The CopDoc Podcast: Aiming for Excellence in Leadership
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The CopDoc Podcast delves into police leadership and innovation. The focus is on aiming for excellence in the delivery of police services across the globe.
Dr. Steve Morreale is a retired law enforcement practitioner, a pracademic, turned academic, and scholar from Worcester State University. Steve is the Program Director for LIFTE, Command College - The Leadership Institute for Tomorrow's Executives at Liberty University.
Steve shares ideas and talks with thought leaders in policing, academia, community leaders, and other related government agencies. You'll find Interviews with thought leaders drive the discussion to improve police services and community relationships.
Happy to report that The CopDoc Podcast is listed as #4 in the 10 Best Worcester Podcasts!
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The CopDoc Podcast: Aiming for Excellence in Leadership
Dr. Mike Marquardt: The Power of Questions: How Great Leaders Ask Instead of Tell
The CopDoc Podcast - Season 8 - Episode 155
What if the most powerful leadership tool isn't having all the answers, but asking the right questions? Dr. Michael Marquardt, after studying leaders across 50 countries for over five decades, discovered a surprising pattern—the greatest leaders in every field share one fundamental skill: they ask exceptional questions.
In this thought-provoking conversation with Dr. Steve Morreale, Marquardt challenges traditional notions of leadership, particularly in policing where command-and-control approaches have dominated. Drawing from his extensive research and bestselling book "Leading with Questions," he explains how the simple act of inquiry can transform leadership effectiveness and organizational culture.
For police leaders, the implications are profound. While officers excel at tactical questioning during investigations, leadership requires a different approach—one that uses open-ended questions to unlock creativity, build trust, and develop problem-solving capabilities throughout the organization. When leaders ask "What are you seeing?" or "How can we improve?" rather than issuing directives, they tap into collective intelligence and foster genuine engagement.
Marquardt introduces the concept of "action learning"—reflecting on experiences to continuously improve—and explains how questioning creates learning organizations that adapt and thrive amid complexity. He offers practical strategies for leaders to shift their approach, acknowledging that great questions often don't yield immediate answers but trigger deeper thinking that leads to breakthrough insights.
The conversation reveals how questioning is actually hardwired into human development—babies learn to walk and talk by asking subconscious questions—yet this natural learning approach gets suppressed in traditional organizations. By reclaiming the power of questions, leaders create psychologically safe environments where innovation flourishes and everyone contributes their best thinking.
Whether you're a police executive, front-line supervisor, or aspiring leader in any field, this episode provides a masterclass in how to lead more effectively by embracing curiosity and inquiry. Learn how to ask better questions, create reflective practices, and build a culture where continuous improvement becomes the norm.
Contact us: copdoc.podcast@gmail.com
Website: www.copdocpodcast.com
If you'd like to arrange for facilitated training, or consulting, or talk about steps you might take to improve your leadership and help in your quest for promotion, contact Steve at stephen.morreale@gmail.com
Welcome to The CopDoc Podcast. This podcast welcomes guests from policing academia and other government agencies. And now please join Dr Steve Morreale and industry thought leaders as they share their insights and experience on The CopDoc Podcast.
Steve Morreale:Well, hello everybody. This is Steve Morreale, coming to you from Boston, Massachusetts, today, and we're going to Reston, Virginia, to talk to a colleague, Dr. Michael Marquardt. He is an author, a former professor, a pracademic, I would say, like myself, and we're going to be talking about leading with questions in the learning, organization and action, learning and all those kinds of things and how that might apply to policing, especially as you try to lead an organization.
Steve Morreale:So, first of all, I'm thrilled to have you, a thought leader yourself, mike. Good morning, good morning, I'm delighted to be with you. Thanks so much. I do appreciate it. I have been following your work and I have been using doing training from your work leading with questions to try to suggest to police leaders and even sergeants at that level don't answer people's questions, ask them questions, you questions. Ask them questions, let them think, draw out their creativity, draw out their critical thinking, make them find the answer or maybe coach them to the answer, but help them and certainly asking people at all levels what's going on, so that a leader can not be an ivory tower but understand what's going on at the worker level. So I'd love you to talk about your history in business and, of course, your history in academia and the writing that you've done, mike.
Mike Marquardt:Okay.
Mike Marquardt:Yes, I've been in the field now for over 50 years. For my first 30 years in corporate work business work, government work I worked in close to 50 countries around the world in areas of leadership development, organizational change, team building, and then, when I reached the age of 50, I became a professor at George Washington University. I became a professor at George Washington University and we had an executive doctoral program in which we trained executives from around the world. We took 25 students every year. They came for weekends for two years and then worked on dissertation. Over my 25 years as a professor, I chaired 117 doctoral dissertations. One of them was a police chief in New Jersey. Really, he did a great research on different personality types and how they lead in the police force and I still stay in touch with him. He's become an academic as well, teaching at a university in New Jersey.
