Hello and Welcome to improving your Questioning and Listening Skills. In video one, we began our exploration of the fundamentals of communication by looking at the communication cycle and how you can use it to improve the quality and value of all your business conversations. Let's focus in on two of the critical skills that form part of this cycle: Questioning, where we invite the other person to share their viewpoints with us, and listening. Think of questions as keys, keys to unlocking what you need to know. In fact, imagine having a bunch of these keys on your business belt, which you can take with you anywhere. In terms of unlocking your understanding, a question is like a key, in that, if you use the wrong key, it will not unlock anything at all. Using questions effectively is not about jamming lots of keys into the metaphorical lock, one after the other, until you find the one that works. Instead, it is about selecting just one key, the right key, the one you know will work before using it. Specifically, the process for using questions effectively looks like this: Firstly, consider what it is you know and what you still need to know. Without speaking, select the question in your head that you believe will unlock that extra information. Ask the question. And finally, switch into active listening mode. This approach is highly effective, but it does take self-discipline and practice. You also have to be comfortable as you silently select your question, which can be challenging when the other person is in front of you. Which questions work best to enable you to understand fully? To explore and understand, you have to use open-ended questions. To clarify and check, you can use closed questions. Remember, the difference between an open-ended and closed question is that a closed question elicits a yes or no answer, but an open-ended question will not.

So is this an open-ended question? No, it isn't, as it elicits a yes or no answer. How closed is this question? It's not closed at all as you cannot answer it with yes or no. The key learning point here is you cannot explore anything with a closed question, as you may remember if you have ever played 20 Questions. Wouldn't it be a lot easier, although not as much fun, if you could just ask in that game, "Who is it you're thinking of?" The most expansive, open-ended questions are what are known as TED questions. They stand for: tell me about, explain, and describe.

Technically speaking, these are not questions at all, but requests for information. But they are very successful in allowing the other person to talk in detail. Here are some examples. "Tell me about your problem." "Explain the process behind this." "Describe the situation to me." A subset of open-ended questions are sometimes known as five bums on a bench, as this is what they look like. And it's an effective, if slightly unusual, way to remember them. They stand for: what, why, who, where, when, and how.

Which of these is arguably the most powerful question? It's why. Why is a very powerful question because it gets behind the other person's statement and reveals their underlying thoughts. For example, if someone says, "I don't think this will work." Well, there's not much useful information to you in that statement. But if we ask why, they might then reveal, "Well, the deadline is too tight and we don't have enough people." Which question would you ask next to move this conversation forward? Perhaps, "Tell me more about that," or, "How can we make this work?" The more open-ended the question, the more there will be to listen to. So you will need to develop your active listening skills. There is no great skill here. Active listening is a mindset, a commitment you make to truly hear everything that is being said to you. Not to evaluate it, not to formulate responses to it, but to truly hear it. Think about your own barriers to active listening, such as other distractions, your own thoughts, your emotional reaction to what is being said, or most commonly, simply the urge to respond. Commit to listen, to truly hear, to understand the other person, and only evaluate your response once they have finished speaking. Then summarize back to them to check your understanding and confirm with a closed question, such as, "Did I understand you correctly?" Once you have confirmed your understanding of what has been said, then you can move back to the informed part of the communication cycle and decide whether you want to share your viewpoint, or perhaps you could simply ask another question. You will spend much of your business life in communication mode. So remember, this is your training ground, your opportunity to be self-aware, to apply these techniques, to review your results afterwards, and ultimately to continually improve.

See you in the next video.