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The other day my two-year-old-daughter asked me her first why question. She wanted to figure out why her seven- week-old brother was crying. I’m sure many parents are familiar with children asking “Why?” all the time. In the sometimes confusing world we live in, they are trying to understand problems by asking. |
In school, we learn how to answer, but not how to ask. But in today’s world where the right answers are easy to find online, asking the right questions can be much more powerful. Questions help us identify the problem we wish to solve.
In order to get to the root cause of a problem, Toyota’s production system developed a technique called “Five Whys”. Whenever a problem was identified, the question “Why?” was simply asked five times in a row to get to its root cause. If a server was down, asking why would usually result with a technical answer, such as “Because the system crashed”. Asking “Why?” again would uncover why the system crashed, and so on.
This process helps reveal both technical and human causes of problems, and how to fix them.
In your next sales call, get to the bottom of your prospects issues by asking “Why?”: “Why is it that sales are down?”, “Why are your customers buying elsewhere?”, “Why won’t your sales staff close more deals?”, “Why is sales training not happening regularly?”, “Why does the sales manager feel that way about training?”. You get the picture by now…
In selling, prospects don’t want answers as much as they want someone to help them identify their problem. The “Five Whys” technique can help identify a prospects problem and provide the ‘raw material’ on which the rest of the sale can be built. Once you know what the problem is, solving it becomes a lot easier!
♦ Ahmed al-Akber is the managing director of ACK Solutions, a firm that helps companies to improve their marketing and sales results. Ahmed has worked internationally in marketing, sales, and strategic planning at companies such as The Coca-Cola Company, Philip Morris International and Dell. Questions or comments can be sent to Ahmed on [email protected]