Over the years I have developed five questions that I ask myself, other leaders, and my team all the time.
They are so simple. They are also so profound. Can it really be that simple?
I have come to believe that just about every problem worth solving can be discovered through these five questions. Almost every blind spot. Almost every friction point. Almost every thing you wish you had known six months ago. Five questions. That is it.
Just about every problem worth solving can be discovered through these five questions.
If you are leading a team and you want to know what is actually going on under the surface, these questions get you there. If you are coaching another leader who is stuck, these questions get them unstuck. If you are sitting alone in a clarity break trying to figure out what to do next, these questions will surface the answer.
Here they are.
- What has you excited.
- What has you scared.
- What has you frustrated.
- What tools do you need to do your job.
- What do I need to know.
That is it. Five questions. They will save you years.
How I got to these five
I did not invent them. The people who shaped them deserve the credit.
The first three came to me through my friend TJ Christensen, who picked them up from an Andy Stanley marriage study. Andy Stanley has used them time and time again. Then I had the privilege of having dinner with Jeff Henderson, and I was asking him for advice. He told me he runs a quarterly advisory board meeting that he has held for over a decade, and the entire agenda is built on three questions. What has you excited. What has you scared. What has you frustrated.
The next two are the ones TJ added, because he had found they worked when he was a manager. What tools do you need to do your job. What do I need to know.
When I first started using them, I used them because they sounded good. But over six years of asking them, in some way, shape, or form, almost daily, the more I have used them, the more convicted I have become. Not because they sound good. Because of the results. The conversations they unlock. The blind spots they surface. The relationships they deepen.
Not because they sound good. Because of the results.
Why these questions actually work
These questions do not ask you to think. They ask you to feel.
These questions do not ask you to think. They ask you to feel.
That is the whole key. If I ask you how you are doing, your brain goes to work. It runs through a list. It edits. It picks the safe answer. You will tell me good or busy or hanging in there, and we will both move on, and neither of us will be any closer to the truth.
But if I ask you to tell me about a time you were scared, something different happens. You do not think. You feel it. The fear surfaces first, and the words come second. The specific feeling is the key. Not how are you feeling, which is abstract and easy to deflect. But what has you scared, which is specific, and you cannot dodge it without lying.
That is also why the order of the five matters. The three feeling questions go first. Excited. Scared. Frustrated. Those get the person into reflective mode. By the time you get to what tools do you need to do your job, the person is not in their analytical brain anymore. They are in their reflective brain.
Reflective brain has real answers. Analytical brain has spreadsheet answers.
The fifth question lands deepest of all, because by then everything else has been said. By the time I ask what do I need to know, the person has emotionally cleared their throat. They are ready to tell me the thing they almost did not tell me. Three feelings, then a practical reset, then the deepest one. In that order. Every time.
What has you excited
Ask someone to describe what retirement looks like and most of them cannot do it. But ask someone what has them excited and they can answer that fundamentally. No matter how hard life is going for someone, they can still point to something that has them excited. Excitement is hope for the future. That is why this question goes first. You want to start from a positive place.
What has you scared
If I asked what challenges do you have, or is anything bothering you, I would not get as rich of an answer. Scared is an emotion we all share. Sometimes we cannot even name what scares us, but we can feel it, and when we name the feeling the answer comes. If you want to know what your team is really struggling with, this is the question.
What has you frustrated
This is completely different from scared. Scared is the thing being exposed, the thing you do not have an answer for. Frustrated is the friction. The pain points. As leaders our job is to remove obstacles and barriers for our team so they can be the best version of themselves. Imagine the insight you would have about your team if you just knew, plainly, what was frustrating them.
Frustrated is the friction. Our job as leaders is to remove it.
What tools do you need to do your job
Leadership is one of the loneliest things in life, because people do not want to share the pains and struggles they are carrying. I do not know what tools my team needs unless I ask them directly. The answers always amaze me. Sometimes it is a day off. Sometimes it is access to a program they did not know they were missing. You will never guess it. You have to ask it.
What do I need to know
This is my personal favorite. Because leadership is lonely, and we genuinely do not know what is going on. I cannot tell you how many problems I have solved through the answer to this question. People mistreating other people. Tasks not getting done. Things I never would have seen on my own. The answer to this one often takes time. People have to build trust before they will say it.
Three directions
I ask these in three directions. Of myself. Of other leaders. Of my team.
With my team, every quarterly review with every team member, these are the questions. I have built them into our rhythm so deeply that people now come prepared, and the answers I get the third or fourth time are deeper than the first, because trust compounds.
With other leaders, I use them two ways. To gather insight — you learn more about a leader in fifteen minutes with these five questions than you do in a year of standard small talk. And when a leader is stuck — I hand them the questions and tell them to go ask themselves. Most of the time, the answer they need is already inside them.
Sometimes the most helpful thing you can do for another leader is not to give them advice. It is to hand them a better question.
With myself, once a month I take a clarity break. I get out of the office, sit down with a journal, and work the same five questions on myself. And the deepest one I ask God. God, what is it that I need to know that I do not know? Every time I sit with that question, something comes up.
None of this works without a safe space
Every one of these questions is useless if there is not a safe space for the answer. With your team, that means they have to know you, like you, and trust you, and you have to show them an ROI on what they share. With other leaders, the safe space is your posture — you have to ask because you actually want to help. With yourself, you have to give yourself permission to write down hard answers, and then do something with them.
These questions are useless if you do not ask them consistently, if you do not ask them with genuine interest, if you do not listen, and if you never follow up.
How to make them even better
Have you read Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss? He was an FBI hostage negotiator. He teaches that you should not ask questions when you can make statements instead. Questions put people on the defensive. A statement is an invitation. So once you have gotten comfortable with the five, try this. Stop asking. Start telling.
Stop asking. Start telling.
- Tell me what has you excited.
- Tell me what has you scared.
- Tell me what has you frustrated.
- Tell me what tools you need to do your job.
- Tell me what I need to know right now that I do not know.
Same five questions. Different posture. And the answers change. Try it for a quarter. Compare the answers you get. I think you will see what I see.
Live Intentional.
Greg Furer
Founder and Visionary