Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
In our daily life and work, communication with people is an indispensable content. When there is communication, we must ask questions, and when we ask questions, we must ask questions. Then, if we want to use the limited time to complete urgent tasks in our communication with others, we must pay attention to certain communication skills and questioning strategies to achieve our goals.
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
In the training class, someone did a closed-ended problem test: the experimenter asked a student to draw a playing card, and then he was not allowed to see it, and he directly handed the drawn playing card to the experimenter. Then the experimenter asked several closed-ended questions in succession, and finally gave the students the answer to what the playing card was.
Experimenter: A deck of playing cards has two colors. Do you choose red or black?
Student: red
Experimenter: So, is the rest black?
Student: yes
Experimenter: There are spades and clubs in black. Do you choose spades or clubs?
Student: Plum Blossom
Experimenter: There are flower cards and character cards in the club. Do you choose the flower card or the character card?
Student: font
Experimenter: There are odd numbers and even numbers in the plaques. Do you choose odd numbers or even numbers?
Students: double
Experimenter: 8 and 10 in even numbers are large numbers, and 2, 4, and 6 are decimal numbers. Do you choose large or small?
Student: big
Experimenter: There are only 8 and 10 left for large numbers. Do you choose 8 or 10?
Students: 8
Experimenter: So is the remainder 10?
Student: yes
Experimenter: Is this this one? (I happen to have a 10 of clubs in my hand)
Student: yes
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
In daily communication, common questioning methods can be roughly divided into two categories according to their content, namely closed-ended questions and open-ended questions. Closed-ended questions are relative to open-ended questions, which refer to pre-designed questions with selected answers, when the respondents' answers to the questions are only limited to the alternative answers.
In other words, the answers they give are mainly when they select the answers with a higher degree of recognition from the alternative answers. Closed-ended questions are a bit like true-false or multiple-choice questions, requiring only one or two words to answer, and are more concise.
Common vocabulary for closed-ended questions mainly includes can, is, will, can, how long, how much, etc. If the questions contain the words above or similar to the above words, it can basically be concluded that these questions are closed-ended questions.
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
As the name suggests, open-ended questions are the opposite of closed-ended questions. They are often asked relatively free or broad questions, giving the questionee enough space to express their opinions and views. Since there is no fixed pattern and answer, Therefore, open-ended questions are relatively lengthy and cumbersome in length.
Therefore, when communicating within a limited time or in emergency situations, most people will choose closed-ended questions to ask questions, in order to obtain the required information directly and quickly to achieve their own communication purposes.
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
Small case:
At a company's new product launch conference, the manager of the company's public relations department made a brief speech, and left the rest of the time to the media. In the case of ample time, many media reporters asked a lot of macro and broad questions. question.
If a reporter asks: "What are the advantages of your company's new products?"
"Which market will your company's main scientific research funds be invested in in the future?";
Mr. Liu, please talk about your company's development plan in five years." Although open-ended questions are easy to arouse the communicator's favor and desire to express, you can't spend too much time on rambling discussions.
When the question time was about to end, a reporter from a certain media asked a brief and clear question that left a deep impression on people.
I saw the reporter looked serious and asked: "According to some media reports, some of your company's products are suspected of plagiarizing competitors in the industry, right? Your company's competition with a certain company will become more and more fierce, and your company will Why won’t you poach talents from your opponents?” For these simple and sharp questions, within a limited time, in the expectation of the public, and under the media’s inquiries, the company’s CEO did not have many choices and only The time-sensitive answer is yes or no, yes or no.
The reporter asked the most questions in a limited time, and of course got a relatively large amount of information. In this way, not only can I obtain as much information as possible by asking questions, but also save a lot of time for myself and the other party, and achieve a win-win situation in communication. Why not do it?
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
Closed-ended questions ask concise questions, clear answers, and save time. Even in the form of questionnaires, respondents with lower education levels can complete them well. Most respondents are more willing to accept this questioning method, so the question The answer rate is high. The level of the answer to the question, whether it is concise and powerful, should not be sloppy. Especially in some special occasions, for some sensitive questions, using closed-ended questions to ask questions is often more realistic than using open-ended questions directly.
Small case:
A star in a certain country was seriously injured due to a drunk driving accident, and the injured were observed and treated in the intensive care unit of the hospital. After the injured family members filed a lawsuit against the star, the star had to bite the bullet and respond to the lawsuit.
In order to reduce his sentence, the star did not hesitate to hire the most famous defense lawyer in the area to defend his innocence. Just as the defendant's lawyer talked freely about how his agent stepped on the brakes and how the injured person did not obey the traffic The plaintiff's lawyer just listened quietly when he made a statement that the car accident happened due to the rules. Afterwards, he asked the judge with a serious expression, "Are you going to let such a dangerous criminal go unpunished, and should some celebrities be exempted from punishment because they have been defended by good lawyers?" The words were sonorous and powerful.
Just when the judge was hesitating, a professor in the audience stood up angrily and said righteously to the judge: "Your Majesty, don't you think that this is not a question of whether a sentence should be sentenced or not, but a sentence of more than one sentence? less questions?"
Immediately, the audience fell silent. After a while, the audience stood up and applauded for his righteousness. The audience instantly burst into warm applause. Behind this applause, it was actually the professor's justice, which made people feel guilty about illegal acts. of contempt and hatred. Just when the judge was hesitating, the professor who was listening in suddenly resolved the conflict on the spot with a closed-ended question of justice.
Yes, it was only at this time that people suddenly realized why we fell into the trap of the possibility of innocence designed by the defendant's lawyer from the beginning, but did not expect that this is really not a question of whether to sentence, but should be sentenced more and less sentenced. controversy. A closed-ended question instantly solves a problem that people don't understand, and saves a lot of so-called guilt and innocence arguments. It not only saves time, but also makes a concise and powerful interpretation of justice.
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
Through this example, we found that many times closed-ended questions not only solve the problem of time, but also allow us to get the information we want and achieve our goals in a straightforward and structured way, which saves time rather than saving time. It would be better to say that the efficiency has been improved, and the right and wrong have been clearly distinguished.
Therefore, the clever use of closed-ended questions not only has the effect of multiplying the results with half the effort, but also sometimes has unexpected surprises and gains.
Communication will not ask questions? Learn to use closed-ended questions to quickly reach your goals
The reason why closed-ended questions can quickly achieve their goals is that they can be widely used, not because of their time-saving and brevity, but more often because the communicators value the unambiguous content of the questions and answers of closed-ended questions. , the right and wrong are clear, thus cleverly avoiding many unnecessary disputes and possibilities.