84. Quality Questions for a Better Business
This week, I’m sharing one of the most important skills you can develop as an interior design business CEO: asking high-quality questions.
If you’ve ever wondered why the mindset aspect of my work is so critical in my sessions with clients, this topic exemplifies exactly why. Your brain is with you 24/7 and has the power to completely transform your life and business. When you start asking high-quality questions, you essentially train your brain to become solution-oriented, and I’m showing you how to start in this episode.
Whether you want to make more money, up-level your clientele, overcome procrastination, or are unsure of what goal to pursue next, tune in this week to hear why asking high-quality questions is the solution to it all. You’ll learn how all solutions originate from high-quality questions, what happens when you’re in the practice of asking open-ended, curious questions, and how to start training your brain to think in this way.
CEO Summer School is my summer podcast series where we’ll explore the power of questions. To join me in CEO Summer School, subscribe to the show to make sure you don’t miss an episode!
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What You’ll Discover from this Episode:
Why asking high-quality questions is one of the most vital skills you can develop as an interior design business owner.
How any problem you’re trying to solve starts with a high-quality question.
The difference between crappy questions and high-quality questions.
Why asking high-quality questions helps you make empowered decisions.
A general guideline for what high-quality questions entail.
How to start developing the skill of asking high-quality questions.
Listen to the Full Episode:
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Full Episode Transcript:
Hey designer, you’re listening to episode 84. In this one I’m going to be talking about developing one of the most important skills, if not the most important skill, you can develop as an interior design business owner, and it’s probably not what you think. Not only are you going to learn so much from this episode and how you can apply it to your business, I’m also going to be sharing the details of an upcoming summer series I have planned especially for you that’s going to help you practice what I’m sharing in today’s episode.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you’re ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you’re in the right place. I’m Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let’s go.
Hello, designer. Welcome back to the podcast. I am glad to be here with you today. I’m coming back from, oh my gosh, the worst cold. I can’t even remember. Yeah, like since I probably had Covid. But I didn’t have Covid, I was just, I was so sick. So if I still sound sniffly, that is why. And deadlines are deadlines, so I’m going to keep this rolling.
But let me just say, this was a great reminder of the power of open space on your calendar and the ability to shift and change. Last week I had to reschedule so many sessions. And to all of my clients who are listening and were so gracious about it, thank you. I appreciate you. And fortunately, we’re back on track.
So I’m so grateful for my past self who planned ahead with not just these podcast recordings, but had some extra space to shift around clients. And I’m not going to miss a beat, even though I was basically on my sofa all day, every day last week. So all that to say, I am so thrilled to be on the mend, even though I still probably sound a little congested, and back here with you today.
The other thing I wanted to say is thank you so much for all of you who have left reviews for the podcast. Lately we’ve had a bunch of new ones, which is always really exciting. And I wanted to give a quick shout out to one of the listeners. Their name they left, and I believe I’m saying this right, but it’s WaBoln. WaBoln left a review titled, episode topics are always aligning and on point.
And they share, “It seems like Desi reads my mind in advance and then shares an episode about what I’m struggling with this week in my own design firm. I love that I can consume an episode on my daily walks.” And I’m so glad that you’re listening to me on your walks. That’s when I love to listen to podcasts as well. And I am always thinking about you all and thinking about your brain and how I can help you. So I’m so glad to hear that it’s helpful.
And a reminder to all of you who haven’t left a rating and review, I do still have the giveaway happening where you can leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts. And then you submit a quick form that I have a link to in the show notes. And then that will enter you to win a one-on-one coaching session with me.
And I’m planning to do a bunch of these giveaways in the fall once my schedule opens back up after the summer. So you’ve got a great chance to win. So if you haven’t left that rating or review, go do that now. And you could win a time for us to meet face-to-face and I could help you with any problem you’re facing in your business.
All right, let’s talk about what the topic is for today. Now, we’re going to be covering an essential tool or skill set that you need to have in your interior design business. You can really use this skill, and that skill is asking high-quality questions, to create better results for you in any area of your interior design business and in your life. This skill is going to go with you everywhere because when you change your brain, well, it goes with you everywhere you are.
And that’s why the mindset aspect of what I do and the ways that I work with my clients is so important, is that wherever you go, there you are. And so this skill of asking high-quality questions is going to help you make more money, up-level your clientele. If you’re sitting down to write an Instagram post or newsletter and you’re navigating that, what to put up. Or even just navigating how to get over that internal hump of actually doing the thing.
If you’re troubleshooting part of your client process, if you’re struggling to manage your team, if you’re wondering what’s next in your business or what goal you want to go after next, this skill of asking high-quality questions applies to it all.
