Listening
Question, listen, follow up
Use questions to build understanding rather than to collect answers.
The shape
- Question
- Listen
- Identify what matters
- Follow up
Why that order
Each follow up is generated from what was actually said, which is what separates a conversation from a form.
A worked example
- Ask
- What is creating the biggest difficulty right now?
- They say
- The requirements keep changing.
- Follow up
- At what point are they usually changing?
- Further
- And who is involved when they change?
What usually goes wrong
Working through a prepared list without listening to the answers, which produces an interview nobody learns anything from.
Used in
Where this shape does its work in a real situation.
Practise it
Knowing the shape is about ten minutes of work. Running it while somebody senior is looking at you is a different thing, and that is what these are for.
Mostly serves Connection, and reaches into Intent and Message.
A framework tells you what shape the answer takes. It cannot tell you whether shape is what you are short of, and for most people it is not. Which one is yours, and whether a framework is the right instrument at all, is what a Discovery Call is for.
Take the AssessmentOr read the whole glossary first.