Why Asking Questions Beats Giving Advice Every Time (+ Examples)
We love curiosity in this house! Just keep your proverbial blender lid on by asking open, generative, earnestly curious questions.
In 1955, a young physicist named Albert Einstein was asked what he would do if he had just one hour to save the world. His response has become legendary: "I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and 5 minutes solving it." This wisdom captures something profound about human nature and problem-solving that we often overlook in our rush to provide answers—the transformative power of asking the right question.
We live in a world obsessed with answers. Social media rewards hot takes, business culture celebrates decisive action, and our educational systems train us to have solutions ready. Yet the most breakthrough innovations, the most meaningful conversations, and the most effective leadership often emerge not from brilliant answers, but from brilliant questions. The art of good questioning is perhaps one of the most undervalued skills in our toolkit, despite being one of the most powerful.
When in Doubt, What It Out
Questions do far more than simply gather information. They shape thinking, direct attention, and create possibilities that didn't exist before they were asked. When we ask "What went wrong?" we focus on problems and blame. When we ask "What did we learn?" we shift toward growth and possibility. The question itself becomes the architect of what follows.
Michael Bungay Stanier, author of The Coaching Habit, describes questions as "the engine of curiosity." They don't just extract existing knowledge—they generate new insights. When someone asks us a powerful question, our brains literally create new neural pathways as we search for answers we've never articulated before. This is why great coaches, therapists, and leaders often seem to possess an almost magical ability to help others find clarity. They're not providing the answers; they're providing the questions that unlock thinking.
Research in neuroscience supports this phenomenon. When faced with a question, our brains activate what psychologists call "elaborative interrogation"—a process that forces us to make connections, examine assumptions, and create meaning. This is why Socrates built his entire teaching method around questions rather than lectures. He understood that learning happens not when information is deposited into our minds, but when our minds are activated to discover.
Consider the difference between these two approaches to helping a struggling team member:
Advice-giving approach: "Here's what you should do. First, prioritize your tasks better. Second, communicate more clearly with stakeholders. Third, set better boundaries with your workload."
Question-based approach: "What's working well for you right now? What would need to change for you to feel more effective? If you had to pick just one thing to focus on, what would make the biggest difference?"
The first approach assumes the leader knows exactly what the problem is and how to solve it. The second approach recognizes that the person closest to the situation often has insights that aren't visible from the outside. More importantly, solutions that people discover for themselves tend to stick better than solutions imposed from above.
This principle is particularly relevant for those of us in helping professions who may be experiencing our own challenges. As I explored in my recent post about The Forest Fire Model of Workplace Burnout, even those dedicated to helping others can benefit from the right questions to understand their own patterns and needs.
What Makes a Question "Good"?
Not all questions are created equal. The structure, timing, and intent behind a question dramatically influence its effectiveness. Good questions share several key characteristics that distinguish them from their less powerful counterparts.
Open-ended exploration: Good questions open doors rather than closing them. They invite expansive thinking rather than simple yes-or-no responses. "What possibilities are we not seeing?" generates very different thinking than "Do you think this will work?"
Genuine curiosity: The best questions emerge from authentic interest in understanding, not from a hidden agenda to prove a point or lead someone toward a predetermined conclusion. People can sense the difference between genuine inquiry and manipulative questioning.
Focus on the future and possibilities: While understanding the past has its place, transformative questions often orient toward what could be rather than what went wrong. "What would success look like?" tends to be more generative than "Why did this fail?"
Appropriate depth: Good questions match the moment and the person. Sometimes a light "What's on your mind?" opens exactly the right conversation. Other times, deeper inquiry like "What beliefs might you be holding that are no longer serving you?" creates the breakthrough.
Permission to not know: Paradoxically, the best questions often give people permission to acknowledge uncertainty rather than demanding immediate answers. "What don't you know yet that might be important?" can be more valuable than questions that assume knowledge should already exist.
The Practical Art: Questions for Different Purposes
Different situations call for different types of questions. Understanding this variety helps us become more intentional about our inquiry.
Questions for Curiosity and Discovery
These questions help people explore their own thinking and uncover insights they didn't know they had:
"What's surprising you about this situation?"
"If you stepped back and looked at this from 30,000 feet, what would you notice?"
"What would someone who disagreed with you say about this?"
"What are you assuming that might not be true?"
"If this problem were a gift, what might it be trying to teach you?"
Questions for Clarity and Focus
When people feel overwhelmed or scattered, these questions help bring essential issues into focus:
"What's the real challenge here for you?"
