Creating Company Culture of Questions

When looking at the effectiveness of a company culture, the first thing I usually analyze is if the company has fostered a culture of questions.

At the surface level, that seems like a very basic thing.

But you would be surprised at how many people are afraid to ask simple questions for fear of being ridiculed, looked at like they don’t understand their job, or simply don’t want to appear like they don’t know their discipline.

Asking questions in the workplace can be a very vulnerable thing. For instance, before I took over as VP of Operations for our marketing firm, frontline employees would receive tasks that had maybe 30% of the information they should have.

The problem with 30% of information on a task is if you only give 30%, you’re only going to get at best 30% back. So, one of the most important steps someone could take would be to gain confidence to be able to ask questions that would help take us the rest of the 70% of that task so we can get a clear understanding of what is required.

In assigning tasks the first set of questions needs to come from the assigner. If I’m assigning that task I need to ask myself “if I did not have the context that I currently have based on the information within this task, could I complete it to its fullest”? 

This practice of questioning myself usually results in making the rest of the project more successful down the line. If I’m giving the team who is carrying out the task all the information they need, and in marketing that includes images, content, call to action, value proposition, sale information, etc… I reduce the back and forth that comes from a lack of information.  I’m increasing efficiency and quality.

Now the second line of questioning needs to come from the task receiver. Looking at the tasks, if I have a clear vision of what I need to accomplish, I should be able to hit the ground running. But what if I don’t?

Does your company culture allow anyone to ask questions to anyone else?

Well, that’s why we started the culture of questions. When the company moved to position questions to be revered, wanting questions, celebrating questions, and promoting questions, we unlocked something that wasn’t there before, A clear path to understanding.

You see, it’s not so much about the question itself, it’s more about the free flow of information without concern or ridicule or even suspicion you may not understand your job.

There have been many times since we established this culture of questions when in my conversations with people they would ask me questions about policies and procedures and it would spark within me. Ideas that I hadn’t considered before. It allow me to see more of the challenges our frontline employees have, which I was not able to see given the position that I’m in but gave me the proper insight to understand the solution from a different vantage point.

Often times I will thank someone for being inquisitive, and giving me a new perspective

Questions as a teaching tool.

There are several ways to handle situations that come up within the workplace.  Traditionally we rely on our managers to dictate what things should look like in regard to policies and procedures and even solutions to problems.

And from the traditional top-down approach, this is always been very appropriate, but as trends change, one of the things that promotes a positive culture within the workplace is the ability to cultivate and make decisions based on hearing feedback from your team.

For instance, in a training session, I can take discuss 40 topics I want a new trainee to learn, and dictate to them all 40 topics.

I can go into great detail about those things, and I can go into even greater detail about how my trainee should implement and regard those 40 things.

But what of those 40 things is that employee going to emotionally accept?  How much are they going to remember?  The challenge with dictating a large amount of information is the receiver has no emotional investment in it. There was no work to attain it so retention and acceptance of those changes traditionally tend to be minimal.

Now let’s take that situation and flip it on its head.

In the book the Toyota way, they cultivate a habit where they ask the trainee to come up with questions.  To write down as many questions as they possibly can regarding the subject matter they’re teaching on.

This gives the trainee a platform for training based on the questions that they have put investment into. If I take the same amount of topics from our previous example, and I answer 40 questions that my trainee has asked, it tells me several things. One, my trainee is interested in the subject matter, they put an emotional investment in and an intellectual investment into the things that are about to be learned.  And two, their retention should be higher because they picked topics that they have invested in.

So I asked the same question, how much of that are they emotionally going to accept? How much of that are they going to remember?

In my experience, it makes training so much more effective.

There was a time our content manager came and asked about how to lean their blogging process.  Identifying writing a blog can be broken down into four basic steps, research, writing, posting, and tracking.  I asked her what she felt was the most important of those steps is in the overall writing process.

She identified that research was one of the most important things they can be doing as a department as it supports the rest of the steps.

I said “Great, go ahead and focus on the research side”.

She responded back with a thank you for the clarification and was going to go back and let them know about the new procedure that they have to follow regarding research.

I called the time out “T” with my hands.  And shared, “What good is a  culture of questions if in our delivering of a change in policy comes from a top-down dictation?

I invited her to share this information with a different approach.

“Ask your team which of the four steps, which is the most important.

When somebody says research, identify that as a topic you’d like to dive further into.

Ask them about their current habits of research.

Ask them what has worked best in those habits of research.

Ask them then, what could they do to improve those habits of research.

Ask them if they agree as a group that those are the next best steps.

And if we’re getting close, then possibly suggest other outcomes that might help with the research steps.

And once you have fully explored the topic of research in both guiding through questions and sometimes direct guidance through ideas and then asking questions about what they think and how they think that suggestion might best be implemented, You can share with them your confidence that they have made the right decision, and set proper expectations in deadlines for the implementation”.

The beauty of this “questions first” approach is everyone in the meeting walks away edified, and the solution came from the frontline.  Since they’re the ones invested in the success of their department and the idea came from them emotional acceptance increases, people feel heard within the workforce, and they feel supported in their efforts. Overall, faster training, and more effective implementation.

So what do we need to do to cultivate a culture of questions?

The first thing we need to do is identify questions as something that is desirable within the organization.  Anytime somebody asks a question, be sure to give it the time that it deserves.

As leaders within a company, it’s important to hear each question and treat it with respect.

When approaching asking questions from the vantage point of the new corporate structure, you’re able to answer that question with more empathy.  Understanding that our job is not a top-down dictation, but a bottom-up support for our teams gets us in the mindset to be better a better support.

Also understanding that it could take a bit of courage for somebody to be vulnerable and ask questions within the workplace in fear of being looked at as if they don’t understand their position is crucial as well.

We need to remove the stigma that just because we’re asking questions doesn’t mean we’re questioning.  It doesn’t mean that we lack the knowledge to do the job.

Generally, what it means is someone is getting past their feelings of vulnerability to ask clarifying questions which may empower someone to get the task done the first time the right way.

Not everyone is going to accept questions as a means of opening up communication or even using questions as a teaching tool.  The question you then need to ask yourself is, “Is this person a fit in our company culture?  Do they grasp the power this tool has? Not everyone is on board with changing company culture.  How do we handle the Naysayers?  I’ll write more about this on another post.

There’s no such thing as a dumb question

Overall, I believe this to be a true statement. However, not all questions are created equal. There are some questions that are more effective than others.

For example, on a personal level, if I continue to try something and it persistently doesn’t work, I can ask myself personally. Why do I keep failing at this?

This is absolutely a question, but it is not very productive.

The question isn’t why do I keep failing,

A more productive question would be “What can I do to overcome this challenge”?

This sets the proper motivation behind a question. If I ask “why I keep failing” my internal voice is going to want to answer it and tell me about all the reasons I fail. This mindset is neither very positive nor productive.

Whereas, when I frame the question, what can I do to overcome this challenge, I’m framing it as a challenge, challenges are meant to be overcome.

But we’ll cover this in greater detail in a different blog post. But for now, understand that some questions are more productive than others and that all questions are valuable in their own way.

The topic of creating a culture of questions may not seem like one that is super important, but I can say with great confidence that when you adopt a culture of questions within your own company, you will see a change in people to a great degree, you’ll find that people will be more open to ideas, and the sharing of the free flow of information.

Communication in the workplace is crucial, questions as it’s own topic become a vehicle that allows for that flow of information. Try it yourself. Think about the ways your company would change if you fostered an environment of questions. Take an entire quarter of the work year and see how questions transform your internal company culture.