Ask - by Jeff Wetzler (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Too often, we don't find out what others think because we don't know how to ask the right questions in the right ways. Co-founder of Transcend and former Teach for America executive Jeff Wetzler wants to show you how to fix that. In Ask, he brings you a conversation guide based on a simple premise: that learning how to ask other people what they truly think, know, and feeling is game-changing. Wetzler reveals Five Practices, each answering an essential questions: 1. Choose Curiosity: How can we increase our authentic interest in learning from others around us? 2. Make it Safe: How can we make it comfortable, easy, and appealing for others to share with us? 3. Pose Quality Questions: How can we ask questions that best tap into the experiences, perspectives, and wisdom in those around us? 4. Listen to Learn: How can we maximize the chances we'll hear what others have to say? 5. Reflect & Return: How can we process what we've heard in ways that create actionable insights and encourage ongoing learning? The skills and messages of Ask could not be timelier. Whether the setting is in large corporation, a nonprofit, a school district, or a small business, people inside organizations need help learning to communicate and extract information in a more productive way"--

Book Synopsis

Globally recognized expert on learning and leadership, Jeff Wetzler offers a hands-on, surprisingly effective way to find out what others really think, know, and feel, leading to smarter decisions, more creative solutions, and deeper relationships.

"Invaluable ... required reading." --Kim Scott, author of Radical Candor and Radical Respect

Too often, we don't find out what's truly on others' hearts and minds because we don't know how to ask the right questions in the right ways. Co-founder of Transcend and former international business consultant and Teach for America executive Jeff Wetzler wants to show you how to fix that. In Ask, he brings you a powerful method called The Ask Approach(TM), based on a simple premise: that tapping into what other people truly think, know, and feel is a game-changing superpower.

Wetzler reveals the most common things that people think and feel but often keep to themselves, as well as the key reasons why they choose to withhold information that could be valuable to you and your organization. He delves into the five steps of the Ask Approach, each answering an essential question:
1. Choose Curiosity: How can you awaken your curiosity to make new discoveries and unexpected connections?
2. Make it Safe: How do you make it easier for people to tell you hard things?
3. Pose Quality Questions: What questions will best tap into the wisdom of anyone you ask?
4. Listen to Learn: How can you hear what someone is really trying to tell you?
5. Reflect & Reconnect: How do you turn talk into action?

Ask helps you make asking an everyday superpower--not only for yourself but also for your team and organization, as well as for the next generation and society at large. In a fast-changing world where AI is supplanting an increasing range of skills, the ability to learn from and connect with other people is one of the most important, fulfilling and uniquely human capabilities to master.

"Readable, compassionate, intelligent, and useful." --Amy Edmondson, Harvard Business School Professor & author of The Fearless Organization & Right Kind of Wrong

Review Quotes

"In Ask, Jeff Wetzler goes deep on the first step in the Radical Candor order of operations: solicit candor. The book provides an invaluable, highly actionable method for drawing out the real thoughts, feelings, and experiences of those around you. If you want to build relationships and organizations rooted in honesty and openness -- improving learning, innovation, and results in the process -- this book is required reading. Ask gets to the heart of what it takes to invite the full humanity of those around you."--Kim Scott, author of Radical Candor and Radical Respect.

"Ask is a great primer for leaders to improve the quality of their conversations with their teams and support deeper learning and relationships. Through compelling stories, it vividly exemplifies key concepts while equipping you with practical, hands-on tools to enhance your collaborative efforts with colleagues."

--Susana Córdova, Commissioner of Education, State of Colorado

"At the root of all transformative change is our ability to bring curiosity, questions and deep listening to connect with one another - especially with those different from us. In Ask, Jeff Wetzler breaks down this deceptively difficult task into incredibly practical steps, opening up new possibilities for leadership, love, and liberation."

--Thaly Germain, CEO of Onward and Managing Director of Transformation and Culture at Berlin Rosen

"Curiosity leads to conversations, and conversations unlock the understanding we need to find and reach our mutual goals. We can all learn to do this better, and Jeff's book is a great place to begin."

--Seth Godin, bestselling author, This is Marketing

"Effective 21st century leadership is all about collaboration and connection. In Ask, Jeff Wetzler offers a concrete, actionable framework for making the critical shift from "me" to "we" that our time demands. This is a call to action for all of us - from corporate CEOs to social entrepreneurs to world leaders - to tap into our true collective potential."

