Change Your Questions, Change Your Life: 10 Powerful Tools for Life and Work - Softcover

Adams, Marilee

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1576756009 ISBN 13: 9781576756003

Verlag: McGraw-Hill Professional, 2009

Inhaltsangabe

Questions are at the core of how we listen, behave, think, and relate as individuals and organizations. Virtually everything we think and do is generated by questions. Questions push us into new territories. The future begins with our thinking, represented by the questions we ask ourselves.
Change Your Questions, Change Your Life shows readers how to consistently choose the questions that can lead them to success, both personally and professionally. This technique, called "QuestionsThinking," stimulates innovation, accelerate productivity, and create more rewarding relationships.
Change Your Questions, Change Your Life is a personal growth fable that tells how a seasoned executive, Ben Knight, uses QuestionThinking to move into a higher leadership role and how the same methods of change help him and his wife, Grace, enrich their marriage.
Readers follow Ben as he first resists the lessons of the inquiring coach, assigned to him by his boss, Alexa Harte. Then Ben experiences breakthroughs both in his work with colleagues and in his marriage. The story of how Ben meets these challenges and ultimately succeeds is the perfect vehicle for revealing the exciting, practical new system of self-management and inquiry called QuestionThinking.
In addition to Ben's experience, readers also learn about the powerful applications of QuestionThinking through the life experiences of secondary characters as they deal with real-life issues--from friendships to financial freedom--to which many of us can relate

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Marilee Adams, PhD, is president and CEO of the Inquiry Institute and the originator of the Question Thinking methodologies. She is an adjunct professor of leadership at American University’s School of Public Affairs and presents the Question Thinking system in a wide variety of organizational, educational, health-care and public settings.

Marshall Goldsmith is the million-selling author or editor of 31 books, including the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers,MOJO and What Got You Here Won't Get You There.

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CHAPTER 1

Moment of Truth
If we would have new knowledge, we must get us a whole new world of new questions.

Susanne K. Langer

A rosewood paperweight on my desk bears a sterling silver plaque declaring: Great results begin with great questions. It was a gift from a very special person in my life—Joseph S. Edwards—who introduced me to Question Thinking, or QT, as he called the skills he taught me. QT opened up a part of my mind that otherwise I might never have discovered. Like everyone else, I believed the way to fix a problem was to look for the right answers. Instead, Joseph showed me that the best way to solve a problem is to first come up with better questions. The skills he taught me rescued my career and saved my marriage as well. Both were definitely in trouble at the time.

It all started when I was invited to take a position at QTec. The company was in the midst of a major overhaul at the time, and the word on the street was that, barring a miracle, they would fold before the year was out. A friend warned me that accepting a position with QTec would be like signing up to crew on a sinking ship. What convinced me to take the risk? It was my trust in Alexa Harte, the recently appointed CEO at QTec, who’d offered me the position. I’d worked with her for years at KB Corp., my previous employer, where she’d won my respect as a gifted leader. Her confidence about turning QTec around was infectious. Besides, she promised me a great promotion: hefty pay raise, impressive title, and a chance to lead a team in developing an innovative new product. If everything went well the risk would pay off in aces. If not . . . well, I tried not to think about that.

At first I was riding high, convinced I had the job wired. Alexa had hired me for my technology and engineering smarts, and I knew I could deliver on that count. The new product really intrigued me, and the technical challenges were right up my alley. At KB—where Alexa said she’d seen me work miracles—I’d won accolades as the Answer Man. I’d faced down the toughest technical problems, one right after the other. However, at QTec I was also facing a different kind of challenge—heading up a high-stakes, high-visibility team. I was excited about taking this on, although Alexa had let me know I’d have to put effort into developing my people and leadership skills.

My team seemed an enthusiastic and talented bunch, and for a while everything went well. Then life at QTec started unraveling. It was as if suddenly a glaring spotlight was focused on my shortcomings. I didn’t dare say it, but secretly I concluded I’d been stuck with a bunch of losers.

To make matters worse, there was Charles. Before I came aboard at QTec he’d been passed over for the job I’d been offered. I could understand why he might resent me. And, just as I expected, he was a real troublemaker from the word go, questioning everything I said and did.

