Presented by: Kristin Lamendola

1. Kristin Lamendola
Vervago
Effective Business Communication with
Society of Women Engineers
WE12
November 10, 2011

2. Today’s Learning Objectives
① Use Precision Questioning and Precision
Answering to make discussion more efficient
② Use the Precision Questioning Toolkit to
analyze problems from different angles
③ Use Precision Answering to preserve credibility
in interactions with executives, senior
management and stakeholders.

3. Background for this work
 Fifteen years of development at Stanford
University
 Observations or interviews with 225 executives
 25 longitudinal studies of executives
 In 2007, 55 formal interviews in 9 industries
 In-depth study of PQ+A in two global companies
• Cypress Semiconductor
• Microsoft
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4. Four deep trends
 Information overload
 Higher levels of complexity
 Complexity is dynamic
 Increased time crunch
Time 
The pressure to
improve discussion
The efficiency of typical
business meetings
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5. Two factors make it difficult to manage
complexity and overload in meetings
 Questions that lack focus
 Answers that destroy focus
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6. When answers lack focus
 Not clear
 Not crisp
 Not concise
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7. What’s going wrong?
 She asks a precise question
• “What are the unit sales for the urban and suburban
segments?”
 He hears a generic question
• “Give me an update.”
 He believes he’s helping the discussion by
providing “valuable context”
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8. Precision Answering solves the problem
 The basics of PA
• Answer the question that was asked
• Start with the core
• Keep it short
 The benefits of PA
• Better focus
• Greater efficiency
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9. When questions lack focus
 Low efficiency
 No depth
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10. What’s going wrong?
 We shouldn’t be asking this:
• What do the lines show us?
 If the question in our mind is this:
• At the end of the quarter, what was the rate at which
sales were decreasing?
• Is the rate of decrease slowing down or speeding up?
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11. Precision Questioning solves the problem
 The basics of PQ
• Be precise
• Get to the heart of the matter
 The benefits of PQ
• Greater efficiency
• Better analysis
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12. Precision Questioning

13. Drill-down questions fall into seven categories
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14. The seven categories
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Solid-state device
performance
requirements are
becoming more
complex.

