The Coaching Habit

Question 1

“When you got back to the office, the status quo flexed its impressive muscles, got you in a headlock and soon had you doing things exactly the way you’d done them before.”

“the seemingly simple behaviour change of giving a little less advice and asking a few more questions is surprisingly difficult. You’ve spent years delivering advice and getting promoted and praised for it. You’re seen to be “adding value” and you’ve the added bonus of staying in control of the situation. On the other hand, when you’re asking questions, you might feel less certain about whether you’re being useful, the conversation can feel slower and you might feel like you’ve somewhat lost control of the conversation (and indeed you have. That’s called “empowering”). Put like that, it doesn’t sound like that good an offer.

Question 2

“WHAT PEOPLE THINK OF AS THE MOMENT OF DISCOVERY IS REALLY THE DISCOVERY OF THE QUESTION.

Jonas Salk

”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 3

“The Kickstart Question is the way to start any conversation in a way that’s both focused and open. The AWE Question—the best coaching question in the world—works as a self-management tool for you, and as a boost for the other six questions here. The Focus Question and the Foundation Question are about getting to the heart of the challenge, so you’ve got your attention on what really matters. The Lazy Question will save you hours, while the Strategic Question will save hours for those you’re working with. And the Learning Question, which pairs with the Kickstart Question to make the Coaching Bookends, will ensure that everyone finds their interactions with you more useful.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 4

“a Duke University study says that at least 45 percent of our waking behaviour is habitual. “Leo Babauta frames a helpful way of connecting to the big picture in his book Zen Habits: Mastering the Art of Change. He talks about making a vow that’s connected to serving others. Leo gave up smoking as a commitment to his wife and newborn daughter. So think less about what your habit can do for you, and more about how this new habit will help a person or people you care about.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 5

“Practice Deeply

For his book The Talent Code, Dan Coyle researched why certain parts of the world were talent “hot spots” for certain skills. Brazil: soccer. Moscow: women’s tennis. New York: music (think the Julliard School). One key factor in each hot spot was knowing how to practice well—Coyle calls it “Deep Practice.” The three components of Deep Practice are:

Practicing small chunks of the bigger action (for instance, rather than practice the whole tennis serve, you practice just tossing the ball up).

Repetition, repetition and repetition… and repetition. Do it fast, do it slow, do it differently. But keep repeating the action.

And finally, being mindful and noticing when it goes well. When it does, celebrate success. You don’t have to go buy the bottle of Möet, although you can if you wish. A small fist pump will do just fine.
  

  
”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 6

“The Kickstart Question: “What’s on Your Mind?”

An almost fail-safe way to start a chat that quickly turns into a real conversation is the question, “What’s on your mind?” It’s something of a Goldilocks question, walking a fine line so it is neither too open and broad nor too narrow and confining.

Because it’s open, it invites people to get to the heart of the matter and share what’s most important to them. You’re not telling them or guiding them. You’re showing them the trust and granting them the autonomy to make the choice for themselves.

And yet the question is focused, too. It’s not an invitation to tell you anything or everything. It’s encouragement to go right away to what’s exciting, what’s provoking anxiety, what’s all-consuming, what’s waking them up at 4 a.m., what’s got their hearts beating fast.

It’s a question that says, Let’s talk about the thing that matters most.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 7

“Coaching for performance is about addressing and fixing a specific problem or challenge. It’s putting out the fire or building up the fire or banking the fire. It’s everyday stuff, and it’s important and necessary. Coaching for development is about turning the focus from the issue to the person dealing with the issue, the person who’s managing the fire. This conversation is more rare and significantly more powerful. If I ask you to think back to a time when someone coached you in a way that stuck and made a difference, I’ll bet that it was a coaching-for-development conversation. The focus was on calling you forward to learn, improve and grow, rather than on just getting something sorted out.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 8

“Here you’re looking at patterns of behaviour and ways of working that you’d like to change. This area is most likely where coaching-for-development conversations will emerge. They are personal and challenging, and they provide a place where people’s self-knowledge and potential can grow and flourish. And at the moment, these conversations are not nearly common enough in organizations.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 9

“Cut the preliminary flim-flam. You don’t need a runway to pick up speed—you can just take off.

If you know what question to ask, get to the point and ask it.

(And if you must have a lead-in phrase, try “Out of curiosity.” It lessens the “heaviness” of any question and makes it easier to ask and answer.)”

Question 10

“WHEN THIS HAPPENS…

When I’ve got a question to ask…

INSTEAD OF…

Setting it up, framing it, explaining it, warming up to it and generally taking forever to get to the moment…

I WILL…

Ask the question. (And then shut up to listen to the answer.)”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 11

“I know they seem innocuous. Three little words. But “And What Else?”—the AWE Question—has magical properties. With seemingly no effort, it creates more—more wisdom, more insights, more self-awareness, more possibilities—out of thin air.

There are three reasons it has the impact that it does: more options can lead to better decisions; you rein yourself in; and you buy yourself time.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 12

“Tell less and ask more.

