Scenario: Powerful Question

As an action learning coach, how would you handle the following situation: Someone asks a question that changes the depth and understanding of the true nature of the problem.

Tags: Action Learning, ActionLearning Coach, Team Coach, WIAL, WIAL Action Learning, WIAL Talk

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Comments (9)

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    Thomas Ernst

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    I would wait to see if the team identifies it as a powerful question first. If not I would make mention at the next intervention check point of the powerful questions being asked, and what the impact is on the discussion at hand. Ideally if the right question is asked, the team is moving in the right direction without intervention on my part.

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    Savin Oeun

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    Being as a coach, I would ask the team that “how can we as a team can have peeper understanding of the problem nature like this”?

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    Prasad Natarajan

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    I will ask the team to write Problem Statement again and ask if we have an agreement on the Problems – Yes / No / Close
    We have another XX minutes to work on this problem and then I will ask the problem presenter what actions he is going to take as a result of this session.
    Now, who has the next question

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    Kathy Zou

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    I will handle it dependent on the situation and learning needs. If I feel the team need to learn more about powerful questioning, I might capture the opportunity and do a pulse-check. I will ask the questions such as “how do you think you did in past XX minutes?” “how was the quality of questions?” and I may ask the team to write problem statement and ask if they have an agreement on problems-yes or not.

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    Esther Inniss

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    I would check to see the impact this had on the team, if any and wait to see if the team recognizes the shift themselves. if this is not addressed by the team, I would enquire whether the questions were being directed to the right persons, ask whether the process was effective / helpful and what they thought about the quality of the questions being posed.

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    Tomasz Pachoł

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    1. I wouldn’t like to interrupt group and stop it from benefiting from this useful question.
    2. During the summing up I would talk with the group What did this question do to them?
    What was unusual about this question that made such an impression. What would they need to ask this kind of questions.
    3. I would do intervention to to make the group realize how effective these kind of questions are.

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    Karan Kathuria

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    I would give the group sometime and observe if the problem evolves. I would closely observe the questions asked and take a call if they’re relevant to the problem statement. If the line of questioning is relevant and is contributing to the discussion, I will not intervene. If the line of questioning is not relevant, I will intervene and check with the group if they have consensus on the problem statement.

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    yiming zhou

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    Scenario: Powerful Question
    As an action learning coach, how would you handle the following situation: Someone asks a question that changes the depth and understanding of the true nature of the problem. If the maturity level of the team is higher, I will choose not to intervene for the time being and observe whether the question triggers everyone’s thinking. I will record the question and everyone’s answers and ask the question later in the stage summary. “I just heard XX ask this question, how does everyone feel about it?” “How does a question like this affect us?” “What can we do better next?”
    If the team’s previous questions are not of high quality and someone asks a quality question, I will choose to intervene immediately and ask the team, “XX asked this question, what did you see? How do you feel about it?” Let everyone say what they think about the question, and then ask “Why is it important for us to ask quality questions?” “What can we do to make sure we get it right?”

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    Noraini Mahmood

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    I will observe if the team picks up on the deep questioning and move on to agree to what the real problem is. If they do proceed to agree, then at the end of the session I would ask the team ‘Were there any good questions asked?” and ” What do you think about the impact of such questions have on the team ?”.

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