Solutions for any problem you’re trying to solve for or a goal you’re trying to achieve starts with asking a high quality question and then a series of other high-quality questions because all solutions originate with a question. Yes, you can Google things and get some answers, but even then when you have a tactic or tip that an expert has shared, you still have to ask yourself a high-quality question of how does this apply to me? That’s a high-quality question because you’re assuming there’s a way for it to apply to you and you’re assuming your capability in applying it.
When we’re asking ourselves questions, you can either ask yourself a dead-end question that keeps you stuck in the outcomes that you don’t want to create or keeps you stuck in inaction, or you can learn to ask yourself high-quality questions that keep you solutions focused, forward thinking and proactive in your actions. This is what I do for my clients as a coach. I have honed my skills at a master level of being able to ask really great questions.
As a podcast listener, you’ve probably even experienced this yourself of being on the other side of a question that I’ve posed that really lands or opens something up for you. And it’s so helpful to have somebody else outside of your brain who sees what you can’t see to pose these questions.
And at the same time, asking powerful questions is a skill that you can develop and use as the leader of your interior design business because as the CEO, you want to train yourself to think in this way. Again, it’s always helpful to have that outside perspective and that outside perspective, you can’t necessarily carry it around in your pocket like you can carry around your brain in your body.
No matter what stage of business you’re in, whether you’re just getting started, you’re three to five years in, maybe you’re 10 years in or even maybe you’ve been in the industry for 20 years, no matter what stage of business you’re in, this skill set of being able to ask high-quality questions is going to be so helpful for you. And the focus of today’s episode is the perfect kickoff for the special summer series I’m creating for you. I have more details on that and how you can participate at the end of this episode.
Let’s break this whole idea of questions down and then we’ll go on to talk about the difference between what I’m going to call a crappy question and a high-quality question. I always love to look up definitions, you probably have heard me talk about that on the podcast before. The definition of a question is a sentence worded or expressed so as to elicit information. The elicit information part of the definition is what’s important and what I want to call attention to because remember, solutions, which is really information and ideas you can use to solve a problem, solutions will come from questions. That’s where they originate.
As an interior design business owner, you are always solving problems. I like to say we’re professional problem solvers. And professional problem solvers are looking for solutions. And this is what, as a professional problem solver looking for those solutions, I want you to know about your brain. Your brain loves to problem solve. Even though sometimes, right, you’re sitting at your desk and you’re like, oh, this is so hard. Why isn’t this easier? Which by the way, isn’t a great question, but we’ll talk about that later.
But your brain loves to problem solve. And it’s going to try and answer any question you pose. It’s a meaning-making machine. It’s going to work to answer whatever you prompt it with. Kind of like a Google search bar. And you know, when you’re on the web and you start typing in the Google search bar and there’s that part that just starts populating answers below. Sometimes the answers are spot on. It’s exactly what you want to be looking for. And sometimes those suggestions I’m thinking, what, I can’t believe people search for this.
And if you’re old enough, around my age, I’m going to be turning 40 this summer. You might even remember being taught how to identify useful search terms for the internet. You had to use a couple of keywords and then link them together in a certain way. I can’t even remember exactly what that process was, but it did have to make you very intentional about the information you were searching for or the solution you were searching for.
Now, you don’t have to do that level of detail or nuance with Google anymore, but we should be thinking about that with your brain. The other thing I really want you to know about your brain is that in addition to wanting to answer any question posed to it, it wants to answer that question as quickly and as efficiently as possible.
Here’s what this means for you. One, if you ask yourself a negatively worded question, I’m going to call that a crappy question, your brain is going to offer you a negative answer. It’s not going to make the effort to do anything else on your behalf. So for example, if you’re asking yourself, why is this so hard? The answer is going to probably be some well-worn belief you have about yourself or about your business or about your clients, right?
Maybe when you say to yourself, “why is this so hard?” your brain is going to answer, because everything’s harder for you. You’re just not that smart. You should be able to figure this out, right? These are not useful answers.
The second thing that your brain wanting to be quick and efficient means to you, is if you have a set of negative thought patterns you tend to have on repeat, your brain’s going to go offer those up first. That’s kind of what I was just talking about. And it’s because it wants to expend as little energy as possible. So maybe the crappy question is, why am I always behind? And then your brain’s going to offer up something like, you’re always behind. There you go procrastinating again. You always do this.
So those two examples of why is this so hard? Why am I always behind? Those are crappy questions. They’re negatively framed questions and they are just going to never provide a useful solution to a problem. They’re only going to reinforce the belief that is present in the question that is holding you back.
Because I want you to notice with both of those questions, they’re not even really questions. They’re more like statements, disguised as questions that you’re just using to reinforce something you think is true. Why am I always behind, is really just you repeating to yourself, I am behind.
If you go back all the way to the beginning of the podcast with episode three, the title is Overwhelm is Optional if you want to refresh yourself or go back and listen for the first time. What I teach you is that sentences you think generate certain emotions that fuel actions or inactions and produce results. If you’re asking yourself, why are you always behind? You’re reinforcing the idea that you’re always behind. And then you probably feel something like anxiety or overwhelm. And we can all think of how we act when we’re feeling those emotions.
