When I look at my own journey as a business leader, this has been a big part of my leadership growth. I often gave in to the urge to be the first to speak and solve problems without the input of anyone else. It wasn’t until I began working with my business coach that I was able to grow significantly in this area.
To be an effective leader, it’s important to balance answering and asking questions, but a strong balance usually requires you to ask more questions than you answer. In fact, I think it’s difficult to ask too many questions while it’s easy to speak too much.
Believe it or not, questions are some of the most powerful leadership tools at your disposal. Here are my top five tips for using questions as part of your leadership strategy.
Resist the urge to speak
The most successful leaders are those who can resist the urge to jump in with their thoughts and instead are able to actively listen to those around them. Just because you have a solution in mind doesn’t mean you’re aware of everything that’s going on with a project, with your team, or in your business as a whole.
By speaking before listening, you shut down the opportunity to learn more about the situation or gain valuable feedback. Additionally, you can also disempower your team from working together to innovate and find their own solutions.
Ask to ensure you have all the facts
Once you’ve given others the opportunity to speak, take the time to ask some important questions before providing solutions. This helps you avoid jumping to conclusions based on your assumptions. Remember that the people involved in a project or a problem often know more about the situation than you do and may have important information you wouldn’t have thought to consider.
Ask to discover what you can learn and to see what ideas and solutions your team has in mind. You never know—they may have some excellent ideas, or their ideas may lead you in the right direction! Give them the opportunity to explore and discuss their thoughts. After all, they’re the experts in what they do.
Use questions to steer the conversation
One of the most powerful ways leaders can use questions is to guide conversations. Strategic questions allow you to steer a discussion in the direction it needs to go and help to get to the heart of an issue as well as help your team see their own potential to leverage their strengths. Asking good questions can help you avoid micromanagement and increase the innovation and collaboration of your team by encouraging them to find solutions together.
Rather than dictating actions and solutions, by asking strategic questions, you can guide your team to collaborate in the decision-making process and create an atmosphere that encourages communication rather than shutting it down. This has been a game-changer for me as I’ve learned how asking questions can help my team innovate and discover more effective solutions than I ever would have on my own.
Learn to ask better questions
The more you practice asking questions, the better you’ll get at it. And there is a difference between a good or a bad question! Good questions open communication, build trust, and increase understanding, while bad questions steer the conversation in the wrong direction, assume answers, or shut down communication. Remember the way you ask questions matters.
Questions can come across as curious, leading, or even confrontational depending on your approach, so it’s important to evaluate your wording, tone, and timing. But when you learn to ask excellent questions, it will help you get to the heart of a problem to discover new solutions, understand the motivations of those involved, and gain a greater understanding of all factors involved.
Build better relationships and leadership skills through better communication
Asking questions goes a long way to building trust and relationships, which are the foundation of leadership. You cannot be an effective leader without asking questions to understand the people you’re leading. Communication is built on listening, and listening helps build relationships. Listen to empathize with your team members, and ask questions that show you care.
By demonstrating your vulnerability, humility, and willingness to listen, you’ll earn your team’s trust and respect. They’ll respect you more if they know you listen to them, even if you don’t agree with their conclusions or choose a different path.
If you’re like me and find yourself answering more questions than you ask, make asking questions a habit. The more you ask, the more naturally it will come to you, and the better informed you’ll be to make strong leadership decisions while empowering your team to communicate and collaborate more effectively.