Things went from bad to worse. If the QTec ship wasn’t actually sinking, as my friend had warned me was happening, it was definitely taking on water, and I had no idea how to plug up the leaks. My team meetings became a farce—no discussions, no solutions, and no sense of teamwork. And nobody had to remind me that if we couldn’t get our product to market before the competition, we would prove the naysayers right.

Life wasn’t much better at home. Tension was growing with Grace, my wonderful wife of less than eight months. She constantly asked me about what was going on at work. Finally, one day I just told her she was asking too many questions and she should keep her nose out of my business. She was hurt, I was miserable, and I hadn’t the vaguest idea what to do about it.

I didn’t want Grace to know how much difficulty I was having. I’d always taken great pride in solving problems that baffled everyone else. This time, with any luck, the right answers would turn up before Grace, Alexa, and the people on my team found out that the job was way over my head. Meanwhile I kept more and more to myself and did my best to just get through each day.

I was mystified and overwhelmed. It seemed like everything in my life was falling apart. Then came the awful turning point. Grace and I had an argument in the morning, and only hours later there was a major crisis at work. Nobody said it, but I could see it in their eyes: we were cooked.

This was my moment of truth. I needed to be alone and face facts. I called Grace and left a message that I’d be putting in an all-nighter to finish an important report. Then I spent the whole long night in my office, staring at the walls, still searching desperately for the right answers and reliving the most disastrous weeks of my life. I told myself I had to face the truth: I had failed. Just after six that morning I went out for coffee and then started drafting my resignation. I finished three hours later, called Alexa, and made arrangements to see her immediately.

The walk to Alexa’s suite was less than a hundred yards. That morning it felt like a hundred miles. When I got to the big double doors of her office I stopped and took a deep breath to regain my composure. I stood there for some long moments, working up the nerve to knock. Just as I was raising my arm, I heard a voice behind me.

“Ben Knight, you’re here. Good, good!”

It was Alexa. There was no mistaking that voice, always cheerful, exuding a sense of optimism even when things were going badly. An attractive, athletic-looking woman in her late 40s, she radiated confidence. I’d told Grace that I’d never met anyone quite like Alexa. She approached her responsibilities at QTec with boundless enthusiasm. It wasn’t that she didn’t take her job seriously. She took it very seriously! And she did it with such pleasure and self-assurance that she made it look easy.

At that moment, her mere presence made me acutely aware of my deficiencies. I felt numb, barely mumbling a subdued good morning as she touched my shoulder and ushered me into her office.

The room was expansive, the size of a large living room in the best executive home. I crossed deep green carpeting, soft underfoot, and walked over to the large bay window where the meeting area was set up. There, two overstuffed sofas faced each other across a large walnut coffee table.

“Sit!” Alexa said, gesturing in a welcoming way to one of the couches.” Betty said your lights were on when she left her office at seven-thirty last night, and you were here when she came in early this morning.”

She sat down across from me on the other couch.

“I presume that’s for me?” Alexa asked, pointing to the green folder containing my resignation that I’d placed on the coffee table.

I nodded, waiting for her to pick it up. Instead, she leaned back, looking as if she had all the time in the world.

“Tell me what’s going on with you,” she said.

I pointed to the green folder. “It’s my resignation. I’m sorry, Alexa.”

The next sound I heard stopped me cold. It was not a gasp, not a word of reproach, but laughter! It was not cruel laughter, either. What had I missed? I didn’t understand. How could Alexa still sound sympathetic in the face of all I’d screwed up?

“Ben,” she said, “you’re not going to quit on me.” She slid the folder in my direction. “Take this back. I know more about your situation than you realize. I want you to give me at least a few months. But for that period of time, you’ve got to commit to making changes.”

“Are you sure about...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: McGraw-Hill Professional
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2009
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1576756009
• ISBN 13: 9781576756003
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Auflage: 2
• Anzahl der Seiten: 240
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Berrett-Koehler; https://www.dc.com/tv; ; 1333 Broadway Suite P-100; Oakland; CA; 94612; USA
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar