APPLICATION ARTICLE BY TRAINING PARTICIPANTS:

Application article – raise question instead of giving direction, make other person say “yes yes”, make other feel that the idea is from him.

I have a friend who has been running a small company with his classmate for a long time.  Unfortunately they did not make a lot of money. 

I start with the compliment to him that he is very amazing to run a company and a factory, he is very happy but still he said it is not very successful.

Then I asked, “Why?”  He said that at the beginning he is not familiar with the product and market. I agreed but asked that now after 3 years his experience should be improved? He said yes and told me now he had a clear picture of where the potential consumer is and what kind of product they are looking for.

So “you should do something now and what is your plan? ”  I asked. He thought for a while and said that he is going to have a meeting with the sales and the technician so that everyone can work for 1 direction.  He prefer to focus on 1 main product and gain more market share, thus the produce efficiency will be improved and the customer will be targeted.

 I do not think the cooperation between he and his partner is good enough, but I did not say it directly, due to their long time working together.

I just said “do you think you can work together with your classmate better? ” He said yes. He admitted that he and his classmate always think in a different way, he is mainly concentrate on the consumer but his classmate mainly focus on the product itself. 

I raised the question “why” again. He said that maybe it is because his partner always stayed in factory but never face the consumer while on the other hand, he always communicate with consumer but seldom responsible for production.

 He suggested that he will improve communication with his partner.  How he will improve the communication? May be the different view is because different role? I suggested exchanging the role with his partner. He agreed and suggested that to let his partner to be a sale to face the customer will make him have a live image of the requirement from market; to make him realized that only when he can make the customer satisfied the company can make money, the product will have the market. At the same time, he can also learn to manage the factory, to manage the production. That will also enlarge his experience.

Finally he suggested that he will have a meeting with his partner, to communicate with him about the future of the company, the role of them in the company.

GOAWAYCOMEBACK COMMENTS:

Questioning and enabling go hand in hand. As managers, if we ask questions step by step as the questioner in the article, we are enabling the team to a higher level of performance!

One more strength we can learn from the questioner is her ability to hold the answer until her friend found the answer by himself.

In Gongfu Panda, why the fat and clumsy ABAO became a legend Gongfu master? Because Master Tortoise has faith in him even if nobody believed in him.

Have more faith in our team member, ask more questions to facilitate their potential, then they will surprise us with their amazing abilities like Gongfu Panda.

卡内基训练简介：https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8QOnBFFWDU0