Top Tips: Effective Questioning Skills
The ability to ask effective questions is a key skill in all areas of life. Interpersonal situations rely on questioning and listening skills and they are particularly important when building relationships and working with others. In attempting to stimulate conversation but without influencing the answers, we can call on a range of question types.
Open questions
These begin with ‘what, why, when, where, how and who’. Tell, explain, describe. They are an excellent way of opening up a topic of conversation:
• Tell me what happened…?
• How do you see the problem…?
• What would you like to do in the future…?
Probing questions
Having stimulated the other person to respond with an open question, we might want to follow up a point raised:
• What exactly do you mean by…?
• How often did you…?
• What happened when you…?
Closed/direct questions
These questions can be answered by ‘yes’, or ‘no’ or with a short factual answer eg:
• Are you sure about that?
• Do you agree?
• Is that right?
They are particularly useful when we want to establish specific facts and information but if overused can turn the conversation into an interrogation.
Summarising, reflecting and clarifying questions
Often used to double check what the respondent has said:
• As I understand it, we agreed… is that so?
• So you consider the real issue here is…?
Questions to avoid
The following questions can influence the answer and should be avoided.
Leading questions
Suggest the answer the questioner wants to hear:
• You liked that job didn’t you?
• I should think you are good at that, aren’t you?
• None of those techniques work, do they?
Limiting questions
When the other person is asking to choose an alternative, the questioner can force the choice to one that is acceptable to him/her:
• Would you like to practise that now or later?
• Shall we have a coffee break in 15 minutes rather than now?
Assumption-laden questions
This is a type of leading question when you assume that the other person agrees with you:
• What do you consider to be the mean cause of the department’s inefficiency?
• What do you think led to her depression?
Multiple questions
When several questions are rolled into one:
• How did you deal with that complaint, how did the client respond and with hindsight how would you tackle it differently next time?
Hypothetical questions
Usually about hypothetical situations and will often attract hypothetical answers that cannot be relied upon:
‘How would you deal with a member of your team who was under-performing’.
