They say that half of knowledge is asking the right question.
Challenging People to Think Critically
I was on a call today with all the senior leaders in our region and the regional director. The regional director's sole job, it would seem, was to ask these senior leaders questions about why certain metrics look the way they look.
I remember one moment in particular. He asked the leadership of my old building why a certain metric was the worst in the region. The assistant general manager of the building gave an answer that seemed to me like it was BS. And the regional director definitely felt the same way. I know this because as he was speaking, the RD went through and deep dived that metric. He pushed back and gave actual numbers of areas where the numbers were bad and asked why we were missing there. He pulled their numbers against the rest of the network and found that there was only one site that was worse.
After this, there was an uncomfortable silence. Nothing was said, but everyone on the call understood. There was no BSing this guy. If you're going to say something, you better bring data to prove your point. By pushing back, he essentially said that if I ask you something, you better have a well thought answer, not just some BS.
When your leaders are challenging you to think critically is when you get growth in an organization. Once the senior leaders start accepting BS answers is the beginning of the downfall.
The Role of The CEO or General Manager
When you're the leader of a company, your job is not to master everything. Rather its to know enough about each aspect to be dangerous. You need to know enough about every aspect of the business to know what questions to ask.
In order to attract the most talented people and keep them, you have to ask the right questions. You have to understand the strengths and weaknesses of your leaders and push them to grow. You do that by asking them the right questions.
As a leader I need to make sure the people around me are thinking like me. When its time to make a decision, they shouldn't have to ask me my thoughts, they should already know what I'm going to say. Asking questions is one of the most powerful means of imparting your way of thinking on others. If you can get others to come to the same realization by asking them questions, they will be bought into that solution. Whereas if you tell them what to do, most people don't respond so positively to that.
My current boss always challenges me to think about what value each step is bringing in the process. This has changed the way I look at every process in the building. She wanted to create a culture where we're only doing things that provide value, and one of the ways that she inculcated that in me is by challenging me with those questions every time I present a process.
How to Ask the Right Questions
My building's general manager is one of those people that always has the right question to put people on their toes. I once asked him how to ask the right questions. His answer shocked me:
You have to listen.
He mentioned that the most important part of asking the right questions is being engaged and listening. Listening for verbal, non verbal cues. If you sense a little bit of hesitation, that's a spot you push back on. If you see a metric that doesn't make sense, you ask them to explain it. Listen to them explaining and ask questions that dive deeper on their response. He said that when he's in meetings, he doesn't bring his laptop. He's fully listening.
Another thing he mentioned is that once you're in enough of these regional calls, you get so annoyed with the questions they ask. They ask the same questions over and over again. You get to the point where you know exactly what they are going to ask and have your answers ready for those questions. It helps being on those calls because you can learn from other leaders what type of questions to ask.