đź“ť
20 GREAT OPEN QUESTIONS
As you coach someone through a challenge or dilemma, replace problem-solving, advice-giving, and judgy-sounding questions with authentically curious, truly open questions
| Instead of This | Try This |
|---|---|
| Why did you do that? | What’s the driving force here? |
| Why can’t you move forward? | What’s feeling fuzzy about this? |
| Why did this make you react that way? | What feels surprising? |
| Why does this matter so much to you | Which of your core values is being messed with? |
| Why are you stuck? | What’s feeling stuck? |
| Why are you hesitating? | What's the most likely outcome, and what's the worst possible outcome? |
| How will you measure success? | What’s the #1 most important aspect of this? |
| Who have you talked to about this already? | What do you need? |
| How can you have better results next time? | What’s in the way? |
| What’s your first/next step? | What, if anything, is going unsaid? |
| What’s your proposed solution? | What’s your north star here? |
| What do you want to change about yourself? | What effect/impact do you want to have? |
| Why haven’t you taken that step yet? | What’s holding you back |
| How do you know…? | What’s your spidey sense telling you? |
| Why do you want that? | What do you find motivating? |
| Why not [this other thing/solution]? | What are you optimizing for |
| Why are you feeling anxious | What’s feeling especially significant about this? |
| Did you already try...? | What is your gut telling you? |
| Who can do this for you? | If you could wave a magic wand, what one thing would you change? |
| What if you tried…? | What, deep-down, do you truly want? |