Mike Marquardt:So all my life I've been involved in leadership development, trying to develop leaders, and an insight I gained, and we had a center at George Washington University, a center for organizational leadership and learning. And, being a new professor, I had to identify a. And, being a new professor, I had to identify a research agenda that would put me in the field where I would start writing in academic journals and books and so forth. And the area I chose was leadership and at the great leaders from around the world and what made them great leaders. And I also look at what made great leaders in the political sphere. I looked at a number of articles, journals, books, what made leaders in the spiritual realm in every field, leaders in the spiritual realm in every field.
Mike Marquardt:And my research led me to the conclusion that all the great leaders, no matter what field they were in, they asked great questions. When you asked who's a great leader in your organization, they would say, well, you know, bob in this department or the CEO is a great leader. And I would ask what made them a great leader? And they said they ask questions. Sometimes I had to probe a little bit and say, well, I just like being around him, I like to follow him, he gives me inspiration. And I said, well, what causes inspiration? What causes you to want to follow him or to, you know, go battle for him and with him, and so forth. And it always led to the fact that they ask great questions. And so my conclusion was that all great leaders ask great questions. But the parallel of that is that if you ask great questions, you will become a great leader, and so the better your questions are, the better leadership you would have.
Mike Marquardt:And so in this book, in earlier writings, I asked people what were some of the questions they asked. What were questions that inspired you, that motivated you, that caused you to be creative, and so forth. And so in this particular book, you see a lot of stories forth. And so in this particular book, you see a lot of stories, examples of leaders and the actual questions they asked and the purpose.
Mike Marquardt:And then I went to the leaders themselves. I said you know, you've been identified as a great leader, and one of the reasons you've been asked, you've identified as a great leader, is that you ask questions. And sometimes they weren't so conscious of it. They said, well, I just like to ask questions, or I feel better asking questions. And so then I asked them well, what are the reasons you ask questions? When do you ask questions? Why do you ask questions? And so, as the book goes in depth, it says there's a number of reasons that people, leaders, ask questions. But it's a paradigm shift. First, they have to realize that in the past they felt they had to lead through statements that their models for leadership made statements, that if you didn't make statements, you were not a leader, you're not seen as being powerful or competent.
Steve Morreale:Well, so let me interrupt you because that's interesting to me, because it seems to me and we're talking to Mike Marquardt, who is a retired professor and the author of several books but it seems to me that when you're asking questions, you're becoming curious and you're being probative and you're trying to learn yourself. Also would guess that you found that most of the leaders that you interviewed saw themselves as lifelong learners, that they didn't know everything, that the leader doesn't have to have all of the answers, and I think that's the mistake. We were raised with autocratic leaders in a lot of ways, and they dictated what you were going to do and then go follow them. And this is a change, that paradigm shift, would you say.
Mike Marquardt:Yeah, it's a change, although these were leaders from 2000 years ago. You know practice, the act of questions. Whether it be any religious leader Jesus, muhammad or whatever, or a political leader they had that insight. You know they weren't academics. They had the insight that by asking questions they gained not only a lot of valuable information, but they developed good rapport, they developed the people around them. They got a lot, you know. It made life more enjoyable for themselves and so forth.
Mike Marquardt:Not many people chose that form of leadership over the years. Now, in the last maybe 20 years, I think it's become the motto that leaders realize that they do not have all the answers. Part of the environment has changed. You know, 50 years ago you maybe could be knowledgeable enough that you could direct your staff and organization with your knowledge alone, but now it's impossible. The world is so complex, change is so fast that even a fairly incompetent leader would realize I don't have all the answers. I've got to get more information, but I only have to get much more information.
Mike Marquardt:To be a leader, I have to get my people leading with me. I cannot do it by myself. I have to give them the skills and them the motivation and encouragement to lead and help lead and take responsibility. These citizens can't wait for a day or week or a month to move up to me. They have to be made on the spot if we're going to compete in any kind of environment or provide the services that our citizens expect of us. So it has so many benefits. When you ask questions, it makes it much more comfortable for you. It's a much more warm, encouraging, supportive environment to be with colleagues whom are asking questions of each other. You're asking questions of them, so it makes it easier for you. They are eager to you know everyone deep down wants to be asked how they can help someone else. That's one of the greatest joys in any culture, any person in the world is to make that person feel good. You ask him or her for their advice, for their ideas, and that instantly makes that person feel better and they like you immediately.