And typically then, we are not taking action to do anything, right? We get in that overwhelmed shutdown state. And then if you’re believing you’re always behind, you don’t really make any real effort to try and change because you’re like, well, this is just my reality. I can’t change this. And then you continue to be behind in whatever way it is that you’re describing. Or you continue to perpetuate that feeling of behind, even though you don’t even maybe know what you’re behind because maybe the deadlines hadn’t actually been set or it was an internal deadline that you set and you were never even really clear about what needed to be done by what date.
So you can see those types of questions just lead you down paths that you really don’t want to be going and using your time and energy with. So that’s what I’m going to call a crappy question.
So let’s contrast that crappy version to a high-quality question. And that’s really the skill that I want you to start to develop, is asking these high-quality questions. Let’s say we have a circumstance where you thought you’d be at a certain point in your presentation materials by Thursday, and it’s Wednesday night. You’re working late, and you are nowhere near where you need to be. You could ask yourself the crappy question, why am I always behind? And then judge yourself, make yourself feel bad and wallow in that circumstance.
Or you could start asking high-quality questions and get yourself on track to useful problem solving. High-quality questions you could be asking in that moment might sound like, what do I need to do to support myself getting this done? Or how could I set this timeline differently on the next project so I have more space? Or what else could I set aside for now to free up more space to work on this?
Hopefully you’re hearing how all of these questions have the opportunity to provide forward focused solution-oriented answers. Maybe you look at how you’re setting project timelines and realize it’s just not realistic to ask yourself to produce that much in a given timeframe. And you can change that in your process going forward.
Maybe you realize there’s a part of the presentation you could delegate, or you decide to shut off your email for a while so you can really focus and be more effective with the time you do have. A great way to support yourself by the way. Maybe you realize that something you’re telling yourself is urgent really isn’t urgent and could wait until after this deadline has passed. That’d give you more space to work on the task at hand.
Can you see how these high quality questions have opened up possibilities? And you reclaim your agency and the opportunity to make empowered decisions with these types of questions. And this looks so, so different and feels very different than throwing your hands up and saying, well, here I am again, can’t do anything about it.
And that is the power of learning to ask yourself high-quality questions. Asking yourself better questions will change the trajectory of your interior design business, I guarantee it, and help you grow as the leader of your company.
Hopefully at this point I have sold you on this idea of asking high-quality questions and working on developing that skill as one of the most important skills you can develop in your interior design business. Let’s talk now about how you develop that skill, because it really is a skill that you can develop and a muscle that you can strengthen as part of your own self-leadership and leadership of your business.
The very first thing, as always, is to create awareness around the type and quality of questions you’re asking. It always starts with awareness, doesn’t it? We have to know what we’re doing and how we’re doing it in order to make a change. So that’s the very first piece. Just notice what types of questions you’re asking. You can think about, am I asking myself a crappy question or a high-quality question?
Checking in with how you feel or the emotions that come up when you ask yourself a question is a great signal of which type it is. If there’s judgment, defeat, or blame, or one of those kind of unpleasant negative emotions simmering under the question, it’s probably a crappy question and will not be helpful. And that’s a great time to pause and reconsider how you could frame that question in a more positive, open, solutions mindset way.
You can choose then to proactively work on asking yourself high quality questions that are open-ended and curious. You can rephrase the question you just asked yourself to be a high-quality question when you notice that the answers that you’re receiving from your brain aren’t going to serve you.
And as a general guideline, high-quality questions often start with what, how, or could. There’s a softer tone to a high quality question that you’ll start to notice and be able to tune into. And the big thing here is that this is a skill. So you might not notice the quality of your questions until after the fact, and you’ve got kind of a bad answer to what you just asked yourself, or it’s going to feel really clunky to go, oh, shoot, that was a really crappy question I just asked myself. I’m going to switch to a high quality question.
That might feel clunky, and that’s okay. That’s normal. And it doesn’t mean you’re bad at this or won’t get it. Think about riding a bike. Just because you fell off the bike or needed a parent or somebody to hold onto the seat as you got going doesn’t mean that you are never going to ride a bike. Same thing with learning the skill of asking better questions.
One of the things that I do with my clients is I encourage them to answer a simple set of questions at the beginning and end of every week. And not only are their responses helpful to them for planning the week ahead and consistently taking action from the lessons that they’re learning as they progress, but the repetition begins to train their brain to actually think in high-quality questions. You start to train yourself to be solution oriented.
And the same is going to be true for you. The more you practice high-quality questions in your daily life, the more you will benefit from them. When you learn to ask yourself better questions, you’re opening yourself up to ideas and insights and solutions that are already inside of you. They are already there.
