Ask More: The Power of Questions to Open Doors, Uncover Solutions, and Spark Change pdfdrive com

CHAPTER 6
FOR THE RECORD
Confrontational Questions
S
OMETIMES YOU CAN
’
T BUILD BRIDGES
. You’re not looking for empathy and you’re not
looking for trust. You just need an answer. You have to hold someone’s feet to the
fire, stare straight into their eyes, and ask what they knew, when they knew it, or what
they did, said, or intended. You want a clear answer to a straight-up question. You
need to pin down someone’s role or responsibility, complicity or culpability. You
want accountability.
?
There are plenty of times when people need to be confronted and held to
account. We do it with our children in order to teach them responsibility, set
boundaries, and demonstrate the consequences of their actions. We want our
politicians to be accountable because they hold a public trust. We think
corporations should be accountable because they should do more than just make
money. We hold one another to account if we think there has been wrongdoing,
bad behavior, hypocrisy, or incompetence: Perhaps you suspect a colleague has
been cheating on her expense accounts, the police chief may be turning a blind
eye to corrupt cops, a relative is siphoning money from Aunt Sophie’s retirement
account, or a partner is acting suspiciously.
Is this your handwriting?
Were you aware that this was happening?
Confrontation and accountability questions put issues on the table and
demand answers for the record. They air a grievance, level an accusation, and
reinforce the rules of acceptable behavior. Accountability questions are asked in
public or in private, in the glare of the lights or in the shadows of the most
intimate relationships. They are necessary, but they can be risky business. The

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principles of confrontational questioning reflect the realities of this high-voltage
exchange. They are best approached when you:
Know your goal. Set it and stick with it. Do you want an acknowledgment, an
admission, an expression of regret or remorse, or a confession? Plot your
question trajectory with your objective in mind. Anticipate what it will take to
get there.
Know your facts. Be sure they are complete and accurate. You need a solid
foundation of information if you are going to accuse or confront. This is key to
asking the right questions, anticipating the answers, and avoiding embarrassing
mistakes.
Frame your questions surgically. Precise answers are elicited with precise
questions. Use direct questions. Frame them to support your case. Listen closely
and ask again if you don’t get a direct answer.
Care about the question. If you’re going into battle, you should be more than a
mercenary. Your passion and your commitment will elevate the intensity and
poignancy of the questions you ask. Craft your questions to project moral
authority. Take the high road.
Expect a defensive, evasive, or confrontational response. People don’t like to be
called on the carpet and may ignore the question, duck the answer, or attack the
messenger rather than acknowledge their fault or flaw. Be ready to rumble. Be
prepared with a follow-up if this happens.
Succeeding in the high stakes world of confrontational questioning requires
engaging all of these principles so that you can be a worthy adversary. You will
be tested on several levels.
Care to Listen
Caring about your cause brings commitment. Being knowledgeable conveys
authority. Listening closely provides opportunity. If you’re going to stand up to
the mayor or to the neighborhood bully, you need the courage of your
convictions and the muscle of facts. And you want to use the clock to your
advantage.

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CNN’s Anderson Cooper is adept at using all of these skills. He is
approachable, but he is tough and unflinching when he leans on someone for
what they’ve done or said. We met at his home, a renovated old firehouse in
lower Manhattan, to talk about these types of questions. Decorated with
antiques, collector’s items from his famous Vanderbilt ancestors, and other gems
—I especially liked the eight-foot black bear looming over the living room—the
house is a mix of old-world royalty and hipster urban retreat. Not far from the
commanding portrait of Cooper’s great grandfather, railroad and shipping
magnate Commodore Vanderbilt, we settled in for a conversation about how
questions, listening, and confrontation connect.
Cooper and I overlapped a bit at CNN. He always impressed me with his
intelligence, range and sincerity. His work has taken him from epic disasters
around the world and mud hut sanctuaries in Africa’s embattled hellholes to
stage-managed presidential debates in America’s heartland and the most
glamorous places on the planet. He is empathetic by nature. He told me that he
tries to be a “capable recipient” of everything he hears. Respecting silence
matters to him. He got involved in mindfulness meditationto become more
“present.”
His interest in holding people to account is an acquired skill. “Confrontation
doesn’t come naturally,” he acknowledged. But he believes that public officials
are seldom held to account in a thoughtful and thorough manner. When he’s got
facts that stand in stark contrast to the reality of a situation or what a person has
said or done, he feels compelled to challenge openly.
He doesn’t like confrontational interviews driven by opinion or attitude. “I
find them circular and ultimately unsatisfying. But an interview where you have
facts that oppose and contradict what a person has said, and you are presenting
those facts to them, you’re challenging them basically on something they said—
those are the interviews I now enjoy and are important,” he told me. “These are
the hardest interviews” because they require so much preparation and “you have
to be armed with what is true.” Cooper has refined his approach.
“I used to make the mistake of thinking I had to cover everything. I now
realize in those interviews, those confrontational interviews, that you focus on
one or two points.” He knows the clock is ticking and his adversary is
calculating. “The other person often relies on the time constraints and on you
ultimately just backing off and moving on. But if you just refuse to move on and
are willing to ask the same question over and over again, when they’re not
answering, it reveals something else about them.”

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Confrontational questioning often requires assertive interruption or repetition
in order to make it as difficult as possible for your adversary to change the
subject, dodge the question or run out the clock.
Cooper’s defining interview in this respect took place in the midst of disaster
after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He had been on-site for a few days, had seen the
flooding, and talked to everyone from citizens to first responders and elected
officials. On this day, he’d been out with a recovery team from the Federal
Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). They had gone to a flooded home
where the dead were still lying in their living room. The stench, the images, the
loss were all fresh in his mind. They collided with images from other places
where he’d seen bodies left to rot—Somalia, Rwanda, Sarajevo. But this was
America. This was home.