As you coach someone through a challenge or dilemma, replace problem-solving, advice-giving, and judgy-sounding questions with authentically curious, truly open questions.

After you do this quick check of your body language and tone, adjust to use affirming body language:

Gently nod at the pace they’re talking at, or slightly slower. It shows you’re following and tracking what they’re saying.
Make soft eye contact. Hard eye contact is intense, eyes wide—it’s a little creepy. Soft eye contact is more like a Tyra Banks “smize”—a subtle relaxing of your facial muscles that shows you’re not ready to pounce as soon as they’re done talking. Don’t worry about keeping constant eye contact. As Paloma taught me, research shows you can break eye contact every 3 seconds naturally, then connect again, and this still feels attentive and affirming to the other person.
Lean in, but not too much. When we’re uncomfortable, we sometimes unconsciously tip away from the person in whatever way we can. Make sure you’re squarely facing the person—or if you’re on video, squarely face the camera—and lean slightly. Even as little as 1” will do the trick! If I’m on Zoom and sitting at my desk, I like to make sure my elbows or wrists are evenly resting on it.

INSTEAD OF THIS	TRY THIS
Did you already try…?	What is your gut telling you?
Why did this make you react that way?	What feels surprising?
Why does this matter so much to you?	Which of your core values is being messed with?
Why did you do that?	What’s the driving force here?
Who can do this for you?	If you could wave a magic wand, what one thing would you change?
Why can’t you move forward?	What’s feeling fuzzy about this?
What if you tried…?	What, deep-down, do you truly want?
Why are you stuck?	What’s feeling stuck?
Why are you hesitating?	What’s the most likely outcome, and what’s the worst possible outcome?
How will you measure success?	What’s the #1 most important aspect of this?
Who have you talked to about this already?	What do you need?
How can you have better results next time?	What’s in the way?
What’s your first/next step?	What, if anything, is going unsaid?
What’s your proposed solution?	What’s your north star here?
What do you want to change about yourself?	What effect/impact do you want to have?
Why haven’t you taken that step yet?	What’s holding you back?
How do you know…?	What’s your spidey sense telling you?
Why are you feeling anxious?	What’s feeling especially significant about this?
Why do you want that?	What do you find motivating?
Why not [this other thing/solution]?	What are you optimizing for?