The Coaching Habit

02The Best Coaching Question Ever Asked

Once you have successfully opened a conversation with the Kickstart Question, you will naturally encounter a new challenge. The other person will give you an answer, and your Advice Monster will immediately wake up, stretch, and prepare to offer a brilliant solution to whatever they just said. You must resist this urge with everything you have. Why? Because the first answer someone gives you is almost never the only answer, and it is rarely the best answer. Human beings are complex, and our initial responses are often protective shields or superficial reflections of a much deeper issue. When asked a question, a person’s brain quickly searches for the safest, most acceptable, and most readily available answer. It is the conversational equivalent of a reflex. If you immediately jump in to solve that first presenting problem, you are likely wasting your time fixing the wrong thing. This is where Michael Bungay Stanier introduces what he confidently calls the Best Coaching Question in the World, also known as the AWE Question: "And what else?" These three words possess an almost magical quality. When someone finishes explaining a problem, a situation, or an idea, and you simply pause, look them in the eye, and ask, "And what else?", you completely change the dynamic of the interaction. You are telling them that you are truly listening, that you value their perspective, and that you believe they have more to offer. You are creating a spacious environment for their thoughts to expand. Let us explore a practical workplace scenario to see the AWE question in action. Suppose you are managing a marketing team, and your lead designer, Mark, comes to you looking stressed. You start with the Kickstart Question: "What is on your mind, Mark?" Mark sighs: "I am completely overwhelmed with the new product launch. The deadlines are too tight, and the sales team keeps changing the requirements." At this exact moment, your Advice Monster is screaming at you to intervene. You might want to say, "Let me talk to the sales director and get them to back off," or "Why don't you delegate the social media graphics to the junior designer?" If you say either of those things, you have taken ownership of Mark's problem. You have rescued him, but you have not coached him. Instead, you take a breath and ask the AWE Question: "I hear you, Mark. That sounds incredibly stressful. And what else is contributing to this feeling of overwhelm?" Mark pauses. He was expecting you to jump in with a fix. Forced to reflect further, he says: "Well... honestly, I am also struggling with the new design software we implemented last month. It is slowing me down, and I haven't had time to properly learn it." Notice what just happened. The initial problem the sales team changing requirements was certainly an issue, but the hidden problem a lack of software training was a massive contributing factor that Mark hadn't even consciously prioritized until you asked. The AWE Question acts as a powerful self-management tool for you as a leader. Every time you ask "And what else?", you are actively pushing the Advice Monster back into its cage. You are buying yourself time to listen rather than simply waiting for your turn to speak. Stanier recommends asking this question three to four times in a single conversation. It might feel unnatural at first, almost like you are interrogating the person, but if delivered with genuine curiosity and a warm tone, it feels incredibly supportive to the recipient. You keep asking "And what else?" until the person eventually says, "There is nothing else." That is the golden moment. That is when you know you have reached the bottom of the barrel, and all the relevant information, anxieties, and ideas are out on the table. However, mastering the AWE Question requires you to become comfortable with something that makes most professionals deeply uncomfortable: silence. When you ask "And what else?", there will inevitably be a pause. The other person is literally searching their brain for new connections. They are thinking. In our fast-paced corporate environments, silence is often interpreted as a lack of progress or a breakdown in communication. Managers rush to fill the void, often answering their own questions or offering immediate suggestions just to break the tension. You must learn to embrace the silence. Bite your tongue. Count to ten in your head if you have to. Let the other person do the heavy lifting. When you allow silence to exist, you are giving the other person the gift of cognitive space. You are allowing them to sift through their thoughts and articulate something they may never have realized if you had rushed them. The AWE Question is a profound tool because it shifts your role from a dispenser of solutions to a miner of insights. You are helping your team members excavate their own minds. By repeatedly asking "And what else?", you gather a comprehensive list of all the variables at play. But once you have all those variables out in the open, the conversation can easily become overwhelming. You now have a giant pile of issues, ideas, and complaints. How do you figure out which one actually matters? That requires another shift in focus, leading us to a highly strategic approach to problem-solving.

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