Mastering the Art of Precision Q&A: Techniques for Better Questioning and Answering

“The art and science of asking questions is the source of all knowledge.” — Thomas Berger

One of the best leadership tools I ever learned is the Precision Q+A framework.

You might hear it referred to as Precision Questions and Answers, or Precision Questioning and Precision Answering, etc.

Ultimately, Precision Q+A is a thinking framework to ask better questions, and answer questions better.

When I first learned the Precision Q+A framework, I felt like I was given one of the most profound tools on the planet to grow my executive leadership skills.

In fact, looking back, I would say that the Precision Q+A framework is by far one of the most powerful thinking and decision frameworks ever created.

Hat tip to Dennis Matthies of Vervago for creating the framework, and Monica Worline of Vervago for sharing and scaling the framework more broadly in the business world.

Bill Gates Wanted Everybody Trained in Precision Q+A

I remember hearing long ago that Bill Gates was frustrated because staff didn’t answer his questions very well in meetings.

Often, they didn’t answer the question that was asked.

Or they gave long-winded answers.

Or they shared a lot information that wasn’t relevant to the question.

And, as a leader who needs to make important decisions, it can be difficult to cut through the fluff or the noise or even evasive behaviors.

So Bill Gates required staff to get trained in the Precision Questions + Answers framework.

The Origin of the Precision Questions + Answers Framework

If I got this right, Dennis Matthies, Vervago co-founder, created the Precision Q+A framework at Stanford over 25 years of teaching at Standford.

He created the Precision Q+A framework for for deeper thinking and accelerated learning.

As master coach at Vervago, Dennis coaches executives to present their best thinking during C-Suite and Board of Directors meetings, and as they lead their teams.

Why Practice the Precision Q+A Framework?

Unless you’re a lawyer, chances are you have not been trained how to ask and answer questions with skill.

Meanwhile, you are constantly trying to make decisions with limited information and wading through information to figure out what you need to know.

When you practice the Precision Q+A framework, you learn how to:

1. solve complex problems
2. conduct deep analysis
3. make difficult decisions

The big idea with Precision Q+A is to learn how to use precise questions and answers to learn what you know, don’t know and need to know next.

You also learn how to learn more completely and to understand the full dimensions of a position, a decision, and supporting information.

Imagine If You Could Ask and Answer Questions Better

Learning Precision Q+A could be a career growing move.   Not learning Precision Q+A, could be a career-ending move.

I like how Ken Wells, Director of AGS Performance Improvement at Applied Materials, framed the idea in his article, Reflecting on Seven Years of “Precision Questioning and Answering”:

“Imagine being asked by an executive to stop talking, leave the meeting, and don’t return until you learn how to answer a question.

For some people this could be a devastating, career-stalling experience.

For others who gain precision answering skills, this could be a launching pad to exponential career growth.

The confidence gained when you can concisely and accurately answer questions (while not oversimplifying), convert stressful executive interrogations into collaborative conversations.”

The Illusion of Knowledge

The Precision Q+A framework can help us counteract the Illusion of Knowledge by helping us better understand what we know and what we don’t.

The Illusion of Knowledge comes down to this:

“I am under the impression that I know and understand more than what I really know and understand.”

The Illusion of Knowledge is a bias in our thinking, and it can represent a significant obstacle to our learning process by impeding reflection on our own knowledge and preventing us from distinguishing what is known from what is not.

Shortcogs.com defines the Illusion of Knowledge like this:

“The feeling of knowing or understanding something and the actual knowledge of that thing are not always related to each other.

It is common, in practical and concrete everyday situations, as in more conceptual abstractions, to find that there is a more or less important gap between our real knowledge, and the perception that we have of it.

The illusion of knowledge is a cognitive bias involving a person feeling as though they know more or understand better than what their actual knowledge allows them to assert.

In itself, the illusion of knowledge would therefore represent an erroneous metacognitive judgment, that is to say a bad judgment about one’s own thoughts.”

Learn the 7 Categories of Questions

To practice Precision Q+A, you need to learn the 7 types of questions for focused drilling down:

1. Go / No Go.  Do we need to talk about this?
2. Clarification.  What do you mean?
3. Assumptions.  What are we assuming?
4. Basic Critical Question.  How do we know this is true?
5. Causes.  What’s causing this?
6. Effects.  What will be the effects?
7. Action.  What should be done?

Learn Drill-Down Precision Questions + Answers

In the beginning, I found it easy to remember the 7 categories, but I had a challenge sometimes figuring out which question to ask next within a category.