Steve Morreale:Yeah, they feel valued. And what I'm hearing you say is it strikes me in this way that when we're I don't care whether it's policing or in the private sector we are generally hiring the best people and in many cases we have underutilized those people right, we haven't taken advantage, we haven't piqued their curiosity, we haven't tapped into their, we haven't piqued their curiosity, we haven't, you know, tapped into their potential, creativity and their ideas. And what strikes me is that police and I've said this before we are trained. Having been in it in 35 years, we're trained to ask questions constantly. But most of the questions we're asking of people who were called on because they've got a complaint or someone has committed a crime what happened to you?
Steve Morreale:Where were you? Who else knows about this? In other words, it's the who, what, where, when, why and how that it becomes so natural in policing. But what I find is, as police move up, they stop asking those questions in the organization, about the organization, because they haven't recognized in many cases the value of asking questions of the front line. What are you seeing? What's going on? How can we do it better? How's it being received? What do you think we should do? What's your thought on that, mike?
Mike Marquardt:Well, I think sort of at the lower level of police work you tend to ask very clear, closed questions. You're trying to get very specific information that will build your case or help you solve the case. As you move up, your questions have to be more open-ended, because you're trying to be creative, you're trying to look at patterns, future, doing things in new ways, and so those kinds of questions they're not as good at.
Intro-Outro:It's not natural for them.
Mike Marquardt:And they've not been encouraged to ask those questions. Other questions are part of their training, part of the natural process of doing police work, but police leadership you have to ask more open-ended questions that create collaboration, encourage people to work with you, to take initiative. So it's a different type of question and it's interesting. We get trained in everything in life, but the most important skill of life is to ask great questions and we don't get that kind of training, but it's a training or it's a learning that occurs from getting feedback.
Mike Marquardt:You ask questions to develop great leadership, great questions. You have to be open. To saying I'm going to be asking questions, I realize to be a better leader, I have to ask better questions. To saying I'm going to be asking questions, I realized to be a better leader, I have to ask better questions. So I may occasionally ask a question that's not very helpful or sounds judgmental. So you have to let me know I'm going to ask you how was my question? Did it help us? What are some better questions I could ask at our meetings that would help you do your work in a more, you know, efficient and, you know, inspirational way. So it's a great skill.
Mike Marquardt:It's not. You can't teach people how to ask great questions, but you, it's like it's one of the key things of action learning. Action learning, briefly described, is you. You do something and then you reflect on it, see how you could do it better. So every time you take an action, you try to learn from it, and you cannot learn from it. We have this action. Well, we learn from experience. That's not true. We learn from reflecting on experience and you cannot reflect on experience unless you ask yourself a question how did that work? How can I do it better next time?
Steve Morreale:We're talking to Mike Marquardt and he is the author of, among other questions, leading with questions. He is an expert in learning, organization action learning, and that's what we're beginning to get into. And it strikes me, because you have that experience with this police chief who's now an academic, who was one of your students I've come up from the sevents, when I was in the army it was all about command and control, right In a lot of ways, command and control, and command and control certainly has a place In LA right now on the streets. There's got to be some command and control. Don't question me. We're going to do this unless we're going to fail. Otherwise let's move forward.
Steve Morreale:But command and control is not something that can be and should be used all of the time in very minimal ways for tactical situations. There's no need for command and control throughout the organization. But if you understand policing and the top-down mentality that has evolved coming from the military mentality that has evolved coming from the military, they're sort of resistant, I think, to change police organizations in many cases there's some cultural differences. I look to you as the leader, so why don't you have the answer? You know what's the breakthrough moment that you have when you've been facilitating conversations with leaders to say give it a try, you don't have to know it all. What comes to mind when I ask that question, mike?
Mike Marquardt:Well, going back to your on your military, the military has changed dramatically over the last 20 years. It used to be command and control. Now they realize that officers in the field or privates in the field, they have to make quick, on-the-moment decisions because the battle is very different than it was when you marched in precision and so forth. So every soldier has to be able to make at-the-moment decisions and they cannot make wise at-the-moment decisions if they're not reading the situation, asking the question what's going on here and what's the best way for me to handle it? And so the key to all you know, whatever level you're at, the key is to say what's happening here and how can I handle it better? Or, particularly, if I handle it this time, how can I handle it better next time. You always have to improve. You never get a battlefield decision or a police decision like in Los Angeles, whatever.
Mike Marquardt:Many of those officers have to make an on-the-moment decision. Interacting with some protester, they couldn't wait for what should I do here? They had to make a decision Do I push, pull, shoot, whatever the case may be? And they have to be able to look at the situation and ask themselves what would be the best thing for me to do here, and one of the powers of great leadership and excellent is that these questions need to become clear, automatic, and they're inherent and they're in, they're inside you, so you don't have to formally ask what should I do here? But your mind has been conditioned to say what's happening here and what's the best thing I can do, or what happened a moment ago that didn't work. How can I do it better? So, unless your mind is reflecting and only can reflect through questions that you either directly ask yourself or occur automatically within you. So I think every police officer needs to be aware of creating questions in their mind as they're interacting with any situation, what's?
