The power of questions

You want to quickly and effectively establish a new win-win relationship? Leverage the awesome power of questions.

Number 1: I don’t normally get my advice from actors, but Lisa Kirk, the actress made a brilliant point that got my attention

•        A gossip is one who talks to you about others…

•        a bore one who talks to you about themselves…

•        a brilliant conversationalist is one who talks to you about you.

How true. People love to talk.

And if you want to get them to talk, ask them questions about their favorite topic… themselves

Simply ask questions about them… and they will go on & on.

If you listen, it will give you insight into how they think, what’s important to them.

And they will also have a positive feeling towards you, for you are interested in their favorite topic, them.

Number 2: The person who asks the questions, gets the information

The person talking is giving information… so ask questions

Terry Fadem in his book, The Art of Asking says

Such diverse knowledge is now required in business that an individual manager is rarely expected to be knowledgeable enough to run all aspects of the business successfully without employee specialists…

So, what do generalist managers have to know to maintain the progress of their enterprise?...

They must know how to ask questions.

Number 3: The person asking the questions controls the conversation

It is common courtesy to answer a reasonable question. Listen to their answers in order to follow up with the next question.

Control the conversation by focusing on them and guiding them to what you want them to talk about.

Start with general questions to get over the difficulty of starting a conversation by asking a question on a topic everyone talks about everyday.

     Weather        Food

     Traffic             Holidays

     Family             Hobbies

Once you’ve gotten them talking, shift to typical simple personal questions

•        Where are you from?

•        What do you think of the conference?

•        Are you enjoying the visit? If they come from somewhere else.

Then shift to business questions

·        Where do you work?

·        What do you do for a living?

This flow of questioning will get you information about them as well as allow you to transition it to topics you would like to discuss.

Utilising the power of questions, will leave a good impression, give you valuable information and quickly establish new relationships.

Take action, make a difference.