I found it extremely helpful to keep a cheat sheet of example questions and answers with me as prompts and reminders:

Category	Example Questions
The Go / No Go Question	Why are we talking about this now?   BASIC QUESTIONS What is our agenda? What are our goals? Need any ground rules? Where do we go next? What is the “cost” of this discussion? This email thread? MOTIVATION Is this urgent to discuss? Important? Interesting? PARTICIPATION Do I need to be here? Do you? Who else? Who should participate electronically? Should we take this off-line? FOCUSING Are we getting to the heart of the issue? Are we focusing long enough on key ideas? QUESTIONING THE QUESTIONS Where is this line of questioning going? Are we going down a rat hole? Into deep space?
Questions that Clarify Meaning	What do we mean? AMBIGUOUS Do we mean __ or __? VAGUE Where? When? To what extent? Which type? Which parts? What percentage? How probable? How confident? Compared to what? What’s the rate? What’s the trend? DIFFICULT CONCEPT What is an example? Paradigm example? What is a rough Definition? Formal definition? Synonym? What are its parts? What are its uses? Why is it called “__”? What is an analogy? Draw a picture? How is it related to __? How is it unlike __? MUSH Are distinct claims/ Arguments/questions/ sources/etc. being lumped together? OTHER Paraphrase: Are you saying that __?
Questions About Assumptions	What are we assuming? EXISTENCE Does __ exist? UNIQUENESS Is there only one __? MEASUREMENT Is there a valid way to measure __? Can it be judged qualitatively? POSSIBILITY Is __ possible? Feasible? VALUE Is __ good/bad/OK/etc.? AUDIENCE What is the speaker assuming about his or her audience? How do our background assumptions differ? POLITICAL, HUMAN STEREOTYPES Gender, class, race, age, disability, ethnic, etc. CATEGORY OK to lump __ together? Only one basic type? SIMILARITY Is __ similar to __? TIME, CONSTANCY Are the changes slow enough, small enough, or steady enough to be safely ignored?
The Basic Critical Question	How do we know this is true? DIRECT SOURCE What is this person’s credibility? INDIRECT SOURCE Where did you hear this? QUANTITATIVE REASONS What’s the data? QUALITATIVE REASONS Is this argument valid? (Argument by analogy, ends-means, precedent, tradition, generalization from a sample.) RESEARCH STRATEGY What do we know & what do we need to know? What level of certainty do we need? What is the fastest way for us to access first-rate expert opinion? What is a rough way to get pretty good evidence or expertise? OTHER QUESTIONS For actions, the Basic Critical Question is “Why do this?” For value judgments: “What makes it good/bad/OK?”
Questions about Causality	Why? What caused this? FOCUSING Is it caused by x? y? z? To what extent are the causes inside vs. outside the system? What level of explanation do we want? TRIGGER vs. CONDITIONS What was the immediate cause, the trigger? What conditions needed to be in place? ROOT vs. CONTRIBUTING What were root causes? Contributing causes? DYNAMIC CAUSES What are the opposing Forces? How do they add up? How changing? OTHER QUESTIONS A cause? A correlation? Just random variation? One cause or many? How does it work? What is the mechanism? What was happening at the time __ occurred? WHEN CAUSALITY IS ORGANIC AND NOT LINEAR Are causes interacting? Are effects interacting? Are effects feeding back on causes? What are the system’s best “tweaking” points?
Questions About Effects	What will be the effects? FOCUSING How will it affect x? y? z? To what extent are the effects inside vs. outside the system? ALTERNATIVE SCENARIOS What is the worst case? Best case? Most/first possible? PROBABILITY Most likely case? Less likely but possible? TIME SPAN Short-term effects? Medium-term effects? Long-term effects? PRIMARY vs. SECONDARY Positive side effects? OTHER QUESTIONS Is this prediction a statistical inference? Is it based on a causal model?
Questions About Action	What could / should be done? BY WHOM What should I do? What should be done by groups I belong to? In collaboration with? BY WHEN When will it be done? Is this a commitment? ROOT CAUSE FIX vs. CONTAINMENT Will this merely contain the problem? Is this a root cause fix? STRATEGY vs TACTICS Have a tactical plan? Have a strategy? =i) methodical analysis of all relevant trends? ii) attacking multiple problems with coordinated actions? iii) global & long-term? iv) risk analysis based on changes in deep dynamics v) competition taken into account? OTHER Alternatives considered? Milestones? Exit strategy? Mitigation plan? Timing? Support?

Practice Precision Q+A in Recurring Scenarios

I found that it’s incredibly helpful to practice Precision Questions + Answers during 3 common scenarios:

1. Email
2. Meetings
3. Making a decision

When you get a lot of emails it can be really helpful to use precision to quickly understand what the point is or what the action is or what the decision is.

Similarly, when it comes to meetings, they are a good practice ground to ask better questions and answer questions better.

Chances are you make a lot of decisions throughout your day.   Choose a complex decision or one of your more important decisions to figure out what you know or don’t know, or why you support a particular choice or action.

Practice Balancing Rapport with Results

One recurring criticism of Precision Q+A is that in the hands of some people, it ends up as an abusive tool.

Instead of a collaborative question and answer session to learn and explore a position and a decision, some people use it for interrogation.

Don’t be one of them.

Balance connection and building rapport, along with your desire to learn and explore a position and decision.

Learn Precision Q + A from Vervago

You can find more information on Precision Q+A at Vervago.

If you can take Precision Q+A training, and learn it from a great coach, it will be one of your best investments.

Precision Q+A is among the best leadership tools for making better decisions.

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