When you ask yourself open-ended curious questions, you’re better able to take in information that you learned from somebody else and synthesize it and apply it directly to your own business without having to force yourself to follow an exact blueprint that worked for somebody else. It’s a really flexible tool and it is so powerful.
And what I love, too, is you never know where a high-quality question will take you. It could unlock something even bigger and better and more supportive than you even thought to explore at the start of asking that question. I have a friend who was actually sharing something with me about her personal life that she wanted to start doing, but kept putting off.
And this was just like a casual friend conversation and she was saying she was going to do it, but she never did. You know that pattern? And I apparently asked her a question, I don’t even remember exactly what it was. But months later she said to me, do you remember when you asked me that? And I totally did not, of course, like I said.
But she said it totally created a shift and she started doing that thing she was telling herself she wanted to do, but couldn’t get herself to do. And then now was using that same shift that occurred from that one question in that one specific habit area to create new shifts in other areas of her life that would support her.
So sometimes you ask yourself a high quality question and you know exactly where you want to go with that and where it might take you. And sometimes the question is going to surprise and delight you and create a ripple effect that you could never have imagined. And that’s why questions are so powerful and why I want you to have the opportunity to be answering these types of questions and also learn how to ask these questions of yourself.
When you can learn to ask a high-quality question, you have your own inner mentor that goes with you everywhere. And the more you practice, the better you get and the more naturally you’re going to think this way. Which brings me to my very fun announcement, the summer series. I’m doing some jazz hands here with my microphone.
The summer series I have been planning for you, which by the way, came from a question I asked myself during some self-coaching. And that question was, what would be fun to offer this summer? What would I love to give you all as listeners, as a resource? And when I asked myself this, I had some ideas, but none of them were what I’m going to share.
Here’s the thing with questions, they can stick with you. So sometimes even as you get answers, then you don’t even go with those answers because the question is still percolating in the back of your mind. And you can allow them to really work for you in the background, which is exactly what happened here.
I was talking to a coach friend of mine about something completely different and then it came to me, an answer to this question that I posed weeks prior. And I wanted this summer to be about questions, I realized. And then I let that sit and I asked some more questions of what could it look like? What would be fun to deliver? How could I structure this in a way that feels really fresh? And how could I help my listeners actively engage with the content that I share on the podcast?
And that’s what I’m giving you. And that is CEO Summer School. It is a summer podcast series where we are going to be exploring the power of questions. Questions you can ask yourself with solutions and ideas and frameworks that are going to be able to be applied directly to your business. To join me in CEO Summer School, you don’t have to do anything different to be a part of this series.
The episodes are going to be released under the same show, The Interior Design Business CEO podcast. The only thing you might wanna do differently is that if you aren’t already subscribed to the show, you’re going to want to do that so you don’t miss the episodes and you can follow along. What I want to be super clear about though is that CEO Summer School is going to be way more fun and way more inspiring than doing remedial algebra in actual summer school.
This is actually much less about studying and trying to learn concepts, and more about internal reflection and exploration. I’m going to be guiding you through a series of questions that are going to build upon each other so that while you’re out enjoying summer, enjoying your life, and of course, still getting down to business, you’re letting your brain do some work in preparing you for the fall and the rest of 2024.
This is where the interactive element to the CEO Summer School series is coming into play. I’m going to share more on that next week when I fully introduce what we’re doing and how we’re doing it. There will be a link that you’re going to want to watch for for this interactive part of the series. And that’s going to be a reflection guide that goes with each summer school episode with a few additional points and questions to expand on what I share in the episode so that you can create, essentially, your own little textbook of answers that you’ll use throughout the summer and can use then as you dive into fall.
You’re going to be taking what I share on the podcast as the question that I pose and taking it even deeper and applying it directly to you. It’s going to be like getting coached by me while also developing your own skill set of asking better questions, but it’ll be on your own time and available whenever you need it.
Of course, I would love for you to tell your friends about CEO Summer School. Invite them to come with you and have someone to discuss these questions with and open up new conversations and create even more value through what I’m going to be sharing.
This week, I want you to start paying attention to the types of questions you ask yourself and also the types of answers your brain gives you. How are you feeling when you ask the question to yourself and when you receive the answers? Feeling bad and dejected? Then you’re probably asking yourself a crappy question.
And I want you to practice this skill of asking questions that are expansive, that help you feel lighter and more open. That’s when you’re going to be on the right path with a high quality question. That’s what you’re leaning into this week and we’re going to take this even farther as we dive into CEO Summer School.
Definitely tune in next week where I’m going to be sharing more details on how this is going to work and how you can participate in the interactive element to school.
