Module 4

Welcome to Module 4 Return to Dashboard

Module 4.1

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Welcome back for the fourth module. Take a few minutes before going further to reflect on what you’ve learned about Problem Ownership in module 3. When you were in a challenging situation, have you been able to identify exactly who owned a problem? Who didn’t feel happy? You also learned some skills you can use when the other person has a problem, such as non-verbal responses that we call Attending. These attending skills build rapport.

In module 2 you learned how to create rapport with somebody else, and since then you’ve experimented with those skills. You now also know how to quickly and easily get into a relaxed state by pressing your relaxation anchor.

And in module 1 you learned the 7 criteria of successful goal setting. Have you written down your goals in a sensory specific, positive and ecological way so that they increase your choices and are initiated by yourself? Have you identified the first step you can take to get closer to achieving your goal? Have you taken that step yet? And have you identified your resources you need to achieve your goal, including your inner resources such as being relaxed and confident?

In this module, you will learn some more core helping or listening skills you can use in situations where you feel okay and someone else has a problem. You will learn how to phrase Open Questions and Reflective Listening responses to help somebody else solve their problem. Notice, I didn’t say you will solve somebody’s problems; you will help them solve their own.

One person the developers of NLP worked with extensively was Doctor Milton Erickson. Erickson, a medical doctor and a hypnotherapist, was an expert at enabling others to change. He frequently worked with people whose psychiatric and medical problems had been unsolved by other doctors, and produced a transformation in only one or two sessions.

Many of the skills we’ll study were pioneered by Erickson. Milton used these skills in his private life as well. One day, for example, his 3 year old son Robert fell down the back stairs, split his lip and impacted a tooth into his jaw. The boy screamed in pain and terror, staring horrified at the blood all over the pavement. His father spoke only a few simple sentences to him. Within a few minutes Robert was calmly allowing the blood to be cleaned up, and anticipating with curiosity the stitches he would get at the clinic.

At no time did Milton deny his pain, use formal hypnosis, or use any other “trick”. He simply responded with the listening skills you’ll learn today. In fact, other seminar participants have listened to this story and successfully used the same technique with the same results with children in their own care, after hearing the end of this story. What he said will make much more sense when I finish the story later….

The situation just described is one where someone owns a problem, and the person listening is about to respond. If they avoid the Roadblocks we heard last module, what will they say? Would it be useful to get clearer ideas about that?….

Well, one choice is to ask a question, but a certain kind of question. Overuse of questions is itself a roadblock. Helpful questioning is best understood as an invitation to the other person to talk. Sometimes people will prefer not to talk when they are upset, and just to be nearby may be the very best thing you can do. But at other times, a simple question such as ‘What’s on your mind?’, ‘What needs to change for this to work?’ or ‘How do you feel about that?’ may help them to start talking.

Such questions can be used well in the middle of a conversation too, to help the person say more or direct them to start again if they got lost. There are two kinds of questions; open and closed.

Closed questions: Closed questions can be answered with the words ‘yes’ or ‘no’, or with a specific piece of information such as a number. Examples are ‘Do you like it here?’, ‘Don’t you think you could ask him?’, and ‘What time is it?’

In ordinary conversation when nobody owns a problem, closed questions usually get perfectly good answers. However, when people are upset, they often reply with a straight ‘yes’ or ‘no’, forcing you to ask another question to get the extra information you expected. This easily degenerates into an interrogation, with the speaker saying less and less, as the listener asks more and more. Closed questions are best used to check a very specific issue and are a skill to use sparingly.

Open questions: When you are in a listening situation and want to invite someone to talk more, open questions (which cannot be answered ‘yes’, ‘no’, or with a specific number) will work better. Open questions usually begin with words like ‘what’, ‘how’, or the phrase ‘Tell me about…’, eg. ‘What was that like for you?’, “How is your new job going?’, Tell me what happened before that.’, ‘What do you want to achieve?’

The word ‘why’ also begins open questions (such as ‘Why did you do that?’) but most people find why questions difficult to answer. This is because ‘why’ asks the person to explain what was happening underneath. It suggests that the simple facts are not good enough, and deserve explaining or justifying. Often people hear ‘Why did you do that?’ as a judgement about what they did. ‘How’ questions get a better response (eg. “How did you come to do that?), because they ask for a simple description of what went on, more than a justification.

Notice also that open questions can ask both about the problem the person has, and about the solution they are seeking for. At first it may be useful to invite people to tell you their problem; and as their own problem solving develops, it may become useful to invite them to explore their possible solutions.

For now, our aim is simply to get clear how to word open questions. Turn to the Open Questions Worksheet in your workbook and write an open question to each situation presented there.