Better Questions, Better Connections, Better Community
If we were to ask most any person what they desire, I’m quite certain that community and connection would be among the most-answered responses. (That and winning the lottery.) But how do we get to genuine connection? One answer? Better questions.
As a coach, powerful questions are a foundational skill, one that I use every day, in service of every relationship. If we consider what questions are, the flippant, easy answer is that questions are how we seek information, seek knowledge. Yes, questions are those things, but in truth, they are so much more than that. A good question shows that someone is paying attention, they’re thinking about you, that they’re honoring your space in their circle. A good question shows care, interest, our dedication to maintaining that relationship. Good questions are the care and feeding of human connection.
This interactive talk (meaning that yes, you're going to practice what we talk about in this session) will help you to understand what a good question is, how they connect us to others, and how to use them. You'll leave knowing how to be a better servant-leader in your own relationships.
The ability to ask questions and to listen for the response is to be in service of a relationship. I created this talk to share this skill, to help you create the kind of community and connections that you desire in life.
Outline/Structure of the Workshop
- Intro
- Housekeeping (agenda)
- Learning Outcomes
- Powerful Questions: What Are They
- How Questions Connect Us as Humans
- Five Questions for Any Coaching Conversation
- Practice: (12 minutes)--Participants go into breakout rooms as pairs. For five minutes, participant A asks participant B powerful questions. For one minute, participant B provides feedback to participant A. Then, they switch roles.
- Takeaways
- Size matters!
- Listen, really listen to what the other person says.
- Georgia O'Keeffe: "“To see takes time, like to have a friend takes time.”
- Q&A
Learning Outcome
- Understand what powerful questions are and their impact on human connection.
- Learn five powerful questions to add to any conversation.
- Experience asking and being asked powerful questions.
Target Audience
Coaches. Scrum masters. Agile leaders. Agile-curious. Managers. Executives. People!
Prerequisites for Attendees
It would be helpful if participants knew what powerful questions are, but that is not mandatory.
Links
Erin writes regularly regarding all things coaching on her site, Ad Meliora Coaching. One of her more popular posts and the impetus for this talk is Five Powerful Questions for Every Coaching Conversation. If there is a topic that you'd like to see her cover on her blog, email her at erin@admelioracoaching.com and suggest it! (Coming up with blog-post ideas isn't nearly as much fun as you think.)
You may have seen Erin speak at Keep Austin Agile, at AgileDC, or at various agile groups around the country. She was supposed to be in Lagos, Nigeria, earlier this summer, talking about powerful questions and delivering her Coaching Day workshop, but the pandemic had other plans. So, she spent some quality time in Mural, made the workshop virtual, and delivered the workshop to Nigeria in September.
Erin is the principal coach for her own boutique coaching and consulting practice, Ad Meliora Coaching. She is also one of the co-founders of Agile Coaching Circles, a global initiative to give agile coaches a safe, virtual space to practice their coaching and mentoring skills. She lives with her husband, Joel, in Austin, Texas. When she isn't practicing asking better questions, she can generally be found on one of Austin's many trails, hiking her horrible dogs.
schedule Submitted 5 months ago
People who liked this proposal, also liked:
-
keyboard_arrow_downChristine Frayda - Backlog Priority Games: activities to facilitate discussions with your stakeholders, online edition
60 Mins
Workshop
Beginner
This workshop encourages the participants to take the role of a stakeholder in small group priority discussions. We will sample three online games to prioritize items and compare and contrast them.
-
-
keyboard_arrow_downRehana Rajwani - Organizational Physics - What can we learn from Newton?
40 Mins
Talk
Intermediate
Physics is everywhere - I'm sure you've heard that. If you're an engineer or simply an unexplainably logical person, this conversation is meant for you!
Physics is one of the most fundamental scientific disciplines, and its main goal is to understand how the universe behaves. Physics is one of the oldest academic disciplines and, through its inclusion of astronomy, perhaps the oldest discipline overall.Given the above, it's amazing how physics has been minimally explored in its impact to organizational behaviour and structure. Being an engineer, I was curious and have been exploring how the laws of physics impact the maturity of agile and the organizational culture. I look forward to sharing this information with you in a fun and engaging way!
-
-
keyboard_arrow_downMun-Wai Chung / JF (John Francis) Unson - Daring You to Open the HR Pandora’s Box
Mun-Wai ChungPrincipal ConsultantMunWai ConsultingJF (John Francis) UnsonCoach/ConsultantJF Unson Consultingschedule 5 months ago
60 Mins
Talk
Advanced
The Agile Manifesto came out in 2001. It’s all about teams. And yet, HR processes still focus on individuals. A few years ago, companies in Europe started to ask questions on how Agile affects HR, specifically in performance management and reward & recognition. In the US, this exercise only started recently, even though there were a few voices raising and answering these questions early on. In this interactive talk, we dare you to open the HR pandora’s box and go on a tour with us as we share with you how we navigate the HR waters to increase your business agility. We hope you would be courageous enough to join us in driving this transition in your organisations.
-
-
keyboard_arrow_downSusan Almon - Recovering from Burnout - What to Expect
40 Mins
Talk
Beginner
Burnout is a popular topic, even before the COVID-19 impacts to our lives. There is confusion because people use the word to describe everything from being tired after a tough week to a condition so severe that you need to leave your job, at least for a while.
A shared understanding of what burnout is, how to prevent it and how to recover lets us work together to make our workplaces safer and keep people healthier.
This talk will briefly explain the environments where burnout happens and the personal traits that may make you more susceptible, to set context, then talk about the impacts of burnout and how to recover or support someone who's recovering. Focus will be on topics that don't get talked about as much: cognitive and physical impacts, rehab (how to get your brain back in shape), what help you may need.
I diagnosed my own burnout while watching a DevOps conference talk. This is a "Yes, and..." continuation of the topic, to inform people of what to expect during recovery. Most advice stops after advising rest and possibly leaving your job. That may not be enough to get you ready to go back to work. Burnout can affect your brain like an injury and understanding this will equip you to seek the help you need.
-
