The Art of Questioning

Michal Zieba


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The Art of Questioning
By Michal Zieba
Experienced negotiators understand the importance of an effective questioning strategy and approach in negotiation. Information is a source of power in negotiation and the more accurate information we have the better our chances to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement and create additional value in negotiation. As the quality of information we extract in negotiation depends on the quality of questions we ask, the challenge is: how can we prepare an effective questioning strategy?

First of all we should be aware of the typical communication traps that most professional negotiators fall into: • We have a tendency to justify our own point of view rather than spending time on gathering information about the other side’s needs or interests – therefore we tend to make statements rather than asking questions. • We do not listen to answers – usually we use the time that our counterparty spends talking to prepare our next statement or question. • When we ask questions we respond too soon to the answers – we try to convince our counterparty why he/she should follow our recommendation, do business with us or buy our products or services. It is often useful to ask nurturing questions to understand the other side’s real motivations and objectives.

When preparing your questioning strategy it is important to take into consideration the following elements: • Vision – try to understand the other side’s long-term strategic objectives and identify potential long-term strategic fit. • Value – try to understand what is at stake in the negotiation from your counterparty’s point of view. • Process – try to understand the other side’s decision making process and implementation steps should the other side decide to work with us. • Relationships – try to understand the impact of an agreement on others within our counterparty’s organization and to identify all those involved in the decision making process.

Before entering any negotiation, prepare at least one or two probing questions covering each of the areas above. Make sure that the questions you ask are open ended to invite maximum feedback from your counterparty. Closed questions are those you can answer Yes/No. These don’t give your counterparty an opportunity to share information and elaborate on issues that may be important to both of us. Ensure that you actively listen to the answers provided (this means not responding immediately, but confirming understanding first). Make sure that you use a ‘probing-nurturing’ sequence to uncover further interests.

Example 1:

Probing question: What does it take to establish a business relationship with your organisation?

Answer: Well, first of all we only work with organisations that posses significant experience in our industry…

Nurturing question: Just out of curiosity. What is your experience in working with companies from outside your industry? or…Have you had any negative experience in working with companies from outside your industry?

Example 2:

Probing question: What are the issues that you would like to discuss in our meeting?

Answer: I am interested in price, delivery options, post-sales support, and volume.

Nurturing question: Great, now that I have a clearer picture of all the issues, can you please help me understand which of these are most important to you?

Your ability to nurture will be the key to getting to your counterparty’s underlying needs and interests and therefore it will give you an opportunity to shift negotiation from a positional and tactical environment to a more value added and problem solving interaction.

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The Negotiation Academy (TNA) – http://www.negotiationeurope.com - is a specialist business negotiation management consultancy headquartered in London. Committed to delivering both best and leading practice business negotiation solutions, TNA collaborates with clients to instil a world class negotiation capability. With deep industry experience in several market sectors, global resources and a proven track record, TNA is uniquely positioned to assist clients to avoid the losses associated with sub optimal negotiations. TNA has a core competency in sales negotiation training , purchasing negotiation training and executive negotiation training (mergers & acquisitions negotiation training, asset management negotiation training, corporate finance negotiation training etc.)