Asking Why turns things personal AND complex.
It requires that the one asked justifies and explains a thing, behavior, event.
If it’s too close to them (eg. the owner and their decisions re: their “ugly” website), it becomes a judgment on what THEY decided. They get defensive.
Reframing Why.
Do think (to start) with why, just reframe it into How, What, When.
Why do you work like this? → Explain to me. Justify, TO ME, YOUR decision. Get defensive.
Another ways:
- What made you take this approach to working like this? → Takes you out of the focus, gives you distance from the question, makes you think of the process, decision-making, gain altitude.
- How did you come up to this decision? → Asks about the process to reach the decision, step by step.
- How did things turn to make things work this way? → Asks for the context, facts and perspectives that brought them to this point.
Asking questions is about finding out how you can help your clients, free of judgement, so that you both can move forward.
You can turn complex into simple by just reframing that one word: Why-.