And then one final announcement here before we sign off, I now have the waitlist available for you if you’re interested in working together one-on-one. As part of my summer slowdown, I won’t be taking on any new private one-on-one clients for the time being, but if you want to be the first one to know when those spots open up, definitely check out the link in the show notes so you can add your name and tell me a little bit about you, your goals and your business and submit that quick form. So that way you get first dibs when spots for private coaching become available.
That is what I have for you, and until then I’m wishing you a beautiful week full of beautiful questions. I’ll talk to you in the next episode.
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All you have to do is scroll down to the bottom of your podcast app, tap the five stars and leave a review. Tell me your favorite episode, why you look forward to listening every week, or why another designer needs to check out the show. It won’t take long, and as a thank you for leaving a rating and review you'll have the opportunity to win a private coaching session with me.
Just click the link in the show notes to submit your review so I know how to get in touch. I can’t wait to select a winner and it might be you. I'll talk to you next week.
Thanks for joining me for this week’s episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit www.desicreswell.com. And if you’re ready to take what you’ve learned on the podcast to the next level, I would love for you to check out my signature group coaching program, Out of Overwhelm.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you’re ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you’re in the right place. I’m Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let’s go.
Hello, designer. Welcome back to the podcast. I am glad to be here with you today. I’m coming back from, oh my gosh, the worst cold. I can’t even remember. Yeah, like since I probably had Covid. But I didn’t have Covid, I was just, I was so sick. So if I still sound sniffly, that is why. And deadlines are deadlines, so I’m going to keep this rolling.
But let me just say, this was a great reminder of the power of open space on your calendar and the ability to shift and change. Last week I had to reschedule so many sessions. And to all of my clients who are listening and were so gracious about it, thank you. I appreciate you. And fortunately, we’re back on track.
So I’m so grateful for my past self who planned ahead with not just these podcast recordings, but had some extra space to shift around clients. And I’m not going to miss a beat, even though I was basically on my sofa all day, every day last week. So all that to say, I am so thrilled to be on the mend, even though I still probably sound a little congested, and back here with you today.
The other thing I wanted to say is thank you so much for all of you who have left reviews for the podcast. Lately we’ve had a bunch of new ones, which is always really exciting. And I wanted to give a quick shout out to one of the listeners. Their name they left, and I believe I’m saying this right, but it’s WaBoln. WaBoln left a review titled, episode topics are always aligning and on point.
And they share, “It seems like Desi reads my mind in advance and then shares an episode about what I’m struggling with this week in my own design firm. I love that I can consume an episode on my daily walks.” And I’m so glad that you’re listening to me on your walks. That’s when I love to listen to podcasts as well. And I am always thinking about you all and thinking about your brain and how I can help you. So I’m so glad to hear that it’s helpful.
And a reminder to all of you who haven’t left a rating and review, I do still have the giveaway happening where you can leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts. And then you submit a quick form that I have a link to in the show notes. And then that will enter you to win a one-on-one coaching session with me.
And I’m planning to do a bunch of these giveaways in the fall once my schedule opens back up after the summer. So you’ve got a great chance to win. So if you haven’t left that rating or review, go do that now. And you could win a time for us to meet face-to-face and I could help you with any problem you’re facing in your business.
All right, let’s talk about what the topic is for today. Now, we’re going to be covering an essential tool or skill set that you need to have in your interior design business. You can really use this skill, and that skill is asking high-quality questions, to create better results for you in any area of your interior design business and in your life. This skill is going to go with you everywhere because when you change your brain, well, it goes with you everywhere you are.
And that’s why the mindset aspect of what I do and the ways that I work with my clients is so important, is that wherever you go, there you are. And so this skill of asking high-quality questions is going to help you make more money, up-level your clientele. If you’re sitting down to write an Instagram post or newsletter and you’re navigating that, what to put up. Or even just navigating how to get over that internal hump of actually doing the thing.
If you’re troubleshooting part of your client process, if you’re struggling to manage your team, if you’re wondering what’s next in your business or what goal you want to go after next, this skill of asking high-quality questions applies to it all.
Solutions for any problem you’re trying to solve for or a goal you’re trying to achieve starts with asking a high quality question and then a series of other high-quality questions because all solutions originate with a question. Yes, you can Google things and get some answers, but even then when you have a tactic or tip that an expert has shared, you still have to ask yourself a high-quality question of how does this apply to me? That’s a high-quality question because you’re assuming there’s a way for it to apply to you and you’re assuming your capability in applying it.
When we’re asking ourselves questions, you can either ask yourself a dead-end question that keeps you stuck in the outcomes that you don’t want to create or keeps you stuck in inaction, or you can learn to ask yourself high-quality questions that keep you solutions focused, forward thinking and proactive in your actions. This is what I do for my clients as a coach. I have honed my skills at a master level of being able to ask really great questions.
As a podcast listener, you’ve probably even experienced this yourself of being on the other side of a question that I’ve posed that really lands or opens something up for you. And it’s so helpful to have somebody else outside of your brain who sees what you can’t see to pose these questions.
