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Future of Conflict #11: The Art of Asking Questions

This week I read Ken Cloke’s The Art of Asking Questions. It’s part of his tome, The Magic In Mediation, and — like all of Ken’s work — incredibly dense and powerful.

Part of the reason I chose it this week is that I’m teaching a workshop on The Art of Asking Questions as part of Ken’s Spring Training next week. This week I’ll present four insights I got out of the chapter, and next week I will share the course that I will have designed by then (enshallah).

Here are my four insights:

  1. We use questions in many ways
  2. Slowness is a good goal
  3. Beware of curiosity
  4. Look for agreement upstream

Let’s dive in.

We use questions in many ways

Ken says there are two main reasons to ask questions:

The first, of course, is to find answers. The second is to find deeper questions, which are themselves partly answers, and may lead to still deeper questions and answers.

He then elaborates these two into eight:

  1. Gaining insight into the sources of their conflicts
  2. Gaining insight into why they are stuck
  3. Revealing a path forward
  4. Gaining perspective on themselves, their opponents, and the issues
  5. Strengthening their capacity for empathy and humility
  6. Recalibrating their attitudes and intentions
  7. Surfacing interests
  8. Seeking ways of jointly satisfying interests

(Remember, in mediation jargon, “interests” means the underlying needs and goals we all have, whereas “positions” are the strategies we think will lead to our needs being met.)

I break it down slightly differently.

In conflict, I see questions either as helping one side “end” the conflict, usually through establishing power or correctness, OR as helping both sides understand the conflict.

And I would break those 2 into 11 (at least):

To “end” the conflict

  1. Get objective answers
  2. Prove one side is right and the other is wrong
  3. Persuade the other side they are in error
  4. Humiliate the other side

    To understand the conflict

    1. To get to deeper questions
    2. To understand the sources of conflict beneath the issues
    3. To gain insight into why we have chosen the conflicts we have chosen
    4. To gain perspective, holistically, on ourselves and our opponents
    5. To strengthen our capacity for empathy
    6. To surface everyone’s interests
    7. To see ways of jointly satisfying those interests

    I put “end” in quotation marks because endings of this type tend to be unstable equilibria, where the conflict is buried until the power shifts enough to make the conflict worthwhile again. Nothing is really resolved or transformed.

    The art of asking questions is tricky, and it’s one of those things that must be practiced, like a physical skill. I think the most effective technique is for me to give an example of each of these 11 questions. In order to do that, let me first cook up a scenario.

    … cooking …

    Okay, here we go:

    Scenario 1: Marital dispute

    Imagine a relationship (Peter and Paul) that started with 5 years of bliss and co-creation and led to the parties wanting to marry. Soon after marrying, things went downhill, and 2 years later both parties want to end the relationship. Both parties complain that their personal contributions are unseen and undervalued.

    They are trying to figure out how to divide up their possessions, and currently arguing about a brass statue of Krishna they got during a trip to Varanasi early in their relationship.

    Peter: That statue is mine. I paid for it, I love it, and I’m taking it with me.

    Paul: You’re insane! You think everything is yours. Your selfish behavior is exactly why I need to get out of this relationship.

    You decide to intervene.

    Mediator (you): Paul, do you know why Peter is so attached to that statue?

    Paul: Um, no.

    Meditator: Paul, do you think it would be helpful to know?

    Paul: Yeah, I suppose so.

    Mediator: Why don’t you asking him something about it?

    Paul: Okay.

    At this point Paul turns to Peter and is going to ask a question. Here are 11 ways it could go:

    1. Paul wants to end the dispute by getting an objective answer:

    “Peter, how much did the statue cost?”

    1. Paul wants to prove he is right and Peter is wrong:

    “Peter, I happen to have receipts for everything we bought in that trip. Do you want to see the journal showing that I was the one who wanted it and paid for it?”

    1. Paul wants to persuade Peter he is wrong:

    “Peter, what does it mean that you ‘paid for it’ bought it when we shared money for that entire trip?”

    1. Paul wants to humiliate Peter:

    “Peter, how many other $5 trinkets do you want to fight about?”

    1. Paul wants to get to deeper questions:

    “Peter, what does that statue mean to you?”

    1. Paul wants to understand the source of the conflict:

    “Peter, what would have to happen so that we don’t end up arguing about every item in our household?”

