Asking Questions the Right Way

So let’s dig a little deeper what is keeping us from speaking out at meetings.

What makes it different from just talking to one colleague in the hallway someone we know and trust and we can have a free flowing conversation.

Part of it is just this feeling of different eyes looking at us.

Sometimes it’s the fact that it’s a boss or a boss’s boss.

Sometimes it’s the stature of the people in the room.

It’s a whole bunch of reasons and at some point we had to just get over it and just talk.

I want to start off with the easiest way of talking in a meeting and that is to simply ask a question.

It doesn’t have to be a brilliant question.

It just has to be a question that relates to something that’s being talked about or will be talked about.

But don’t put pressure on yourself.

You are not trying to be Charlie Rose or Oprah Winfrey or Barbara Walter with your questions.

Just ask a simple question.

Here’s what I’m after.

If there say more than 10 people or for you it might even be five people.

But there’s some threshold of people in a room that makes you uncomfortable.

You feel pressure you feel adrenaline pulsating through your body with the idea of speaking in front of people.

I want to get you used to doing that so that the adrenaline doesn’t pump and you don’t have this fight or flight mentality going on in fighting in your body to get out of there.

I want you to be able to be calm now.

It’s perfectly normal to be nervous to be uncomfortable when you’re about to speak in front of people even if it’s to ask a simple question but it is pretty simple to ask a question and it gets you in the habit of simply talking projecting your voice to be heard in front of five or ten or 15 or 20 people so let’s start off with I don’t mean this to sound condescending but let’s start off with some baby steps.

I want you to think of three or four questions you can ask at the very next meeting you have to attend whether it is your business your trade association your civic organization right those questions down now.