--Jeffrey C. Walker, , former Vice Chair of JPMorgan Chase & Co.,& co-author of The Generosity Network

"From a young age, I learned the wonders of asking one good question after another. And when we pose good questions to others around us, we open whole worlds of discovery and authentic connection. ASK provides an astonishingly practical yet profound method for cultivating this kind of curiosity, listening, and reflection that is deeply needed in today's organizations and communities."

--Rhonda Broussard, CEO of Beloved Community and Author of One Good Question

"From research to relationships, no tool is more powerful than a good question - and yet so few of us are ever taught how to design or pose one. Ask demystifies this process, offering a deeply-researched and widely-applicable approach to getting to the heart of what other people really know, believe, and feel. The tools and methods in book will transform the way we learn from and with one another."

--Shereen El Mallah, Assistant Professor, University of Virginia

"In a toxically divided world, getting and staying curious about each other -- especially when we're so different -- is an act of courage and defiance. Jeff Wetzler gives us a step-by-step method for building the skills we need to actually hear each other. Ask offers a well researched and widely applicable approach for turning our assumptions into questions that unlock the world around us. I'm keeping it close by as a reference, and so should you."

--Mónica Guzmán, Senior Fellow for Public Practice at Braver Angels and podcast host of A Braver Way with Mónica Guzmán

"In an increasingly global and multipolar world, Ask is an essential book. It places curiosity, inquiry, and close listening at the heart of effective leadership. I would encourage every leader, aspiring leader, and change-maker to read this book as it might just bring us one step closer to addressing some of humanity's most pressing problems."

--Asheesh Advani, President & CEO, Junior Achievement (JA) Worldwide

"In an incurious world where everyone wants to talk but no one wants to listen, Jeff Wetzler's book Ask is a breath of fresh air. He compellingly and eloquently underscores the urgent need given our global crisis of connection to focus on learning about the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of others by asking them questions rather than just sharing our own. He also provides concrete steps using our natural capacity for curiosity, including the interpersonal type which has been empirically proven to be essential for genuine human connection. His book offers us, in other words, a concrete solution to our crisis that is leading to our soaring rates of loneliness, suicide and mass violence. Read it now!"

--Niobe Way, Professor of Developmental Psychology at NYU, Past President of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Author of Deep Secrets: Boys' Friendships and the Crisis of Connection, and the author of the upcoming Rebels with a Cause: Reimagining Boys, Ourselves, and Our Culture.

"Jeff Wetzler's breakthrough book, Ask, unlocks the key to building authentic relationships by asking deeply personal and intimate questions. Jeff's unique framework, illustrated through moving stories, shows us how to move from judgment to authenticity in our relationships, and lights the way to our personal growth."

--Bill George, Former Chair and CEO of Medtronic, Executive Fellow at Harvard Business School, and bestselling author of True North

"Listening is the new "superpower". Never has it been more important - or more challenging - for leaders to access key information and perspectives from those around them. In this fascinating, engaging, and insightful book, Jeff Wetzler draws from science and practice to offer a much needed solution to this pervasive challenge. In these highly uncertain times, Ask provides an essential compass for leaders and organizations alike."

--Benjamin Finzi, Managing Director and Global CEO Program Leader, Deloitte

"Now more than ever, we must overcome the barriers so many face to realizing their full potential. Our future depends on our collective ability to bring forth the best talent, the brightest ideas, and the most innovative solutions. Ask teaches leaders how to tap into the diversity of perspectives, experiences, and ideas that organizations need to thrive in the twenty-first century and beyond."

--John Rice, CEO and Founder of Management Leadership for Tomorrow

"There is a growing movement afoot in today's world and it is being led by the questioners--the people who have figured out that the best way for us to live, learn, grow, and connect with one another is to lead with curiosity and thoughtful, beautiful questions. Jeff Wetzler's invaluable book shows you how to embrace this way of being and interacting. A must-read for any aspiring "questionologist" (which should be all of us)."

--Warren Berger, best-selling author of A More Beautiful Question

"This book offers you the wisdom of nearly 30 years of practice in the field of how to utilize the Ask Approach to tap into the hidden power of the relationships around you. We know that well constructed questions, asked in proper environments can benefit you and your team greatly. But Jeff Wetzler goes well beyond that. In Ask, Jeff provides systematic models and exercises for how to utilize that skill into action, thereby changing the way you lead, and dare I say, live."