    1. Paul wants to gain insight into how he’s ended up at this moment:

    “Peter, how have I changed since we took that trip together?”

    1. Paul wants to gain perspective, holistically, on himself and Peter:

    “Peter, what went wrong between us since that amazing trip we took together?”

    1. Paul wants to strengthen his capacity for empathy:

    “Peter, I never knew how much this statue meant to you. Can you tell me what it represents to you?”

    1. Paul wants to surface everyone’s interests:

    “Do you think we could each take a few minutes to share what this statue means to us?”

    1. Paul wants to find ways of jointly satisfying everyone’s interests:

    “Are there other items that hold a similar significance for both of us? Is there a way we could each end up with powerful mementos from all of the life-changing trips we did together?”

    !

    I chose to give examples of each question because coming up with Ken Cloke-level questions is very hard. I can’t do it! You can’t get that skill from books. I believe it comes from flexing the muscle of heading towards conflict instead of trying to end it.

    Ken quotes Rilke at the end of his chapter:

    be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart, and to try to love the questions themselves—like locked rooms, and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue.

    He has long lists of examples of questions for close relationships and questions for political disagreements. Read them and “feel” which ones hit you hard. It will be different for everyone.

    Slowness is a good goal

    While we can’t all be Ken Cloke-level with our questions (today), the first step is matching the question to the goal. I’ve seen many conversations where people think they’re trying to “understand” and yet the question they pull out — without reflection — is in the “rhetorical humiliation” department.

    That’s a fail! So the first step is to have a clear understanding of the Why? — what are we trying to achieve with each question. This is similar to Jim Camp’s (Start with No) advice about negotiations — every single action must have a clear purpose.

    It’s important to know the purpose of the question so you can select the right style of question.

    One of the hardest things to do also ends up being one of my most common goals:

    [Reflecting] on how our conflicts have trapped or confined us them in ways of thinking, feeling, acting, and being that have kept us stuck and blocked our capacity for dialogue, learning, and growth

    The simplest question for that is: “Why am I stuck right now?” or “Why are we stuck right now?”

    I often note that the tone of the question is as important as the words. The same question can break open a heart or solidify a hatred.

    “Why am I stuck right now?” with self-criticism and judgment will provoke self-pity and shame.

    “Why am I stuck right now?” with curiosity and awareness of tragedy may lead to a creative insight or breakthrough.

    I call these “Slow Questions”, because they slow things down and lean the dialogue in the spirit of collaboration. Here are more of Ken’s Slow Questions:

    • What question, if it were answered, would mean the most to you right now?
    • What hidden opportunities do you see in this conversation?
    • What is the next level of thinking you need to get to in order to solve this problem?
    • If there is one thing that hasn’t been said, but needs to be said in order to reach a solution, what would it be?
    • What would it take to improve the way you are communicating with each other, or addressing this issue?
    • What would enable you to feel more engaged, energized, or effective in solving it?
    • What most needs your attention right now, or going forward?
    • What conversation, if you started it today, could create new possibilities for your future?
    • What seed could you plant together that would make the greatest difference to your future?
    • What questions might you ask each other that could change everything?
    • What question would you most like to be asked right now?
    • What question have you been waiting for? What question do you yearn or pine for?
    • What question have you always wanted to ask him/her, but were afraid to ask?
    • What question do you, or they, most hope will not be asked?
    • What question have you been withholding or hoarding? Why?
    • What question, when you are going home afterwards, will you wish you had asked today, or be disappointed that you didn’t ask?
    • What kind of person would you most like to be in this conflict?
    • What values or higher qualities would you most like to bring to this conversation?
    • What questions might you ask that would allow you to be and do that?

    Most of those hit me in the stomach. I want to grab someone I love, go on a long hike, and trade those back and forth. But that’s just me.

    Beware of curiosity

    This one is a bit provocative. The basic idea is that questions guided by curiosity are fundamentally selfish. They are questions about you. If you’re looking to learn about the other person’s experience, this kind of questions have limited utility.

    Questions about them involve paying attention to their vocal and body cues when they were speaking, and focusing on what you think was most meaningful to them about their last story.

    Here’s an example. Let’s pretend I’m a Seattle tech bro and I just met someone at a networking event.

