Ep11: Value of Asking Questions

In this episode, Mike shares experience asking questions and demonstrate the value in asking quality questions.

--Transcript--

(Intro)
This is the conversation Iq podcast. I’m your host Mike Ford. Are you sick and tired of dealing with social anxiety? Do you want to overcome your fear of feeling awkward or looking silly in social situations? Do you struggle with just saying hello or maybe keeping a conversation going? Well, welcome to our community of communicators where we are on a mission to rid the world of loneliness by sharing tips, tricks, and techniques from some of the world’s best conversationalist. Super excited to have you guys on this journey with us. We’ll see you on the other side of this episode.

(Episode)
What's up and welcome to another episode of conversation Iq podcast with your host, Mike Ford is episode is focusing on the value of asking questions. How are we communicating and helping people identify biases and, uh, you know, helping them identify knowledge gaps that they have so that we can work with them to bridge some of that stuff. It's a beautiful thing that happens in conversation because people start to prize you differently. They start to look at you as a solution for any of the problems that they have. They value your opinion more. And what you find is that in conversation when you're sharing some of those, or when you're asking those questions and uh, some of the responses that you're getting, people are having a piffen he's on the spot. You'll find that you yourself, one, feel more confident in your ability to engage in conversation to you are now creating a purpose behind every time you start a conversation and you're in conversation.

And three, that's the thing that keeps conversations going. And when you end a conversation, that is a thing that allows or encourages people to come back and say, Hey, can we talk again? Could we grab coffee? Could we continue this relationship? And so, uh, being able to ask questions, the right kinds of questions is really important. So just a little bit of a background behind this question thing, right? So when I was, when I was in the military, my actual job, I was an analyst, right? So I was an intelligence analyst and basically my job would be to go through report and go through articles and identify things that are important for my commander, for he or sheets and make good decisions on the battle space before, you know, a mission is done right there like that, right? So spending time in that environment, doing those things.

I had to learn how to train my brain to not be dumb. What do I mean by that? Our brain has, this, has this habit of creating biases. You know, we've, we've heard about confirmation, we've heard about, you know, group think. We've heard about several things that the advisors are created by our brain. They show up and when they show up, those are the things that make it hard for us to see the truth or see the difference in things because we're so focused on what we think we already know. And so the way to get around that is that you have to challenge your brain. You have to exercise your brain to remain curious and to always ask, restate whatever it is you're thinking and to ask again and continue that refinement process until you feel that, hey, you've reached the limit of your asking and it's time for you to now truly present.

You know your findings when you have a better way of moving forward on on our research project. If you're working on that, that same exact concept can be applied and should be applied in conversation. One of the things people are afraid of or an they get fearful of is asking personal questions and offending somebody because of the questions that you ask or you know, you don't like people asking you personal questions so you don't want to be judged if they ask you a question that takes you deep and, but that's the value of conversation. Being able to identify someone that aligns with your values and being able to develop a relationship with that person where you are then able to transition into something that's long, longterm and and life giving. Right? I always use that word life giving because so much things nowadays are just robbing us of our energy, robbing us of our life force because we spent so much time experiencing stress and all those other things that come along with the flight response, right?

When we're stressed out, when our brain is switched into survival mode because of all the negative things we experience all the Dang time. So asking questions is what allows us to identify biases for ourself, knowledge, gas for ourselves, but also allows you to create a deeper connection with people. So how do we do it in conversation? What you're going to hear is free information. That's information that people just, they share about themselves just cause it seems harmless. It just seems like there's just sharing with them about themselves, you know? And it's something that there's not a lot of risk around asking deeper questions on that stuff. But nonetheless, asking questions on free information is what allows you to start to get to some of the implicit information that they'll share that his point or implied information that is pointing towards some things that are below the surface.

I like to think about conversation, you know, in conversation, asking questions like prospecting for gold, right? We are, we started a place where things are kind of topical. You might hit a little bit of gold, but then you, the vein that you're digging in runs out of gold and you have to shift your digging slightly for you to hit another vein. And then to continue mining goal. And that's how it is in conversation. We are looking for opportunities to ask questions to get us deeper below the surface so that we can connect with more meetings, more purpose behind our connection with the individual. Examples of some questions you can ask, right? Someone says, yeah, you know, I started a conversation with someone. I introduced myself. Hey, my name's Mike Ford. What's your name? Boom. Hey, my name is Scott, or whatever my name is Scott. He's got, and you know that nice to meet you.