15. Write down an issue using one of these formats
 Use a real issue from
your work
 Write legibly
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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16. We are now going to the PQ Gym
 We will use your issue
to practice the
categories
one at a time
 Like practicing
grounders,
pop ups,
line drives,
bunts
 Real PQ is
more fluid than this
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17. Instructions for two-minute drills
 Pair up with a partner
 Decide roles
• One person presents issue & answers questions
• Other person asks questions
 Don’t change roles until instructed to
 These are practice drills for the questioner; this
will not be a fluid discussion
• Answers should be short, honest, and realistic
 Please wait to begin
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18. Establish the big picture
 Presenter starts
• Show them the written statement
• Give an overview of your issue (about 30 seconds)
 Then questioner goes
• Ask questions that help you understand the big picture
(about 60 seconds)
• Big picture questions are mostly clarifications
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19. Go/NoGo questions guide energy and focus
 Setting up a good meeting
• Who should participate?
• Goal?
• How much time?
• Who should tee up the issue?
 Shaping the direction once the meeting begins
• Are we focused on the right thing?
• Are we asking the right questions?
• Should we take this off-line?
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20. Examples of Go/NoGo questions
 OK
• Who should attend?
 Better
• Who knows more about this, Ellen or Bill?
 OK
• What would be the goal of the meeting?
 Better
• Is a half-hour enough time to both review the data and
figure out the underlying causes of the problem?
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21. Practice Go/NoGo questions
 Ask questions that
would help them set up
a real meeting to
discuss this issue
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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22. Clarification questions sharpen the meaning
 By “clarification” we mean clarification of the
meaning of words and sentences
 Three main types of clarification
• Clarifying slippery words
• Asking graph questions
• Asking pivot table questions
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23. Clarification of slippery words
 A “slippery” word means one thing to one person
and something different
to another person
 OK
• What do you mean
by “complex”?
 Better
• Complex in what ways?
• Do you mean complex with respect to number of parts?
• Complex with respect to number of dependencies?
Solid-state device
performance requirements
are becoming more
complex.
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24. Practice clarifying slippery words
 Clarify words that might
mean something
different to the presenter
than to you.
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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25. Clarification through graph questions
 “Draw the graph” with questions
• When did the complexity start to increase?
• How far have you fallen behind the original projections?
• Are you losing ground or gaining ground?
Solid-state device
performance requirements
are becoming more
complex.
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26. Clarification through pivot table questions
 Pivot table questioning
• Picture the parts
• Question the parts
 Examples
• Show it to me by ___ (gender, age, location).
• Where has morale been the most difficult to improve?
• Where has morale been easiest to improve?
Improving morale is
turning out to be more
difficult than we
expected.
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27. Practice graph and pivot table clarification
 Graph questions
 Pivot table questions
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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28. Assumption questions go deep
 An assumption is something that must be true in
order for the statement to be true
 The difficulty: assumptions are in what’s not said
 Useful tip: phrase your questions this way
• Are we assuming…?
• Are we assuming…?
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29. Common categories of assumptions
“I’m looking for the solution to the problem of…”
 Existence
• Are we assuming a problem exists?
 Uniqueness
• Are we assuming there’s only one problem?
 Measurement
• Are we assuming we can measure improvement?
 Value
• Are we assuming it’s bad?
 Time, Constancy
• Are we assuming the problem isn’t changing over time?
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30. Practice assumption questions
 Are we assuming...?
 Are we assuming...?
 Are we assuming...?
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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31. BCQs ask for evidence
 Two main types of BCQs
• Questions about the validity of the data
• Questions about the credibility of the sources of
information
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32. BCQ: questions about the validity of data
 Not
• How do you know that’s true?
 OK
• What’s the data say?
 Better
• How complete is the data?
• How accurate is the data?
• Is the sample representative of the population?
• Is the sample large enough?
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33. Practice data questions
 Ask questions about
the validity of their data
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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34. Establish the big picture
 New presenter
• Show your written statement as you give an overview
(about 30 seconds)
 New questioner
• Ask questions that help you understand the big picture
(about 60 seconds)
• Big picture questions are mostly clarifications
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35. BCQ: questions about the credibility of
sources of information
 OK
• Where did you hear this?
 Better
• Did you hear it from somebody who was on the project
at the beginning?
• Do you have 100% confidence in what they are telling
you?
• Should you check with other people who were on the
project at the beginning?
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36. Practice source questions
 Ask questions about
the credibility of their
sources of information
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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37. Questions about causes help us control
 You may have heard about the “five why’s”
• Why did it happen? What caused that? What caused
that? What caused that? What caused that?
 Here are five precise why’s
• What triggered this (an event)?
• Is there a root cause (a condition of vulnerability)?
• What is the mechanism (how does it work)?
• What are the drivers (pushes)?
• What are the inhibitors (pulls)?
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38. Cause questions
 OK
• Why were our initial expectations so unrealistic?
 Better
• Was the root cause the fact that this was a different
type of problem than we have seen in the past?
 OK
• Why is it becoming more complex?
 Better
• What are the main drivers of complexity?
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39. Practice cause questions
 Root cause? Trigger?
 Drivers? Inhibitors?
 Mechanism?
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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40. Questions about effects help us predict
 When thinking about the future, we tend to
oversimplify
 This 3x3 matrix helps us be more precise
Best case Worst case Most likely
Short term
Medium term
Long term
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41. Effects questions
 OK
• How long will it take?
 Better
• Worst case, how long will it take?
 OK
• What will be the result?
 Better
• What will the long-term consequences be?
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42. Practice effect questions
 Ask questions like this:
• Suppose you don’t
change anything.
In the ___ term, what’s
the ___ case for ___?
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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43. Questions about action
 Many more options than “what should we do
about it?”
• What is our strategy?
• What tactics will we use to enact our strategy?
• What is our plan for the coming week?
• Is our goal a root cause fix? Or is it just containment?
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44. Practice action questions
 Ask questions like these:
• Can you do a root-cause
fix on this?
• Should you just try to
contain it?
___ is more complex
than expected.
___ is taking more ___
[time, resources, etc.] than
expected.
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45. Benefit of PQ
 What is the benefit of making our questions more
precise?
• It helps us analyze our work in new ways
• Our meetings become more efficient
• The level of critical thinking goes up
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46. Tools, not rules
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47. Precision Answering
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48. PQ can’t get very far without PA
 The basics of Precision Answering
• Answer the question that was asked
• Start with the core
• Keep it short
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49. The heart of Precision Answering: bullet points
 Listen carefully to the entire question
• Don’t start forming your answer too soon
 Pause to form your answer
• Decide on the key points
 Start your answers with a number
• Two reasons: 1) ___ 2) ___.
• Three risks: 1) ___ 2) ___ and 3) ___.
 A good rule of thumb: list three bullet points
• That is what our working memories can hold

50. Experiments to try at the conference
 Start with writing
• Emails are an ideal training ground
 Will you be calling a customer, a colleague, or
your admin?
• Try to ask one precise question and see if you get the
information you need more quickly
 Will you be sitting with friends at dinner?
• Ask a precise question and notice how it feels

51. Applying PQ+A on the job
 What are some specific places where you think
you can use PQ or PA?
• Meetings, processes, or other situations
• Discuss at your table
• As a group, select the five where the improvement in
the work would be greatest
• Assign a spokesperson to share your favorite
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52. Today’s Learning Objectives
① Use Precision Questioning and Precision
Answering to make discussion more efficient
② Use the Precision Questioning Toolkit to
analyze problems from different angles
③ Use Precision Answering to preserve credibility
in interactions with executives, senior
management and stakeholders

53. The PQ+A Workshop
 Day-long / highly interactive
 Teaches four things: PQ, PA, and two techniques
for critical thinking and preparation for meetings
 Creates high impact three ways
• Pre-work focuses on real issues and is used in all key
exercises
• Application worksheet used throughout the day
• Post-workshop emails deepen the learning
 Can chose to continue the relationship
• Opt to receive Skills Sharpeners
• Skill Sharpeners Archives
• LinkedIn Group for Alumni
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54. Additional PQ+A Opportunities
 Enroll in full day workshop
• Vervago.com/events
 Sign up to receive Skill Sharpeners
• Vervago.com
 Download past Skill Sharpeners
• Vervago.com/Sharpeners
 Bring the Workshop to your organization
• kristin@vervago.com
• 303.619.8707
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