And at the same time, asking powerful questions is a skill that you can develop and use as the leader of your interior design business because as the CEO, you want to train yourself to think in this way. Again, it’s always helpful to have that outside perspective and that outside perspective, you can’t necessarily carry it around in your pocket like you can carry around your brain in your body.
No matter what stage of business you’re in, whether you’re just getting started, you’re three to five years in, maybe you’re 10 years in or even maybe you’ve been in the industry for 20 years, no matter what stage of business you’re in, this skill set of being able to ask high-quality questions is going to be so helpful for you. And the focus of today’s episode is the perfect kickoff for the special summer series I’m creating for you. I have more details on that and how you can participate at the end of this episode.
Let’s break this whole idea of questions down and then we’ll go on to talk about the difference between what I’m going to call a crappy question and a high-quality question. I always love to look up definitions, you probably have heard me talk about that on the podcast before. The definition of a question is a sentence worded or expressed so as to elicit information. The elicit information part of the definition is what’s important and what I want to call attention to because remember, solutions, which is really information and ideas you can use to solve a problem, solutions will come from questions. That’s where they originate.
As an interior design business owner, you are always solving problems. I like to say we’re professional problem solvers. And professional problem solvers are looking for solutions. And this is what, as a professional problem solver looking for those solutions, I want you to know about your brain. Your brain loves to problem solve. Even though sometimes, right, you’re sitting at your desk and you’re like, oh, this is so hard. Why isn’t this easier? Which by the way, isn’t a great question, but we’ll talk about that later.
But your brain loves to problem solve. And it’s going to try and answer any question you pose. It’s a meaning-making machine. It’s going to work to answer whatever you prompt it with. Kind of like a Google search bar. And you know, when you’re on the web and you start typing in the Google search bar and there’s that part that just starts populating answers below. Sometimes the answers are spot on. It’s exactly what you want to be looking for. And sometimes those suggestions I’m thinking, what, I can’t believe people search for this.
And if you’re old enough, around my age, I’m going to be turning 40 this summer. You might even remember being taught how to identify useful search terms for the internet. You had to use a couple of keywords and then link them together in a certain way. I can’t even remember exactly what that process was, but it did have to make you very intentional about the information you were searching for or the solution you were searching for.
Now, you don’t have to do that level of detail or nuance with Google anymore, but we should be thinking about that with your brain. The other thing I really want you to know about your brain is that in addition to wanting to answer any question posed to it, it wants to answer that question as quickly and as efficiently as possible.
Here’s what this means for you. One, if you ask yourself a negatively worded question, I’m going to call that a crappy question, your brain is going to offer you a negative answer. It’s not going to make the effort to do anything else on your behalf. So for example, if you’re asking yourself, why is this so hard? The answer is going to probably be some well-worn belief you have about yourself or about your business or about your clients, right?
Maybe when you say to yourself, “why is this so hard?” your brain is going to answer, because everything’s harder for you. You’re just not that smart. You should be able to figure this out, right? These are not useful answers.
The second thing that your brain wanting to be quick and efficient means to you, is if you have a set of negative thought patterns you tend to have on repeat, your brain’s going to go offer those up first. That’s kind of what I was just talking about. And it’s because it wants to expend as little energy as possible. So maybe the crappy question is, why am I always behind? And then your brain’s going to offer up something like, you’re always behind. There you go procrastinating again. You always do this.
So those two examples of why is this so hard? Why am I always behind? Those are crappy questions. They’re negatively framed questions and they are just going to never provide a useful solution to a problem. They’re only going to reinforce the belief that is present in the question that is holding you back.
Because I want you to notice with both of those questions, they’re not even really questions. They’re more like statements, disguised as questions that you’re just using to reinforce something you think is true. Why am I always behind, is really just you repeating to yourself, I am behind.
If you go back all the way to the beginning of the podcast with episode three, the title is Overwhelm is Optional if you want to refresh yourself or go back and listen for the first time. What I teach you is that sentences you think generate certain emotions that fuel actions or inactions and produce results. If you’re asking yourself, why are you always behind? You’re reinforcing the idea that you’re always behind. And then you probably feel something like anxiety or overwhelm. And we can all think of how we act when we’re feeling those emotions.
And typically then, we are not taking action to do anything, right? We get in that overwhelmed shutdown state. And then if you’re believing you’re always behind, you don’t really make any real effort to try and change because you’re like, well, this is just my reality. I can’t change this. And then you continue to be behind in whatever way it is that you’re describing. Or you continue to perpetuate that feeling of behind, even though you don’t even maybe know what you’re behind because maybe the deadlines hadn’t actually been set or it was an internal deadline that you set and you were never even really clear about what needed to be done by what date.