"If you could only work on one thing, what would move the needle most?"
"What would need to be true for this to feel manageable?"
"What's most important to you about this situation?"
"Where are you trying to solve too many problems at once?"
Questions for Action and Movement
These questions help bridge the gap between insight and implementation:
"What's the smallest step you could take tomorrow?"
"What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail?"
"Who else needs to be involved in this solution?"
"What resources do you have that you haven't fully utilized?"
"How will you know when you're making progress?"
Questions for Learning and Growth
These questions help extract wisdom from experience and build capability:
"What's one thing you're learning about yourself through this?"
"How is this challenge helping you grow?"
"What would you do differently if you faced this again?"
"What skills are you developing that you didn't expect?"
"How might this experience serve you in the future?"
The key is matching the question to the person and the moment. A brilliant question asked at the wrong time can fall flat, while a simple question asked with perfect timing can unlock everything.
The Trap of Bad Questions
Just as good questions can open up possibilities, bad questions can shut them down completely. Understanding what makes questions destructive helps us avoid these pitfalls and recognize when others are using them, either intentionally or unconsciously.
Leading questions are perhaps the most common form of poor inquiry. These questions have the answer embedded within them and are designed to guide someone toward a specific conclusion rather than genuine discovery. "Don't you think it would be better if we did it my way?" isn't really a question—it's advice disguised as inquiry. These pseudo-questions often create resistance because people sense the manipulation, even if they can't articulate it.
Judgment-laden questions carry assumptions and blame that immediately put people on the defensive. "Why did you make such a poor decision?" assumes the decision was poor and focuses on justification rather than learning. "What were you thinking when you did that?" carries an undertone of criticism that shuts down honest reflection. These questions often say more about the questioner's mindset than they reveal about the situation.
Narrowing questions force thinking into predetermined categories and eliminate possibilities before they can be explored. "Should we go with option A or option B?" artificially limits the conversation when there might be options C, D, and E worth considering. "Do you want to quit or stay?" creates a false binary that ignores the vast middle ground of how someone might want to stay differently.
Overwhelming questions try to tackle too much complexity at once, leaving people feeling paralyzed rather than energized. "How are we going to completely transform our culture, improve our processes, increase revenue, and reduce costs all while maintaining employee satisfaction?" creates cognitive overload rather than productive thinking.
The damage from bad questions extends beyond the immediate conversation. They can erode trust, shut down creativity, and train people to stop bringing problems forward. When someone consistently experiences judgmental or manipulative questioning, they learn to share less, think less openly, and engage less authentically.
Why We Default to Advice-Giving
Given the clear benefits of good questions, why do so many of us instinctively jump to giving advice instead? The answer lies deep in human psychology and social conditioning.
The expertise trap: When we develop knowledge and experience in an area, we naturally want to share what we've learned. This comes from a good place—the desire to help others avoid mistakes or find shortcuts. However, our expertise can become a liability when it leads us to assume we understand someone else's situation better than they do. As Marshall Goldsmith notes in Trillion Dollar Coach, even the most successful leaders can fall into the trap of believing their past success makes them the best judge of what others should do.
The urgency illusion: Modern workplace culture rewards quick action and decisive leadership. There's social pressure to have answers immediately, to solve problems efficiently, and to demonstrate value through visible action. Taking time to ask questions can feel slow and indecisive, even though it often leads to better outcomes.
The helper's high: Giving advice triggers a psychological reward system. When someone takes our suggestion and it works, we experience a sense of contribution and validation. This feels good, creating an unconscious addiction to advice-giving. Questions, by contrast, put the discovery and success in someone else's hands, which requires a different kind of ego strength to appreciate.
Discomfort with not knowing: Questions acknowledge uncertainty, and uncertainty makes many people uncomfortable. Advice-giving creates an illusion of control and knowledge, even in situations where we actually have limited understanding.
The advice trap: Michael Bungay Stanier identifies what he calls "the advice trap"—the almost irresistible urge to jump in with suggestions, solutions, and recommendations. This trap is seductive because giving advice feels generous and helpful, but it often prevents deeper understanding and robs others of the opportunity to develop their own problem-solving capabilities.
The Ripple Effects of Powerful Questions
When we master the art of good questions, the benefits extend far beyond individual conversations. Organizations that cultivate questioning cultures see dramatic improvements in innovation, employee engagement, and problem-solving capabilities.
