HEARING THE ANSWERS

A certain phenomenon frequently occurs when you begin a coaching session and begin asking the Well-Formed Outcome questions. What happens is this—before you ask the question your client is already answering some of the questions-yet-to-be-asked. Amazing! Before you ask “Is there anything that could stop you?” (#14), your client may begin talking about things that get in her way or he mentioned problems in reaching his goal. You haven’t asked for that information yet, but your client offers it. Actually this is not that uncommon; sometimes in fact, it happens a lot.

Now if you have ears to hear and if you are paying attention to what your client is offering, even though your client may not be answering the question you asked, you will recognize this. And by recognizing it, you can then grab it. After all, that’s what you are primarily doing in asking the well-formed outcome questions—information gathering. So gather that information.