I'm like, so what brought you here? Like wire? How'd you end up at this bookstore looking at Harry Potter books? You know, and this is Scott, right? Scott would reply, and I'm a big fan of Harry Potter. My kids are getting into it. You know we, we've got a couple of things that we're planning because we want to go to universal studio cause that new ride opened up in Hogwarts and every one is, I'll check it out. So I'm just kind of get into books again cause I want to get them to a friend of mine that's totally into, you know, starting to get into Harry Potter too. And I want to take a moment just to stop right there and think about those things that Scott just shared with me. I just found out Scott has kids. I just found out he's planning a trip to universal.

I found out that Scott is a fan of Harry Potter. He's such a fan that he's sharing it with his friends against friends, all excited about it. And I found out that Scott is, his love language is gifts, right? Cause he's getting ready to purchase something to share with his friend. And so I can ask several questions around all those things. You know, I can ask God how old are your kids, right. Boom. Or before you ask a question like that because sometimes people would be like, you know, that's a, that's a kind of like a, you're asking a question about someone's family, which a little bit personal. Well the first thing you do is empathize or late and then ask a question. How do you empathize and relate on that ace guy? You know, my, my wife and I are actually working on a star in kids on our own. You know, we just, we just started working on it and, and it's really exciting. You know, how, how old are your kids? See how I transition that now we're Scott Fields that, hey, you know, Scott to dad,

I'm a dude potentially getting ready to be a dad. Scott is going to be more open to sharing a little bit about his kids. Just letting me know, hey, yeah, like is this old? And it that agent. And now I can ask Scott, how is it being a dad? And you know, that's one of the things I'm excited about, but I also want to do a good job, you know, well, what is it? How is it being a dad? And now Scott is expressing to me how it is beat at that. And Scott would probably tell me that being a dad is the most amazing thing ever. He may tell me being a dad is awesome or you might say and you know it's tough and it's challenging and these are some of the things that I have to deal with and I cannot ask follow up question.

So you get the idea right. Without me taking the scenario much further how I have started a conversation on a topic that you know is, is easier or re entry point and then I'm able to deepen the conversation, connect and relate and deepen the conversation so you can see how much different it is. Me talking about Harry Potter versus starting a conversation with, hey man, you got kids, how old are your kids? You know what I mean? Like it's deliberate, right? How's it being a dad? Like this is like being a dad. Like I'm not asking those kinds of questions. The questions I'm asking. Right. And when you start adding those kind of additional details in your questions, it may become leading questions and they're not very good open ended quality questions. Right? You want to ask people to get a better understanding of how they made those decisions, how they came to those conclusions.

Right. Again, this is asking questions is really important. Um, being able to, to, if there's a topic that someone mentioned for whatever reason in your mind, you don't feel that it's a complete answer in a complete statement. It's okay to ask on that. It's okay to ask the individual, hey, can you explain a little further? I think I understand what you're saying. I'm just curious what does this mean or why did that happen that way? Or how did it make you feel? Because I'm working on boom, boom, boom. And to give people that reason, that justification to, as to why you're asking that kind of question, it allows them again, to lower their guard, to be more open to answering. Cause now when people feel significant, right? Significance come from them being able to add value, right? Them feeling like they're helping somebody when they feel that significance, they're more willing and they're happier to help.

So it's really important that we kind of get into the habit of doing that. And you know, as you're developing your skills as a conversationalist, I just want to ask questions, find out more, discover more about people, position yourself to be excited at every time you're talking to someone to an opportunity to learn something new is not a chance for you to test your skills. Test Yourself. This is about getting out and just reconnecting with people on a human level. You know, helping people identify things that they didn't know about ourselves and the same for you. So with that, I'm, I'm out of here for this episode and I'll see you guys on the next one.

(Outro)
 Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Conversation IQ podcast. It’s always a pleasure just to spend time and share and to encourage and empower folks to be better conversationalist. If you aren’t picking up things that you can implement and you had positive results from that, please share with us. We love to hear about your successes. We’d also like to hear about any challenges you are experiencing so that way we can continue to serve the community. We can continue to provide value and continue to equip you with the tools you need for you to be an awesome conversation list. Please check us out at www.conversationiq.co for an opportunity to be a part of our Facebook group Increasing Conversation IQ. It is www.conversationiq.co we’ll see you guys on the next episode.