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Howto: Answer A SIMPLE Question
By insanity | July 13, 2008
Honestly, who writes a howto about answering a question? I mean, everyone knows from childhood how to answer a question right? Yet, the art of answering a question properly seems to be a fading (or perhaps never overly developed) skill. This isn’t restricted to a particular demographic as far as I can tell, but seems to be a mindset. In the last week alone I have experienced university students, university professors, mechanics, siblings and experts in many fields who all exhibit the same base problem: they don’t understand how to answer a SIMPLE question!
I saw this in Harvey Norman the other day:
Customer: “Hi… I’m buying a computer for my daughter at school and was looking at this one *points to a sleek looking machine*. Will this do everything she needs? She just does basic school work”
Service Rep: “Well, that computer only has 1.5Gb of ram and *blah blah blah blah blah blah megaflips doodlebytes blah blah vista blah blah 22 inches blah 75hz refresh blah blah*”
This went on for about 10minutes. I had fun watching the customer start looking around, panic-stricken, trying to find a safe escape route to flee towards. When the service rep finally finished, the customer bolted towards the counter and vanished. Probably to go home, eat some cookies and hope that Santa Claus knew more about computers than they did and would bring an appropriate christmas gift.
Raise your hand if you know what my complaint here is?
The service representative has committed the cardinal sin of answering a simple question: give a simple answer.
There are several important things that need to be remembered when answering a question. Here is my short list:
Rule #1: Answer as simply as possible
This doesn’t mean you don’t provide any background information. It means that you make your explanation ONLY as complex as needed to answer the question. Cut out any sidepaths, deviations or corner cases that the person probably isn’t interested in knowing. If it takes more than twice as long to answer the question as ask it, you should probably warn them! And then still choose your words carefully. Before you say it, you must think to yourself “Do they need to know this to answer JUST their question?”
Rule #2: Answer in appropriate technical depth
The person asking the question in the given example didn’t really seem like they needed technical information. The question was non-technical, and the resulting answer should have been equally as non-technical! If the answer IS technical, again, you need to watch whether the person actually cares/understands. If they ask a technical question, by all means, give a full response, but DON’T fall into the trap of pursuing all kinds of side roads.
Rule #3: Address the key aspects of the question
Each sentence you utter should be related to the question. It should be clear how the answer links to the question. And each part of the question should be answered. If I ask you what is your favourite colour and shape, and you only tell me your favourite colour, you’ve only answered half the question. Make sure you understand all the parts of the question that was asked. Stop and think about it before you start answering!
Rule #4: Re-iterate the answer
People learn through repetition, so ALWAYS repeat the answer. Several times. This doesn’t mean repeat the same sentence, as this will likely annoy your listeners. It does mean rephrase and re-visit the answer. This helps also ensure the questioner doesn’t mishear what you say.
Rule #5: “Do they need to know it this time?”
If the full answer is long, the person probably doesn’t need it all at once. Think about how you learn. The first time you ask me what a good country to visit is, you probably only want around a 30s answer. If you are interested in what I said, you will ask another question won’t you? On the flipside, if I bore you to tears and give you no clear answer, you may not ask me ever again. Only tell the person what they need to know, and need to know NOW! If it can wait till later, well… never do today what you can put off till tomorrow 
So, to repeat this little summary, make your answer:
- Simple (don’t make the answer more complex than the question)
- Sweet (don’t confuse or lose them in detail)
- Complete (answer the full question)
- Reinforced (don’t drown the answer out in “extra information”)
- Short (don’t drag it out)
Believe me, your listeners will be grateful, your collegues will be grateful… who knows, you might start a world-wide revolution in good question-answering
Topics: General | 2 Comments »
July 14th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
My goodness, why didn’t I think to write that article? I consider myself quite good at answering questions, particularly when someone asks me a simple question to which there is no simple answer.
My boss however, when someone asks him “Michael, why is x screen in the database so slow?” he might reply with “Oh, the index segments are wrong since we changed the data range and we have to wait until low system load to re-build the index”, when a simple “We’ve made a change that won’t be completed until tonight” would suffice. People have just learned to nod and accept that somehow that’s a valid answer
July 14th, 2008 at 10:40 pm
Now, if only we can get rid of the really stupid questions:
“I spilled my coffee on my keyboard, and thought it’d be a good idea to use the hair dryer to dry it, and melted the keys… do you think it’ll still be covered under warranty?”