    Me: What’s your story, Bob?

    Bob: I’m a tech bro. I lived in Berkeley for the past 5 years and recently had to move here because my mom got sick… (trails off)

    So, because I’m a tech bro, it would be really easy to connect on our shared career, or ask questions about his work, his car, or his favorite IPAs. Maybe that’s what I’m most curious about: What neighborhood in Berkeley is he from? Does he know of any Dev Lead jobs in the FinTech space?

    But if I want to understand what’s alive in Bob right now, where’s the juice? I’d guess it’s related to his mom’s sickness and/or his relationship with his mom.

    Me: What’s your relationship with your mom like?

    The question is not about me, it’s about Bob. It’s not based in curiosity, it’s based in perception.

    As a brown guy, I get this curiosity thing all the time.

    Stranger: Are you from India?

    Me: My family is, yes.

    Stranger: I went to Rajasthan in 1975. It was amaazzzing.

    The curiosity is rooted in a desire to connect, to share about their experiences, and to be validated. All important things. But not if the goal is to understand somebody else.

    In preparing this essay, I realized that in all the dozens (hundreds?) of times I’ve been stopped by North Americans who asked if I was from India (or Indians who asked if I lived in North America, for that matter), nobody has ever asked me what it meant to me to be “from” two places at once.

    Stranger: What does it mean to you to be Indian in that way?

    That’s a question I would have No Idea how to answer, and would immediately be engaged. I would learn as much about me as they did.

    As I write that I realize it’s another test for a question: Can the answer be surprising and delightful for everyone involved?

    Look for agreement upstream

    The last insight I want to pull out from this chapter is about the amount of agreement possible when there seems to be no agreement possible.

    Or the amount we have in common when we have nothing in common.

    This relates to every kind of relationship and conflict, and Ken’s method for surfacing it involves asking about the conversation process itself.

    In a debate or argument, instead of assuming what people want, Ken simply asks them:

    • What words or phrases would you use to describe the kind of relationship you most want to have with each other?
    • Do either of you disagree with any of those words?

    Much of the time, there will be no disagreement. That’s because ideas around respect, listening, interrupting, giving, and taking are cultural norms.

    But if there are disagreements, you can highlight them:

    • If you disagree, you haven’t yet reached consensus. Now how can you make that happen?

    Assuming they get past that, and do come up with a list of words that describe the kind of relationship (or conversation) they want to have, they can agree on how to “enforce” it:

    • Do any of us have permission to stop the conversation if we begin moving away from those words?

    or “What should happen when we begin moving away from those words?”

    There’s a similar technique for goals:

    • What do you hope to achieve through this conversation that could strengthen your relationship?

    What if every conversation about a disagreement started with that question?

    “What do we hope to achieve through this conversation that could strengthen our relationship?”

    And a parallel technique to address fears instead of burying them:

    • Do you have any fears, anxieties, or concerns about talking about your relationship? What are they?
    • What is one thing the other person could say or do that could help you reduce your fears, anxieties, or concerns?
    • Would you like to know one thing you could say or do to reduce their fears, anxieties, or concerns?

    We know we are in disagreement. We are always in disagreement. The reminder is that the disagreement is likely a very small part of the relationship. Even if I clash with you on every minor work decision, it’s very likely that we want to same things in terms of how we want to feel, how we want to be treated, what we want to achieve at work, what we want to achieve with every interaction, what we want to avoid with every interaction. It’s also likely we have the same fears, anxieties, and concerns, and that we each have power to lessen those anxieties in the other.

    I see this as similar to the idea that 90% of what happens in the world is actually quite positive, and the news focuses only on the most horrible and hideous of all the events.

    Highlighting the hidden positive, the hidden space of shared agreements, sets an explicit, positive, and co-created context for the disagreement to inhabit.

    Review

    Every art takes a lifetime to master (like Othello). You and I are neither going to start nor finish the process by reading this book. But here are some important insights that will guide our practice:

    1. We use questions in many ways: What is the goal with your question?
    2. Slowness is a good goal if you want to learn from the conflict.
    3. Beware of curiosity, because it makes the question about you.
    4. Look for agreement upstream: We have much more in common than than we’re usually aware of.

    Here’s the blog post with all the quotes, notes, and questions.