--Topaz Adizes, Emmy Award winning director, founder of The Skin Deep and Author of 12 Questions for Love

"As a journalist, I know that few tools are more powerful than good questions. This authentic, deeply-researched, and wildly entertaining book doesn't just make the case for why asking matters, but how to do it well. At a time when we can't seem to agree on the color of the sky, the skills of asking and listening deeply are more critical than ever. The world is in dire need of this book right now."--Jenny Anderson, Author, former New York Times journalist, and contributing columnist at TIME

"Ask offers both a practical how-to guide and a compelling why-to narrative on the art of inquiry as a tool for team building and collaborative learning. Using stories, studies, data, and heaps of humility, Wetzler makes the case that curiosity is both the bridge to understanding our time's complex problems and the missing skill we need to connect to one another across the divisions and distrust that too often stand in the way of true learning and partnership."--Debby Irving, author of Waking Up White, and Finding Myself in the Story of Race

"Asking and listening are at the heart of what it means to be a human being in relationship with others. In Ask, Jeff Wetzler presents a practical framework for uncovering the wisdom inside in the hearts and minds of those around you. The tools in this book offer an antidote to our age of disconnection, taking seriously the potential for creativity, collaboration, and courage within us and between us. Here's a book that points the way to a larger life"--Parker J. Palmer, Author of Let Your Life Speak, Healing the Heart of Democracy, and On the Brink of Everything

"Curiosity leads to conversations, and conversations unlock the understanding we need to find and reach our mutual goals. We can all learn to do this better, and Jeff's book is a great place to begin."--Author, This is Marketing, Seth Godin

"I am delighted to provide a few opening thoughts for this remarkable new book about the challenge of learning what we most need to know from the people around us....In this readable, compassionate, intelligent and useful book, Jeff Wetzler teaches us how to do just that... And learning how to ask others what they truly think, know, and feel has never been more important." [Excerpted from Foreword]--Amy Edmondson, Harvard Business School Professor & author of The Fearless Organization & Right Kind of Wrong

"In Ask, Jeff Wetzler demystifies the art and science of asking the right questions to move beyond perfunctory responses. The tools offered in this book, which Jeff models better than anyone I know, provide a practical roadmap to a more productive, collaborative and effective approach to both personal and professional interactions."--Irene Rosenfeld, Former Chair and CEO of Kraft Foods and Mondelez International

"Jeff has worked alongside some of the foremost experts on group dynamics, including Chris Argyris, David Kantor, and Diana Smith. He has not only applied the insights he gained from these thought leaders in his own leadership across multiple organizations but also integrated them to develop his own distinctive point of view. This book does a masterful job of bridging theory and practice, offering invaluable guidance to any leader who seeks to build a culture of curiosity, creativity, and continuous learning. "--Sameer B Srivastava, Professor of Business Administration and Public Policy Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley

"Jeff Wetzler teaches a profoundly useful truth: questions can be better than answers. Even more, he has deep practical insight about how to ask great questions, both as an art form and a systematic discipline. If people everywhere increased their questions to statements ratio, replacing self-certainty with genuine curiosity, the world would be a better place - and I hope Jeff's book inspires people to do exactly that."--Jim Collins, bestselling author Good to Great

"Most people see value in sharpening their listening skills, but few know where to start. This book is an actionable guide to improving at inquiry--and to learning more and bonding more with the people around you."--Adam Grant, #1 New York Times bestselling author of HIDDEN POTENTIAL and THINK AGAIN, and host of the podcast Re: Thinking

"Moving, inspiring, thoroughly researched, and deeply practical, this book shows that we all have the power to change the world, simply by cultivating our own and others' curiosity and nurturing the learning and connection it creates. An engaging must-read for leaders, teammates, parents, educators, and even students -- everyone!"--Bruce Patton, Coauthor of mega-bestsellers Getting to YES and Difficult Conversations, and Cofounder of the Harvard Negotiation Project and the Rebuild Congress Initiative

"The greatest resource for anyone passionate about making a big impact is the wisdom of the people around us - from those closest to the issues being addressed to our team members, partners, and investors. Ask is an inviting and easy guide for unlocking this wisdom and elevating the voices we most need to hear. This book is essential reading for anyone looking to make positive change in the world."--Wendy Kopp, Founder of Teach For America & CEO of Teach For All

About the Author

Jeff Wetzler has been on a quarter-century quest to transform learning opportunities and unlock human potential. Blending a unique set of leadership experiences in the fields of business and education, he's pursued this quest as a management consultant to the world's top corporations, as a learning facilitator for leaders around the world, as Chief Learning Officer at Teach For America, and currently, as co-CEO of Transcend, a nationally recognized innovation organization. Jeff earned a Doctorate in Adult Learning and Leadership from Columbia University and a Bachelor's in Psychology from Brown University. He is a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network and is an Edmund Hillary Fellow. Jeff lives in New York with his wife, two children, and their puppy.