Summary

Aldric Chen, a 1-Man consultant, shares his strategy for regaining control of client meetings by asking three types of questions: informative, involvement, and strategic.

Abstract

Aldric Chen expresses his disdain for unproductive meetings and outlines the necessity for consultants to manage client discussions effectively. He identifies three common reasons client meetings derail: unclear expectations, lack of purpose communication, and absence of mutual alignment. To counteract this, Chen advocates for asking informative questions to clarify meeting objectives, involvement questions to ascertain one's role and necessity in the discussion, and strategic questions to focus on future actions and outcomes. He emphasizes that these questions are crucial for consultants to ensure meetings are purposeful, productive, and result-oriented.

Opinions

The author believes that client discussions often become uncontrolled and waste time, which is a common issue for consultants.
Chen suggests that consultants should not shy away from asking obvious questions as they can help in establishing clarity and purpose in meetings.
He points out that many attendees in meetings may be there for opportunistic reasons, such as clearing emails or using social media, rather than contributing to the discussion.
The author emphasizes the importance of consultants' involvement being relevant and impactful, rather than attending meetings where their input is not required.
Chen advises that strategic questions should be straightforward yet focused on guiding the meeting towards future goals and the completion of consulting engagements.
He concludes that by employing these three types of questions, consultants can steer meetings towards more productive outcomes and ensure they are compensated for their valuable contributions.

3 Types of Questions I Ask to Bring Out-of-Control Client Discussions Back to Earth

Before more time gets flushed down the drain

Photo by The Jopwell Collection on Unsplash

I hate meetings. Really.

There is a high chance that client discussions will spin out of control. When that happens, time gets wasted, and energy is sapped for no reason.

Common?

You bet.

Yet, 1-Man consultants cannot avoid meetings. It is part of our job. Therefore, we must learn to deal with client discussions better.

I prefer to take control of client meetings.

These are the 3 types of questions I ask during client meetings for clarity.

Informative questions
Involvement questions
Strategic questions

Let me explain why and how it works.

Before that — Let me explain how client discussions fall apart. Typically.

How Consulting Client Discussions Fall Apart

It applies to freelancers, side-hustlers, content creators, and everyone who runs a 1-man business after work.

Meetings flop for the following reasons.

Expectations are not established beforehand
The purpose of the meeting is not communicated
Absence of mutual alignment

These are straightforward reasons. The funny thing is we learned nothing from it. They appear and reappear many times on the same day.

You can feel it.

I can.

In fact, I can smell the failure of one meeting after sitting in the room for 5 minutes. The 3 points listed above manifest themselves in the following observations.

No agenda details in the meeting invitation
No structure in the flow of conversation by the chair
No explanation why people must be in the session at the start of the session
No specific & directed questions were asked regarding the purpose of the meeting
No visible expected endpoint at sight

I get trapped in such meetings a lot. And so, I act.

This is how I bring control back into the client meetings.

1. I Ask Informative Type Questions

I have a simple approach as a 1-Man consultant.

When in doubt — Ask.

Of course, the questions must be relevant to the situation.

Let us assume that you decided to attend a client meeting at their office. Or via Zoom. You appear on time, and people are starting to stream in.

The chair appears. The meeting begins.

Random conversations dominate. Every participant says something irrelevant to the consulting engagement.

There are no clear goals in sight.

I will raise my hand and ask these questions.

“What is this meeting about?”
“How many discussion points do we have to close in X minutes?”
“What should we expect by the end of this session?”

I know you are rolling your eyes, thinking how obvious this sounds. However, being obvious does not always translate into actions.

Plus. Many folks are opportunists. They use that time for other purposes.

Some people use this time to submit urgent assignments. Others clear email. A few start scrolling Instagram.

I prefer to inject clarity.

Because instilling clarity in purpose accelerates discussion closure.

2. I Ask Involvement Type Questions

“Why am I here?”

One consulting client mocked me when I asked that seemingly silly question.

“What do you mean why you are here? You are the consultant of our engagement. That’s why you are here.”

I kept my poker face on.

“I know. My question is, what am I here for? What do you need my involvement for?”

My client went silent.

I did not excuse myself from that session. I thought there were genuine involvement needs from my end. Maybe I was supposed to chip in and contribute my thoughts.

Bad idea.

None of the questions were directed at me.

All the random discussion points were company internal — Which means there is nothing I can contribute to.

45 minutes evaporated in the blink of my eye. Learn from my mistake. Next time, ask.

“Why am I here?”

3. I Ask Strategic Type Questions

Such questions appear during the middle of client meetings.

The reason is simple. We know the discussion is going nowhere.

I used to attend meetings with one consulting client where they spent 100% of their time lamenting about their work. No kidding. Everyone was hogging the airtime to compete for the most miserable person in the company.

It ate into my spirit.

So, I raised my hand to hijack the session. I ask these questions.

“Kelly informed me that she resigned. How are we distributing her tasks?”
“What are the issues we facing today? Which ones must be resolved by tomorrow?”
“The deliverable due next week is at 40% completion. How confident are we to finish in time?”

Strategic questions need not be highfalutin.

They are questions that direct us to the future.

Being future-oriented has one benefit. It directs our effort, time, and energy toward achieving the objectives of the consulting engagement.

We get paid on time.

And.

We can end the long-drawn client meeting with actionable takeaways and results.

Parting Keynotes

Client meetings will spin out of control.

That is if we allow them to.

We need techniques to control client meetings and bring them back to relevance when spinoffs occur. Setting clear agenda points is endorsed by many 1-Man consultants.

I choose to ask these 3 types of questions.

Informative questions
Involvement questions
Strategic questions

Here’s why.

I cannot determine the quality of the meeting session before it happens. And many meetings are set up by my clients for my attendance. As such, I must attend.

I am paid, remember?

Therefore, I choose techniques to help steer client meetings to a purposeful and productive outcome.

At least I know I get something done.

About the Author:

As a content contributor, I write my observations from daily life and my business exposure. Because our life experience is the bedrock of our unique perspectives.

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