The Genres of Questions
In the course of our training career, we could have gotten our course participants to play an experiential game, do a workbook exercise, watch a training film, and act in a role play.
The purpose of these activities is to create opportunities for the trainer to debrief his participants. So, after watching a training video, the trainer makes an attempt to question his participants on what they had seen and heard, and though questioning, participants are encouraged to recall, think, and share their insights with others. In the process, they get inspired and learn new concepts.
What differentiate a facilitator from a trainer is that he uses questions more frequently and extensively in the course of his career. A facilitator needs to avoid boring his audience with the same ‘genre’ of questions and more importantly, uses different questions to ‘lead’ the interaction without taking the reins. This means his line of work calls for a greater range of questions to be used and a higher dexterity in applying these questions. For the facilitator, these needs have elevated questioning into an art.
There are many ‘genres’ of questions. Personally, I know of six. One of these, which we are very familiar with, is the ‘Fact-finding’ genre of questions. They come in the form of ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘where’ and ‘how’.
Here are some examples:
The purpose of these activities is to create opportunities for the trainer to debrief his participants. So, after watching a training video, the trainer makes an attempt to question his participants on what they had seen and heard, and though questioning, participants are encouraged to recall, think, and share their insights with others. In the process, they get inspired and learn new concepts.
What differentiate a facilitator from a trainer is that he uses questions more frequently and extensively in the course of his career. A facilitator needs to avoid boring his audience with the same ‘genre’ of questions and more importantly, uses different questions to ‘lead’ the interaction without taking the reins. This means his line of work calls for a greater range of questions to be used and a higher dexterity in applying these questions. For the facilitator, these needs have elevated questioning into an art.
There are many ‘genres’ of questions. Personally, I know of six. One of these, which we are very familiar with, is the ‘Fact-finding’ genre of questions. They come in the form of ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘where’ and ‘how’.
Here are some examples:
‘What kind of roles each of these actors played in the video?’
‘Amongst the actors, who is the one that comes across as most defensive?’
‘When did John say ‘You are the source of our difficulties’?’
‘Where had this conversation taken place?’
‘How did Jamie resolves the conflict between John and Mary?’
‘Amongst the actors, who is the one that comes across as most defensive?’
‘When did John say ‘You are the source of our difficulties’?’
‘Where had this conversation taken place?’
‘How did Jamie resolves the conflict between John and Mary?’
You can see that this type of questions is very direct and is designed to verify data and to gather information about the current situation.
A lesser known genre of questions is the ‘Third-party’ questions. These questions are created by the facilitator to help his workshop participants express their personal thoughts and other sensitive information through projection.
Here are some examples:
Conrad Raj, in a recent article in Today, commented that the Government should take control of the bus and train services from the commercial entities. Otherwise we cannot have a world-class transportation system. What are your thoughts about his comment?’
‘Some people feel that the government should lower GST to boost retail sale in the country. How does that sound to you?’
There is some concern about the recent decision by the government to delay building projects. Can you relate to that concern?
You will notice that there are two parts in the structure of a ‘Third Party’ question. The 1st part is the quotation and this is followed by a question seeking the participant’s opinion.
Usually, facilitators use this genre of questions to avoid putting their participants in a corner because they may be sensitive about expressing their inner thoughts about a sensitive topic. By
using an already expressed opinion from another person or taking a quotation from a published article, we could uncover the participant’s thoughts in an indirect manner and non threatening way. So, instead of asking 'what you think about lowering GST to boost retail sale?', which is direct and threatening, we use ‘some people feel that the government should lower GST to boost retail sale in the country. How does that sound to you?’, which is indirect and non threatening since someone else has already expressed this need and any additional opinions on this subject would not identify the participant as being the 1st to raise it. His opinion is nothing more than a projection of a public opinion.
A lesser known genre of questions is the ‘Third-party’ questions. These questions are created by the facilitator to help his workshop participants express their personal thoughts and other sensitive information through projection.
Here are some examples:
Conrad Raj, in a recent article in Today, commented that the Government should take control of the bus and train services from the commercial entities. Otherwise we cannot have a world-class transportation system. What are your thoughts about his comment?’
‘Some people feel that the government should lower GST to boost retail sale in the country. How does that sound to you?’
There is some concern about the recent decision by the government to delay building projects. Can you relate to that concern?
You will notice that there are two parts in the structure of a ‘Third Party’ question. The 1st part is the quotation and this is followed by a question seeking the participant’s opinion.
Usually, facilitators use this genre of questions to avoid putting their participants in a corner because they may be sensitive about expressing their inner thoughts about a sensitive topic. By
using an already expressed opinion from another person or taking a quotation from a published article, we could uncover the participant’s thoughts in an indirect manner and non threatening way. So, instead of asking 'what you think about lowering GST to boost retail sale?', which is direct and threatening, we use ‘some people feel that the government should lower GST to boost retail sale in the country. How does that sound to you?’, which is indirect and non threatening since someone else has already expressed this need and any additional opinions on this subject would not identify the participant as being the 1st to raise it. His opinion is nothing more than a projection of a public opinion.The design and implementation of this kind of questions needs a bit more finesse on the part of the facilitator. Thus, it is always good to create your 'third party' questions ahead of the facilitated workshop, and practice always makes perfect.
This article is written by Anthony Mok on 26 Jul 2008.
Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.
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