Questions check if you did your best for each of the behaviors you prioritized.

So which of these three methods will you start using for your end-of-day reflection?

Dojo Time

Wrapping up this post, we have explored the three challenges of you questioning your situation, your audience, and your day. The better you become in working with these challenges, the more effective you will be as a leader. Getting there comes with daily practice to gain more experience and daily reflections to learn from your experiences.

In #Grow3Leaders, we practice in a challenging and safe space how to ask questions and engage numerous other effective leadership behaviors. Joining is free of charge—not free of commitment. Find three workplace colleagues to join you in taking up the Grow3Leaders challenge together and influence a positive change in your workplace in only 6 to 8 weeks.