Innovation and creativity: The most breakthrough innovations often emerge from reframing questions rather than finding better answers to existing questions. Instead of "How do we make cars faster?" Henry Ford asked "How do we make transportation accessible to everyone?"
Employee engagement: Gallup's research consistently shows that one of the strongest predictors of employee engagement is whether people feel their opinions matter at work. This isn't just about being asked for input—it's about experiencing the kind of curious, genuine inquiry that signals real interest in their perspectives.
Relationship depth: Personal relationships thrive on mutual curiosity. Couples who maintain strong connections over time tend to be those who continue asking each other genuine questions rather than making assumptions about what they know.
Decision-making quality: Teams that ask better questions make better decisions because they surface assumptions, consider more alternatives, and think through consequences more thoroughly.
Developing Your Question Toolkit
Becoming skilled at asking good questions is a learnable capability that improves with intentional practice. Like any craft, it requires both understanding principles and developing practical skills through repetition.
Start with self-inquiry: Before you can ask good questions of others, practice asking them of yourself. Develop a habit of curiosity about your own thinking, assumptions, and reactions. This practice is especially valuable for those in helping professions who may be experiencing burnout or overwhelm—as I discuss in my burnout resilience work, self-awareness through questioning is often the first step toward sustainable change.
Listen for what's not being said: Often the most powerful questions emerge not from what someone tells you, but from what they don't mention. If someone is describing a work challenge but never mentions their team, that absence might point toward an important question.
Practice patience: Good questions often require silence afterward. Resist the urge to fill quiet spaces with more questions or commentary. Some of the best thinking happens in the pause after a question is asked.
Notice your intentions: Before asking a question, check your motivation. Are you genuinely curious about their perspective, or are you trying to lead them somewhere specific?
Develop question categories: Build familiarity with different types of questions so you can consciously choose the right tool for the moment.
Creating Cultures of Inquiry
Individual skill in asking good questions is valuable, but the real transformation happens when entire organizations, teams, and families develop cultures that prize curiosity over certainty.
Model the behavior: Leaders who want to create questioning cultures must demonstrate comfort with not knowing, genuine interest in others' perspectives, and willingness to change their minds when presented with new information.
Reward curiosity: Most organizational reward systems inadvertently punish questioning by celebrating quick decisions and confident presentations. Creating space for curiosity requires explicitly recognizing people who ask insightful questions and challenge assumptions constructively.
Create question rituals: Some organizations build questioning into their regular practices. After-action reviews that focus on "What did we learn?" rather than "What went wrong?" create learning cultures.
Normalize not knowing: Cultures of inquiry require psychological safety around uncertainty. When leaders admit they don't have all the answers, questioning becomes natural rather than threatening.
The Future of Questions in an AI World
As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly capable of providing answers, the human skill of asking good questions becomes even more valuable. AI can process information and generate solutions, but it cannot replace the uniquely human ability to know which questions are worth asking in the first place.
The most successful professionals in an AI-augmented world will likely be those who excel at formulating the right questions rather than those who excel at having ready answers.
Conclusion: The Question Behind the Question
Perhaps the most important question we can ask ourselves is: "What question am I not asking?" This meta-question—the question about questions—opens up possibilities we might otherwise miss entirely.
The art of good questions is ultimately about honoring the complexity and potential in every situation and every person. It's about choosing curiosity over certainty, exploration over explanation, and possibility over problem-solving.
In a world that often feels overwhelming in its complexity, good questions offer a way forward. They don't promise easy answers or quick fixes, but they provide something more valuable: the tools to navigate uncertainty with wisdom, to connect with others authentically, and to unlock the thinking that leads to breakthrough solutions.
For those of us in helping professions—whether we're coaches, therapists, teachers, or leaders—mastering the art of questions is essential not just for serving others, but for our own growth and resilience. As I explore in my work on burnout recovery, the right questions can help us understand our own patterns, needs, and possibilities for change.
The next time you're tempted to offer advice, give a solution, or provide an answer, consider asking a question instead. Not just any question, but a question that emerges from genuine curiosity about someone else's experience and perspective. Notice what happens when you do. Notice how the conversation changes, how people respond, and how new possibilities emerge.
After all, the right question at the right moment doesn't just change a conversation. It changes the person thinking about the answer. And sometimes, it changes everything that follows.
Interested in exploring how powerful questions can support your own growth and resilience? Check out my other posts on burnout recovery and building sustainable practices for helping professionals.