So you can see those types of questions just lead you down paths that you really don’t want to be going and using your time and energy with. So that’s what I’m going to call a crappy question.
So let’s contrast that crappy version to a high-quality question. And that’s really the skill that I want you to start to develop, is asking these high-quality questions. Let’s say we have a circumstance where you thought you’d be at a certain point in your presentation materials by Thursday, and it’s Wednesday night. You’re working late, and you are nowhere near where you need to be. You could ask yourself the crappy question, why am I always behind? And then judge yourself, make yourself feel bad and wallow in that circumstance.
Or you could start asking high-quality questions and get yourself on track to useful problem solving. High-quality questions you could be asking in that moment might sound like, what do I need to do to support myself getting this done? Or how could I set this timeline differently on the next project so I have more space? Or what else could I set aside for now to free up more space to work on this?
Hopefully you’re hearing how all of these questions have the opportunity to provide forward focused solution-oriented answers. Maybe you look at how you’re setting project timelines and realize it’s just not realistic to ask yourself to produce that much in a given timeframe. And you can change that in your process going forward.
Maybe you realize there’s a part of the presentation you could delegate, or you decide to shut off your email for a while so you can really focus and be more effective with the time you do have. A great way to support yourself by the way. Maybe you realize that something you’re telling yourself is urgent really isn’t urgent and could wait until after this deadline has passed. That’d give you more space to work on the task at hand.
Can you see how these high quality questions have opened up possibilities? And you reclaim your agency and the opportunity to make empowered decisions with these types of questions. And this looks so, so different and feels very different than throwing your hands up and saying, well, here I am again, can’t do anything about it.
And that is the power of learning to ask yourself high-quality questions. Asking yourself better questions will change the trajectory of your interior design business, I guarantee it, and help you grow as the leader of your company.
Hopefully at this point I have sold you on this idea of asking high-quality questions and working on developing that skill as one of the most important skills you can develop in your interior design business. Let’s talk now about how you develop that skill, because it really is a skill that you can develop and a muscle that you can strengthen as part of your own self-leadership and leadership of your business.
The very first thing, as always, is to create awareness around the type and quality of questions you’re asking. It always starts with awareness, doesn’t it? We have to know what we’re doing and how we’re doing it in order to make a change. So that’s the very first piece. Just notice what types of questions you’re asking. You can think about, am I asking myself a crappy question or a high-quality question?
Checking in with how you feel or the emotions that come up when you ask yourself a question is a great signal of which type it is. If there’s judgment, defeat, or blame, or one of those kind of unpleasant negative emotions simmering under the question, it’s probably a crappy question and will not be helpful. And that’s a great time to pause and reconsider how you could frame that question in a more positive, open, solutions mindset way.
You can choose then to proactively work on asking yourself high quality questions that are open-ended and curious. You can rephrase the question you just asked yourself to be a high-quality question when you notice that the answers that you’re receiving from your brain aren’t going to serve you.
And as a general guideline, high-quality questions often start with what, how, or could. There’s a softer tone to a high quality question that you’ll start to notice and be able to tune into. And the big thing here is that this is a skill. So you might not notice the quality of your questions until after the fact, and you’ve got kind of a bad answer to what you just asked yourself, or it’s going to feel really clunky to go, oh, shoot, that was a really crappy question I just asked myself. I’m going to switch to a high quality question.
That might feel clunky, and that’s okay. That’s normal. And it doesn’t mean you’re bad at this or won’t get it. Think about riding a bike. Just because you fell off the bike or needed a parent or somebody to hold onto the seat as you got going doesn’t mean that you are never going to ride a bike. Same thing with learning the skill of asking better questions.
One of the things that I do with my clients is I encourage them to answer a simple set of questions at the beginning and end of every week. And not only are their responses helpful to them for planning the week ahead and consistently taking action from the lessons that they’re learning as they progress, but the repetition begins to train their brain to actually think in high-quality questions. You start to train yourself to be solution oriented.
And the same is going to be true for you. The more you practice high-quality questions in your daily life, the more you will benefit from them. When you learn to ask yourself better questions, you’re opening yourself up to ideas and insights and solutions that are already inside of you. They are already there.
When you ask yourself open-ended curious questions, you’re better able to take in information that you learned from somebody else and synthesize it and apply it directly to your own business without having to force yourself to follow an exact blueprint that worked for somebody else. It’s a really flexible tool and it is so powerful.
And what I love, too, is you never know where a high-quality question will take you. It could unlock something even bigger and better and more supportive than you even thought to explore at the start of asking that question. I have a friend who was actually sharing something with me about her personal life that she wanted to start doing, but kept putting off.
And this was just like a casual friend conversation and she was saying she was going to do it, but she never did. You know that pattern? And I apparently asked her a question, I don’t even remember exactly what it was. But months later she said to me, do you remember when you asked me that? And I totally did not, of course, like I said.
