Facilitation Essential #2: Ask Clear Questions
Running meetings can be uncomfortable for leaders, especially when they are trying to be “collaborative” and “inclusive.” When the questions aren’t clear, leaders can get crickets in response to the questions they pose to the team.
It’s not that the questions are wrong; often, the questions just aren’t clear. Either multiple questions are peppered in, or the way an individual should answer isn’t clear.
I’m talking about the types of questions you might ask when running a meeting to know if you have enough alignment among your team members. “Enough” depends on the situation, a strategic decision would warrant more alignment than moving on to the next agenda topic, for example.
Here’s what not to do:
Don’t ask, “Is everyone okay with that?” because inevitably, the first few team members’ heads will nod and you’ll move on, leaving behind someone who was still thinking about it, unsure, or simply not ready to speak up and say something.
Meetings can be uncomfortable for leaders, especially those who are trying to be collaborative & inclusive
There are two categories of questions leaders can ask when reaching a decision point during a meeting with team.
Opt-In Questions
“Opt-In” questions are exactly what they sound like: team members show, through some action they take, that they are aligned with what the facilitator (often the leader) is proposing. It might look like any of these:
“Can I see with a show of hand the team members who feel aligned with this decision?”
“Say your name if you support this project.”
“Let’s each rank our alignment on a scale of 1-5.”
For that last question, you might have the threshold that anything in the 4-5 range, or 3-5 range, depending on the stakes, is acceptable for alignment.
I was working with a team to develop a plan for how they would run their meetings after I was gone. We had designed several parameters about the who, when, where, why etc. In order to make sure everyone was in support of upholding our plan, I asked the team members to say their name if they were good to go with the plan. When we went around the room confirming alignment in this way, one of the team members got a funny look on her face and said, “Ok guys, I just need to check on something first.” I believe she would not have said anything if I had simply asked something like “are we good with this?” Because I’d given the team a small hoop to jump through, it caught a nuanced hesitation that a team member was experiencing and able to voice.
With another team on Zoom, in a situation where the leadership was redefining territories for a team of about 25 people, the “opt-in” show of support was pressing the raise-hand button on Zoom. It did feel a bit formal, but that formality matched with the significance of the change, and it was helpful for team members to see firsthand that their peers were also in support.
Reserve opt-in questions for higher-stakes situations where you really need to know, as the leader, that your team is on board with moving forward. It would be total overkill to ask everyone to press the raise-hand button on Zoom to confirm they're ready to move to the next agenda item. But for high-stakes decisions like redefining territories where the leader needs their team on board, requiring team members to take an action to demonstrate alignment is essentially giving them a threshold over which they have to cross that helps them 'check themselves’ internally for alignment.
Opt-Out Questions
“Opt-Out” questions are more common, less formal, and great for the low-stakes decision points. Here, the leader just asks for objections to a proposal. So in one sense, it’s a higher threshold for a team member, because they have to go against what is being proposed. But since what is being proposed is lower stakes, it’s not as hard to object.
Here are some examples:
“Any final questions or comments here before we move on?”
“Does anyone have any hesitations about moving forward with this decision?”
“Any objections?”
The reason you should only use ‘opt-out’ questions for lower-stakes situations is because in general, it takes a lot of courage for someone to speak up and go against their leader’s proposal.
Imagine if a leader asked “Is anyone not ok with this change in our territories?” Would you have been the lone voice to speak up and oppose? Opt-out questions applied to high-stakes situations may get a silence that is misinterpreted as alignment and support when it’s actually confusion, team members not paying attention, or fear of speaking up. That said, it works well for low stakes situations where speaking up would be easier.
Whether the leader asks an opt-in or opt-out question, they should try to have their language reflect the question being posed to individuals, rather than a crowd. Saying "Do you need anything else on this topic before we move on?" is better than "Does anyone need anything else on this topic before we move on?" Both of those are still better than "Is everyone ok with moving on?"
This may sound technically tricky, but it will become second nature with practice and you as the leader will have a much more accurate sense of where your team stands.
This is part of a series of facilitation essentials. Read Facilitation Essential #1 here.
