Marilee Adams: Change Your Questions, Change Your Life. 4th edition review

Agnieszka Kucza
Jan 9, 2024
7 min read

Updated: Nov 3

Book review "Change your questions. Change your life." by Marilee Adams

Today, I present a review of another book worth reading at least once in your life. This time, it will be an international bestseller, featuring a foreword by Marshall Goldsmith, recognized as one of the world's top executive coaches.

"Change Your Questions Change Your Life: 12 Powerful Tools for Leadership, Coaching, and Life" by Marilee Adams

I refer to the 4th edition of this book. The first two held the subtitle "10 Powerful Tools for Life and Work."

1. What is this book about?

Every day we ask ourselves questions such as What should I wear? What should I do with my life? The type of questions we ask may impact our attitude toward ourselves, our relationships with people, and our careers. Asking better questions can lead to significant breakthroughs in our personal and professional lives. By changing the questions we ask, we can foster personal growth and achieve great results.

This book is written in the form of a business novel. Drawing on the decades of research and experience as a coach, Marilee Adams uses a highly engaging fable. She demonstrates how to recognize undermining questions that appear in our heads and come out of our mouths.

She instructs how to transform these questions using a powerful Question Thinking Methodology to obtain the right, surprisingly positive results. The author emphasizes the importance of inquiring with the intention of driving success for both individuals and organizations. She proves that great results begin with great questions.

The author describes the adventures of manager Ben. He was frustrated and determined to leave the company. He was also a husband hiding his professional failures from his wife. Being at the crossroads of his life, he finally understood the system.

Thanks to his boss, Ben finds a trainer who, step by step, explains how the system works. Using the concept of Question Thinking, the young manager learns to listen to people, starts asking empowering questions, and eventually gets promoted to a new leadership position. He becomes a charismatic leader and improves his relationship with his wife.

The third edition of this international bestseller contains even more than the previous two, with a new introduction and epilogue. At the end of the book, we get 12 simple yet powerful tools that make the material even more accessible and practical. This book enhances coaching and leadership skills, changes our approach to problems, and triggers a new way of thinking and understanding of cooperation and communication. The methods described apply to all areas of our lives.

2. Who is this book primarily for?

My first answer is: for everyone.

Marilee Adams shows how the kinds of questions we ask shape our thinking and can be the root cause of many personal and organizational problems. If you want good relationships with yourself and the people around you, start achieving success, develop your business, learn to think in solution terms, read the book, and ask the right questions.

I recommend this book to coaches, mentors, psychologists, leaders, managers, and entrepreneurs. This book will be an inspiring proposal for those who work with people daily, as well as those who want to work on relationships, both personally and professionally.

If you are a leader, Question Thinking will help you broaden your perspective and motivate employees to take action. Reach for this book if self-development and improving communication with others are important to you.

3. What are the main advantages of this book?

The style in which it is written is the main advantage of this book. This is not a typical guide. It is a guide in the form of a business story, with characters and a plot in the background. It has a light style and is easy to read. At the same time, it invites reflection, inspires, raises important issues, and stimulates a change of attitude. The text contains thoughts and reflections highlighted in the frames. That allows you to stop and take a moment to reflect. At the end of the book, some tools can be used for further work.

4. The reviewer's opinion of the book "Change Your Questions Change Your Life."

Above all, the book increased my mindfulness. I realized the importance of the questions we are constantly asking ourselves. Questions influence the way we act, the results we achieve, and our relationships. By changing the types of questions we ask ourselves and others, we can change our lives and improve our relationships.

“Change starts with who wants change.”

We may not control what happens, but we decide how we respond. A useful tool here is the Choice Map. I printed it right after reading the book and placed it in a visible place. The Choice Map can be downloaded from Authentic Talent. It's worth having it on hand. It allows you to reflect and work on yourself. Using the Choice Map, the author visualizes two approaches, with two paths - the Learner and the Judger. By following the first path, you choose, you act actively, and you have a chance to use your and others' potential; in the Judge's path, you are merely reacting to what has already happened.

In the book, you can find many examples of both categories of questions, which help us understand what path we are on at a given moment and what question patterns we use daily. The Judge looks for the guilty, shares opinions, and thinks he knows the solution. The Learner is curious and looks for new opportunities. He wants to hear other perspectives and does not judge.

Judger mindset. Sample Judger's questions:

What's wrong with me?
What's wrong with her/him?
Whose fault is it?
How can I prove I'm right?
Why are they so stupid?

Learner mindset. Sample Learner's questions:

What do I value about myself?
What do I value about him/her?
Am I a responsible person?
What can I learn?
What do they think, and feel, what do they want?

I took with me questions from Ben, the main character of the book:

What assumptions am I making?
How else can I think about it?
What does the other person think, feel, and want?

I also remembered to be understanding and kind to myself:

"Accept the attitude of a judge, but strongly practice the attitude of a learner."

Nobody is perfect. Sometimes, each of us judges and tries to prove ourselves right. Everyone has a Judger inside them, and you have to accept it. The key here is mindfulness and self-observation. If we see that we have entered the Judger's path, we can react and consciously choose what we want to do about it. How do we recognize when we are on the Judger's path? It's best to pause for a few minutes and observe yourself. The book contains many exercises.

The book opened a new perspective for one of my clients with whom I worked in the mentoring process. It was an interesting discovery for her and helped her in the business reality.

5. Evaluation of the book on a scale of 1-10. How to ask the right questions?

I rate the book 9. The book is easy and quick to read. Inspires and stimulates positive change. Contains numerous practical tips and tools that can be used immediately. It is an invitation to a transformative journey. We can see how switching from Judger questions to Learner questions can be life-changing, and we receive powerful new tools of Question Thinking.

This is a great book. Explains what role questions play in our lives and how they open us to learning.

For me, the greatest discovery is the Choice Map, which can be downloaded from the website, printed, and placed in a visible place. With reference to the rating, I subtract one point for the slightly American style.

6. A few words about Marilee Adams, the author of the book.

Dr. Marilee Adams is an author, executive coach, advisory and training group director, public speaker, and business consultant, founder of the Inquiry Institute, and the originator of the Question Thinking method.

She is an affiliate instructor for Weatherhead's Executive Education Program at Case Western Reserve University and a former Adjunct Professor in the American University's School of Public Affairs (running Key Executive Leadership Program). She is a member of the Core Faculty in Leadership Coaching, cosponsored by Adler International Learning and the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto, and an ACC (Accredited Coach Coach) with the International Coach Federation.

Dr. Adams is a pioneer in the fields of inquiry-based coaching and is renowned for her groundbreaking works on Question Thinking tools and inquiring leadership. She gives lectures and seminars on the tool she developed, mostly the Choice Map.

Dr. Adams has written two other books: "The Art of Asking Questions: Teaching that Changes Lives: 12 Mindset Tools for Igniting the Love of Learning" (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2013) and "The Art of the Question: A Guide to Short-Term Question-Centered Therapy" (John Wiley & Sons, 1998).

She co-authored, with Dr. David Cooperrider and Dr. Marge Schiller, “With Our Questions We Make the World” in "Advances in Appreciative Inquiry - Constructive Discourse and Human Organization". Her book chapters include “The Practical Primacy of Questions in Action Learning” in Action Learning and Its Applications, Present and Future (2010).

The first edition of the book reviewed here was published in the United States in 2004 and on the Polish publishing market in 2007.