Something to doWorking with others
Ask before you advise
A micro habit for helping someone think a problem through before you hand them your answer
Why it’s worth your time
The first problem someone brings you is often not the one that matters. Jumping to advice solves what they said rather than what they meant, and quietly teaches them to bring you the next one. A question or two first tends to find the real issue, and often they solve it themselves while answering.
How to coach with questions instead of answers
You’ll come away with the real problem named, and often their own answer to it.
We’ll turn this into a checklist you can tick off.
- Notice the urge to answer.
When someone brings you a problem, you'll usually have a fix ready within seconds. That's the moment to pause. You can still give it, just not yet.
- Ask what else.
Their first description is rarely the whole picture. Asking once or twice more tends to bring out the thing they were circling.
You“And what else?”Tip: Two or three rounds is plenty. Said with real interest, it's an invitation; repeated past that, it starts to feel like a drill.
- Ask what the real challenge is.
Now narrow it. The words “for you” matter: they pull the conversation from the general situation to the part this person can act on.
You“So what's the real challenge here for you?” - Offer your view, if it's still needed.
Often they've found an answer by now, and it tends to work better than yours because they own it. If they haven't, ask what they've considered, then give your advice as one option among theirs.
You“What have you thought about doing? I've got an idea too, if it would help.”
Good moments for this: when someone brings you a problemin your next few 1:1swhen you catch yourself answering too fast
We’ll turn this into a checklist you can tick off.
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Making it work for you
Every workplace is different. Here’s what to think about before you start, and what might get in the way.
Things to think about
An outage, a customer waiting on the line, a deadline in an hour. Questions there just slow everyone down. Save this for problems where the thinking is the valuable part.
What might make this harder
Tell them, briefly. Next time, ask just the real-challenge question. People warm to it once they see it isn't a trick.
Questions people ask
What is a coaching question?
An open question that helps someone think through their own problem, rather than one that steers them toward your answer. Two useful ones: what else, and what's the real challenge here for you.
What are good coaching questions for managers?
Start with what's on your mind, follow with and what else, then narrow with what's the real challenge here for you. Michael Bungay Stanier's The Coaching Habit builds a short set around questions like these.
When should a manager give advice instead of coaching?
When the problem is urgent, when the person lacks the context to answer, or when they've thought it through and still want your view. Asking first is a habit, not a rule.
Why this works, and where it comes from
Being good at solving problems is often how people become managers, so when someone brings one, the reflex is to solve it. It feels helpful, and it's fast. But people tend to lead with the symptom, the slipping deadline or the difficult stakeholder, while the thing actually in the way sits a layer underneath. Answer quickly, and you usually answer the symptom.
Michael Bungay Stanier's book The Coaching Habit is built around a handful of short questions for exactly this moment, including the two used here: “And what else?” and “What's the real challenge here for you?” The first widens the picture; the second narrows it to the part the person can act on. His argument is that managers who stay curious a little longer, and advise a little later, get better thinking from their people and spend less of their own time on problems that were never theirs.
From your report's side, every answer you give carries a quiet lesson. If every problem you bring gets solved for you, you learn to bring problems. If it's met with a good question, you start asking yourself that question before you knock on the door. Over months, that's the difference between a team that waits for you and one that thinks alongside you.
It isn't the right move when someone is overwhelmed and needs a decision from you. Asking a stressed person what the real challenge is can feel like a test they're failing. In those moments, help. When there's room to think again, the questions will land.
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Written by Truest, based on The Coaching Habit (Michael Bungay Stanier). Last updated September 25, 2026. We sell a career membership; where that’s relevant above, we say so.