How to Coach Yourself and Others Techniques For Coaching | Page 531

o Problem articulation and framing: What questions are best at
this stage; they allow the group to gather details and
descriptions of the situation and help members understand the
real problem and thus reframe it in a way that everyone can
agree upon. For example, what is the most important thing…?
o Problem analysis stage: At this stage why questions are most
helpful; questions such as why is that important? Why do you
think it happened? Why were you feeling that way?
o Hypothesis generation or diagnosis stage: how questions allow
the group or individual to begin to formulate a tentative theory
to explain or address the problem: how is this situation similar
to or different from other problems? How could you do things
differently? How could we intervene?
o Action stage: At this stage, the group may be seeking to
describe behavior (test for different behaviors) or to share
inferences (test for different views); what questions become
important again. What are the implications of all this for future
action? What should you do now?
At any stage of the problem solving process, a team can get stuck,
not seeing a way forward. To help shake things up so that the
team can see things from a new perspective and move forward,
it’s useful to ask the following types of questions:
o Open-ended questions: Unlike closed questions, which seek a
short, specific response like yes or no, open ended questions
encourage people to expand ideas and allow exploration of
what’s important to them or what is comfortable for them to
reveal. Asking open ended questions also encourages them to do
the work of self reflection and problem solving rather than
justifying or defending a position. For example: what do you
think…? Could you say more about…? What possibilities come to
mind? What might happen if you…?

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