Creating a Culture of Asking the Right Questions

It is a misconception that leadership is about providing the answers.  A leader who always has the answers is setting up his team to fail.  He does not allow them to think, to consider, to grow.  Instead, a leader should facilitate growth by learning to ask the correct questions.  If a leader is always the source of connection, and has the answers for every part of the management team, he becomes the very limiting factor that prevents organisational growth, since growth and initiative is limited by access to him.  As the organisation or company grows, as the team gets larger, as the projects get more complex, he will eventually get overwhelmed, and decisions grind to a halt.  Management becomes ossified, and people are afraid to make decisions at a tactical level.  This limits the agility of the organisation, or the company  There is only so much time a single person has to address every issue. 

Great leadership is sown by empowerment, and empowerment begins with asking the correct questions of peers and subordinates.  A major part of rhetoric is to convince people of a position through rhetorical questions.  A major part of discourse in decision making is asking the questions that shift the paradigm.  This allows stakeholders to buy into an idea or a decision.  Mere statements are never as convincing.  Most modern leaders, whether in organisations, or in businesses, have no real problems asking these questions.  They are where they are because of their ability to recognise the issues and contentions.  The main problem for many is that they cannot resist the urge to answer the questions they ask.  Doing this does not allow the team to grow, and arrive at any state of realisation. 

Giving others room to learn and grow contributes to job satisfaction, since they feel they are integral part of the process.  When people feel that way, they are committed to decisions made, and actions taken.  They have identified with it.  It helps to increase their capacity to think, and make decisions.  This also means having a tolerance for genuine mistakes.  If there are fundamental errors of principle, it is the fault of the leader, since those values should have been inculcated before they were empowered.  Having in place a culture of asking the right questions, makes the organisation or business scalable, and promotes growth. 

The next question is what would be the right question?  The right questions begin when we are able to put ourselves in the shoes of other stakeholders, and look outside the box.  They begin when we are able to consider the consequences of decisions at several levels.  The right question always begins when we try to understand how others feel about business decisions, product design, campaign implementation, the words we use, the way we use these words, and the values we want to portray.  It is not enough to consider, for example, if a policy works based on our conception of what is the appropriate action to take.  We must consider who the stakeholders are, the internal and external customers, and who they would react to it, based on their perspective.  Only then, will we arrive at the answers that help us.