Your advice is not as good

As you think it is.

”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 13

“As you build this habit, don’t just practice asking “And what else?” Use Dan Coyle’s principles of Deep Practice from the chapter on habit building and get used to asking the question with genuine interest and curiosity. For bonus points, practice listening to the answers.

”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 14

“So as you ask, “And what else?” the goal isn’t to generate a bazillion options. It’s to see what ideas that person already has (while effectively stopping you from leaping in with your own ideas). If you get three to five answers, then you’ve made great progress indeed.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 15

“WHEN THIS HAPPENS…

I’ve got the answer, which I want to suggest…

INSTEAD OF…

Asking a fake question such as “Have you thought of…?” or “What about…?” which is just advice with a question mark attached…

I WILL…

Ask one of the Seven Essential Questions. And if I want to present an idea, I’ll offer it up as an option rather than a question.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 16

“The Focus Question: What’s the Real Challenge Here for You?”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 17

“When you start shifting your behaviour from giving advice and providing solutions to asking questions, you will feel anxious. “I’m just asking questions. They’re going to see right through this any minute now.”

Learn to recognize the moment when you ask the question and there’s a pause, a heartbeat of silence when you can see the person actually thinking and figuring out the answer. You can almost see new neural connections being made.

To further reassure yourself, master the last of the Seven Essential Questions—“What was most useful here for you?”—so you create a learning moment for the person and for you.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 18

“Someone once said that everything tastes better with bacon. As a fallen vegetarian, I can attest to that. Equally, every question gets better when you add, “And what else?”

Asking, “What’s the real challenge here for you?” Good.

Adding, “And what else? What else is a real challenge here for you?” Even better.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 19

“I WILL…

Reframe the question so it starts with “What.” So, as some examples, instead of “Why did you do that?” ask “What were you hoping for here?” Instead of “Why did you think this was a good idea?” ask “What made you choose this course of action?” Instead of “Why are you bothering with this?” ask “What’s important for you here?”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 20

“George Bernard Shaw put it succinctly when he said, “The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 21

“When the brain senses danger, there’s a very different response. Here it moves into the familiar fight-or-flight response, what some call the “amygdala hijack.” Things get black and white. Your assumption is that “they” are against you, not with you. You’re less able to engage your conscious brain, and you’re metaphorically, and most likely literally, backing away.

And it’s not a balanced decision. For obvious evolutionary reasons, we’re biased to assume that situations are dangerous rather than not. We may not be right, but over the course of humankind’s evolution, the successful survival strategy has been “better to be safe than sorry.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 22

“However, there’s insight to be gleaned here from a school of therapy known as “solution-based” therapy. They have a go-to question called the miracle question. Several variations exist, but in essence it’s this: “Suppose that tonight, while you’re sleeping, a miracle happens. When you get up in the morning tomorrow, how will you know that things have suddenly got better?”

The miracle question helps people to more courageously imagine what better (and much better) really looks like. A 10x improvement, not a 10 percent tweak. But I think that much of its genius is that it also deliberately focuses on the end before the means. In other words, start with the end in mind rather than (as often happens) collapsing the “what” of the outcome with the “how” of the next steps and immediately getting discouraged.

The Foundation Question—“What do you want?”—is direct, rather than indirect. But it has the same effect of pulling people to the outcome, and once you see the destination, the journey often becomes clearer.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 23

“The Lazy Question: How Can I Help?

The power of “How can I help?” is twofold. First, you’re forcing your colleague to make a direct and clear request. That may be useful to him. He might not be entirely sure why he started this conversation with you.”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 24

“You can likely guess that how “What do you want from me?” lands will depend in no small part on the tone of voice in which it’s asked. To connect it to the Drama Triangle, if you’re in Persecutor mode, it might come across as aggressive; in Victim mode, as whiny; and in Rescuer mode, as smothering.

A way to soften this question, as with all questions, is to use the phrase “Out of curiosity.” What that does is shift the question from perhaps coming across as an inquisition to being a more noble inquiry. Other phrases that can have a similar softening effect on the question being asked are “Just so I know…” or “To help me understand better…” or even “To make sure that I’m clear…”

Excerpt From
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier
This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 25

“What’s essential to realize is that regardless of the answer you receive, you have a range of responses available to you. “Yes” is one, of course. You can always say Yes. But you don’t have to say Yes, and your sense of obligation to say Yes is the source of your anxiety. “No, I can’t do that” is another option. Having the courage to say No is one of the ways you stop being so “helpful.” “I can’t do that… but I could do [insert your counter-offer]” is a nice middle ground. Don’t just give them a No; give them some other choices. And finally, you can just buy yourself some time. “Let me think about that.” “I’m not sure—I’ll need to check a few things out.” ” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 26

“WHEN THIS HAPPENS… Someone gives you a call/drops by your cubicle/shouts out across the office/sends you a text message and asks, “How do I [insert query most likely to sucker you in]?” INSTEAD OF… Giving her the answer… I WILL… Say, “That’s a great question. I’ve got some ideas, which I’ll share with you. But before I do, what are your first thoughts?” And when she answers, which she will, you’ll nod your head and be engaged and interested, and when she finishes, say, “That’s terrific. What else could you do?” More nodding, more being interested. Then say, “This is all good. Is there anything else you could try here?” And then, and only then, you can add your own idea into the mix if you wish. And of course, if the conversation is going well, keep asking “And what else?” until she has run out of ideas.” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 27

“Write out the moment, the person and perhaps the feelings that are your trigger. The trigger here is how much you want to help. So what sets you off? It’s likely when someone asks, “How do I…?” or “Could you…?” or “What’s the way to…?” Or perhaps it’s just when someone comes into your office and tells you about a situation, and the perfect solution pops immediately into your mind. Or when that happens in a team meeting. Or when you think to yourself, It’s faster to do this myself, even though you’re unclear on what the “this” really is. In short, it’s every time you get that urge to jump in, help out and volunteer. And the real insult here—to your time, effort and good intentions—is that the recipients may not even want or need what you’re about to give them. INSTEAD OF… Write out the old habit you want to stop doing. Be specific. The old habit you’re breaking is your jumping into helpful, action mode. You’re giving the solution, you’re providing the answer, you’re adding something to your to-do list. You’re assuming you know what the request is, even though the request hasn’t[…]” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 28

“The Strategic Question: If You’re Saying Yes to This, What Are You Saying No To?” “What exactly are you saying Yes to?” brings the commitment out of the shadows. If you then ask, “What could being fully committed to this idea look like?” it brings things into even sharper, bolder focus. But a Yes is nothing without the No that gives it boundaries and form.” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 29

“Bill “Mr. Simplicity” Jensen taught me that the secret to saying No was to shift the focus and learn how to say Yes more slowly. What gets us into trouble is how quickly we commit, without fully understanding what we’re getting ourselves into or even why we’re being asked. Saying Yes more slowly means being willing to stay curious before committing. Which means asking more questions: Why are you asking me? Whom else have you asked? When you say this is urgent, what do you mean? According to what standard does this need to be completed? By when? If I couldn’t do all of this, but could do just a part, what part would you have me do? What do you want me to take off my plate so I can do this?” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 30

“helping people learn is difficult. Sometimes it feels like even though you’ve hit them across the head repeatedly with an obvious concept (or a shovel perhaps), somehow the point you’ve been trying to make hasn’t stuck. Here’s why: People don’t really learn when you tell them something. They don’t even really learn when they do something. They start learning, start creating new neural pathways, only when they have a chance to recall and reflect on what just happened. ” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 31

“Your job as a manager and a leader is to help create the space for people to have those learning moments. And to do that, you need a question that drives this double-loop learning. That question is, “What was most useful for you?” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 32

“A related insight comes from the world of psychology and, in particular, the excellent book Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning by Peter Brown, Henry Roediger and Mark McDaniel. The authors are distinguished psychology professors, and together they’ve created a useful summary of the best strategies and tactics we have to help people learn. The first major tactic they share is harnessing the impact of information retrieval. They put it beautifully: “What’s essential is to interrupt the process of forgetting.” That forgetting starts happening immediately, so even by asking the question at the end of a conversation, you’ve created the first interruption in that slide towards “I’ve never heard that before!” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 33

“There are a number of questions you could ask to help drive this generative and retrieval process to embed the learning. “What did you learn?” “What was the key insight?” “What do you want to remember?” and “What’s important to capture?” are some of the more obvious ways to help people do that, and they’re all good questions. But “What was most useful for you?” is like a superfood—kale perhaps—compared with the mere iceberg-lettuce goodness of the other questions.” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 34

“the peak-end rule. In short, how we’re evaluating an experience is disproportionately influenced by the peak (or the trough) of the experience and by the ending moments. Finish on a high note and you make everything that went before it look better.” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 35

““Questions work just as well typed as they do spoken.” When I get an email that triggers the Advice Monster… INSTEAD OF… Writing out a long, thorough answer full of possible solutions, approaches and ideas, or even a short, terse answer with a single command… I WILL… Decide which one of the seven questions would be most appropriate, and ask that question by email. It could sound like: “Wow, there’s a lot going on here. What’s the real challenge here for you, do you think?” “I’ve scanned your email. In a sentence or two, what do you want?” “Before I jump into a longer reply, let me ask you: What’s the real challenge here for you?” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 36

“But the real secret sauce here is building a habit of curiosity. The change of behaviour that’s going to serve you most powerfully is simply this: a little less advice, a little more curiosity. Find your own questions, find your own voice. And above all, build your own coaching habit.” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.

Question 37

“If you can read just one book on increasing your impact within organizations: Peter Block, Flawless Consulting” Excerpt From The Coaching Habit Michael Bungay Stanier This material may be protected by copyright.