CAPIR

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  • 1. Participation
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Library Modules 5 - Strategic Questioning

About strategic questioning

In this module:

• About Strategic Questioning
• Types of Questions, Questioning Skills and Ethical Considerations

Strategic questioning is a process of using questions to develop consensus in communities so that they are involved in an activity of change with which they value and feel comfortable.

Strategic questioning helps groups and communities to identify those things they would like to see changed, propose some ways of solving problems and set the process up for action rather than just talking.

What it does

• Creates information rather than communicating information already known
• Creates active participation
• Initiates ownership of the information with the person answering the question
• Generates energy for change
• Creates common ground
• Encourages people to put their own opinions aside long enough to try and find new ways and new ideas

For what it can be used?

• Building good group collaboration
• Creating strategies for change
• Getting through blocks in workshops
• Learning good listening

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What it is based on?

• The assumption that everybody holds valuable knowledge
• Understanding that the wisdom, experience and will to make change is in all of us
• Knowing that change only happens when the way it is brought about agrees with our own way of thinking
• Understanding that people won't act if they are just passive recipients of information provided in an alienating way
• Understanding we need to listen
• Knowing that slow change is the most enduring change
• Realising that motivation is not an external process. If we try to motivate others we assume that 'we' know the most appropriate goal.
• Being committed to building a relationship. Relationships allow goals to emerge that have everyone's support and do not need to be 'sold' to anyone.
• The assumption that we all want to do 'better'.

Related reading

Peavey, Fran. 1992. 'Strategic questioning for personal and social change'.

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Types of Questions, Questioning Skills and Ethical Considerations

Types of questions

Sometimes the best questions have no answers... yet.

Telling people what they should do eg. 'why don't you... ? (a suggestion implied) is a very authoritarian act.

There are seven types of strategic questions:

1. Focus questions - identify the key facts and the situation
2. Observation questions - are concerned with what people see and hear regarding the situation
3. Feeling questions - are concerned with emotions
4. Visioning questions - are concerned with 'dreams', eg. "wouldn't it be good if..."
5. Change questions - how do we get from here to there?
6. Personal inventory and support questions - individuals identify their particular skills, interests and potential contribution
7. Personal action questions- gets individuals down to specific actions.

Strategic questioning skills

• Be able to recognise when people intend to act and feed that part of the question back to the person involved
• When listening to gripes, always ask 'what can we do to change the situation?'
• Understand how people explain the changes they have seen. How people explain past change will help to design strategies to produce change in that society.
• Ask those questions you think may be unaskable, they are often the most relevant
• 'What would it take for you to change on this issue?' is a very powerful question
• 'How can...?' and 'what shall...?' are also good
• If the answer to "What are you doing about X?' is 'Nothing', X may be related to a deeply or commonly held value. Sometimes new ideas are born within the people with the ownership and energy to carry them out. For example, many communities value their environment. Ask them what they are doing to ensure their children will value it too.

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Ethical considerations

• Strategic questioning cannot be used to convince anybody of something
• Try to be objective. Be ethical about what you do with what people say.
• Don't use it if you really want to control the outcome
• Strategic questions may recall upset on the part of the person being questioned. People may drop into helplessness if they feel they cannot address the situation. Be prepared to deal with the upset and help the people work through it.

Tools

Link to useful tools on this module.

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