But she said it totally created a shift and she started doing that thing she was telling herself she wanted to do, but couldn’t get herself to do. And then now was using that same shift that occurred from that one question in that one specific habit area to create new shifts in other areas of her life that would support her.
So sometimes you ask yourself a high quality question and you know exactly where you want to go with that and where it might take you. And sometimes the question is going to surprise and delight you and create a ripple effect that you could never have imagined. And that’s why questions are so powerful and why I want you to have the opportunity to be answering these types of questions and also learn how to ask these questions of yourself.
When you can learn to ask a high-quality question, you have your own inner mentor that goes with you everywhere. And the more you practice, the better you get and the more naturally you’re going to think this way. Which brings me to my very fun announcement, the summer series. I’m doing some jazz hands here with my microphone.
The summer series I have been planning for you, which by the way, came from a question I asked myself during some self-coaching. And that question was, what would be fun to offer this summer? What would I love to give you all as listeners, as a resource? And when I asked myself this, I had some ideas, but none of them were what I’m going to share.
Here’s the thing with questions, they can stick with you. So sometimes even as you get answers, then you don’t even go with those answers because the question is still percolating in the back of your mind. And you can allow them to really work for you in the background, which is exactly what happened here.
I was talking to a coach friend of mine about something completely different and then it came to me, an answer to this question that I posed weeks prior. And I wanted this summer to be about questions, I realized. And then I let that sit and I asked some more questions of what could it look like? What would be fun to deliver? How could I structure this in a way that feels really fresh? And how could I help my listeners actively engage with the content that I share on the podcast?
And that’s what I’m giving you. And that is CEO Summer School. It is a summer podcast series where we are going to be exploring the power of questions. Questions you can ask yourself with solutions and ideas and frameworks that are going to be able to be applied directly to your business. To join me in CEO Summer School, you don’t have to do anything different to be a part of this series.
The episodes are going to be released under the same show, The Interior Design Business CEO podcast. The only thing you might wanna do differently is that if you aren’t already subscribed to the show, you’re going to want to do that so you don’t miss the episodes and you can follow along. What I want to be super clear about though is that CEO Summer School is going to be way more fun and way more inspiring than doing remedial algebra in actual summer school.
This is actually much less about studying and trying to learn concepts, and more about internal reflection and exploration. I’m going to be guiding you through a series of questions that are going to build upon each other so that while you’re out enjoying summer, enjoying your life, and of course, still getting down to business, you’re letting your brain do some work in preparing you for the fall and the rest of 2024.
This is where the interactive element to the CEO Summer School series is coming into play. I’m going to share more on that next week when I fully introduce what we’re doing and how we’re doing it. There will be a link that you’re going to want to watch for for this interactive part of the series. And that’s going to be a reflection guide that goes with each summer school episode with a few additional points and questions to expand on what I share in the episode so that you can create, essentially, your own little textbook of answers that you’ll use throughout the summer and can use then as you dive into fall.
You’re going to be taking what I share on the podcast as the question that I pose and taking it even deeper and applying it directly to you. It’s going to be like getting coached by me while also developing your own skill set of asking better questions, but it’ll be on your own time and available whenever you need it.
Of course, I would love for you to tell your friends about CEO Summer School. Invite them to come with you and have someone to discuss these questions with and open up new conversations and create even more value through what I’m going to be sharing.
This week, I want you to start paying attention to the types of questions you ask yourself and also the types of answers your brain gives you. How are you feeling when you ask the question to yourself and when you receive the answers? Feeling bad and dejected? Then you’re probably asking yourself a crappy question.
And I want you to practice this skill of asking questions that are expansive, that help you feel lighter and more open. That’s when you’re going to be on the right path with a high quality question. That’s what you’re leaning into this week and we’re going to take this even farther as we dive into CEO Summer School.
Definitely tune in next week where I’m going to be sharing more details on how this is going to work and how you can participate in the interactive element to school.
And then one final announcement here before we sign off, I now have the waitlist available for you if you’re interested in working together one-on-one. As part of my summer slowdown, I won’t be taking on any new private one-on-one clients for the time being, but if you want to be the first one to know when those spots open up, definitely check out the link in the show notes so you can add your name and tell me a little bit about you, your goals and your business and submit that quick form. So that way you get first dibs when spots for private coaching become available.
That is what I have for you, and until then I’m wishing you a beautiful week full of beautiful questions. I’ll talk to you in the next episode.
Have you ever wished I could be your coach? If so, keep listening. For a limited time when you leave a rating and review for the podcast you’ll be entered to win a one on one coaching session with me. I can answer your questions and coach you on your unique challenges.
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Thanks for joining me for this week’s episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit www.desicreswell.com. And if you’re ready to take what you’ve learned on the podcast to the next level, I would love for you to check out my signature group coaching program, Out of Overwhelm.
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