If you lead a team, you've probably heard that the best results come from coaching your people, rather than telling them what to do. This advice usually implies doing more asking then telling.
So far, so good. But if you've tried this, you may have found yourself playing a frustrating game of "Twenty Questions" with your staff. Especially if you assumed your questions should lead people to the answers already in your head. This is not coaching.
If you know something critical to success, please just tell your team; don't torture them with a guessing game. That said, most complex work can be tackled in a variety of ways that could work.
So how do you encourage creativity and ownership without trying to trick people into guessing your answer?
Two Simple Rules
Just keep these two simple rules in mind for your coaching questions:
A coaching question is one you don't know the answer to.
A coaching question is one you'd like the other person to ask themselves.
If your questions meet those two rules, both you and your team member will learn from the conversation.
Some Examples
Let's imagine you've just asked one of your direct reports to take the lead on a new project. Here are some possible questions you might want them to consider:
What will be most challenging about this for you?
What will you say to keep your team motivated?
How are you thinking about this?
What's going to be your next step?
Putting into Practice
The best questions fit the situation and the person. For your most experienced people simple, open questions like "How are you thinking about this?" can be great. It invites a big-picture perspective and will reveal a lot about how this person thinks. It also reveals a lot about how you communicate.
For example, you might hear they missed an important nuance. Often that nuance is something you knew, but didn't think to share. So you can clear it up now instead of fixing it later.
For team members who are usually too optimistic, have them think about what might go wrong: "What could get in the way of getting this done?" If they respond, "Nothing, it will be fine," share one of your concerns and follow that up with a coaching question. "One thing I'm worried about is..." "How do you think you'd handle that if it happens?"
Again, you're not hinting, or trying to lead them to your concern; you state it clearly. Then ask a genuine coaching question. One you don't know the answer to.
Team members who are just learning to manage their own work benefit most from concrete questions: "What will be your next step?" "When can you finish this?"
Notice that you can't truly know the answers to any of these questions. For some, you might have an idea or even a preference for the answer. That's fine; just hold that idea or preference lightly, and stay open to other ideas.
If it's not really a preference, but a requirement, don't ask a phony question about it: instead, just state it. No one likes to believe they have choice and then find out they don't.
Remember
So the secret to using a coaching approach isn’t to stop telling and just ask—it’s to do each with self-awareness. Tell when you need to share what’s required. Ask when you want someone to think. That’s what makes a coaching approach work.