Steve Morreale:happening here and how can I do it better, what are my options, what's my experience here, what do I need to do differently? And so we start talking a little bit about the learning organization. And you know that the military and you're quite familiar with that and certainly police agencies, especially with large scale events, they do sentinel reviews or after action reviews, and that's the time to reflect. You know what happened, what were we confronted with, what did we do, what can we learn from this so that we don't repeat it or we handle it in a different way? So there's a cycle of thinking and again reflection and introspection on that. And so what is your take about the learning organization? Why should police agencies focus on being learning organizations, having active learning approaches to virtually everything they do, to stay current, to keep up to date and to anticipate the future?
Mike Marquardt:current, to keep up to date and to anticipate the future. Yeah Well, I think every organization, every police organization as well, has to continually improve, because they have more and more responsibility, more and more people to serve, more and more situations that are unique, maybe with less resources to do it. So the only way a police organization could be successful is they continuously improve, they get better, they can do more things in less time with a higher result, and you can only do that by reflecting what you're doing now and how could we do things better. So the the after action review is a perfect example of what learning organizations need to do, because every time they have a large situation, conflict, action, they say what happened and how could we do it better the next time that we encounter something similar to this.
Mike Marquardt:Now, that's at the organizational level, but a learning organization has to have learning individuals. So what they do at the organizational level but a learning organization has to have learning individuals so what they do at the organizational level has to be done in groups as well as individually. So when a group of police officers are encountering the situation in Los Angeles, they have some quick moments where they have to say, okay, something has happened. That's four of us. What do we do? How can we have this? What can we do that will prevent this or keep the momentum going in our direction?
Mike Marquardt:And, of course, the individual. So learning has to go with the individual group and an organization-wide level, but the organization as a whole. They can set the motto, they can set the culture, because individuals kind of behave according to the culture. So if you're in an organization whose culture is one in which you encourage people to learn, you take time to reflect, you ask questions about what's happening and how it could be improved, if there's that culture in the organization, then the teams and individuals will start behaving that way, not only inside the organization but when they're outside the organization.
Steve Morreale:So one question that comes to mind and you've been familiar and engrossed with a number of different organizations, let's say a business organization what could police leaders learn from approaches that businesses take to stay current, to maintain, to stay ahead of the curve, to meet market demand, whether it's cars or telephones or AI, whatever it is? Mike, what's your experience been that these organizations are in a constant state of evolution?
Mike Marquardt:Well, I think the ability to ask the right questions is critical. So, whether you're the chief of the top person in the organization, top administrative person, or a chief of a unit or whatever it would be, if you ask the right questions then you start getting the right information. And particularly now with AI, you know AI can be so valuable to police departments. But you have to ask the right questions.
Steve Morreale:Yeah, well, you have to give it the right prompts and context. I understand Clearly you've been using. I'm trying.
Mike Marquardt:AI. It can only be as good as your question is. So if you start asking and you don't get to the right questions or great questions unless you do it with each other, but sometimes just ask the power of questions is you don't have to have the answer, you just have to have the right question. The answer will emerge. So the greater my question is, the more it causes me to think and reflect. I might immediately come up with a response, but it might come up with a response a day or a week later. And so great leaders ask the great questions, some of which you need an immediate response, but some of which you can get a few days later or a week later. And you're just saying what would be a great question for my department to ask AI? That's all you have to ask. You don't have to have the right answer yet. What would be a great question? It gets everybody around you.
Mike Marquardt:Their subconscious works and their subconscious is much more creative, much more can do many more things than your conscious. So a great leader asks the questions, not expecting immediate answers, because you don't get great responses immediately. You get great responses when the subconscious has done reflection. So a great leader could say to his team of people around him we need to get more information from AI. What would be three great questions we could ask AI next week? And so the people around him, a team of five people. They don't want answers. The police chief does not want answers right away, he wants them in a week.
Steve Morreale:Think about it.
Mike Marquardt:He wants you to think for a week, because your subconscious works 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and so if I plant a great question in you and say in a week I'm going to ask you for your response, you're going to have a lot of great ideas that would not have emerged if you hadn't given the answer.
Steve Morreale:I like what you're saying To me. I call it planting seeds and I think that's exactly what you're suggesting, that you know you have a meeting, you're talking with your command staff and you're saying to them listen, we're going to focus on the future, next week or at the next meeting, and what I want you to be thinking about is what questions? What's missing? What do we have to do? How can we use AI better? How can we drive that? It's those kinds of questions. You know.
Steve Morreale:For me, it's about the curiosity. I get excited by it. I'm sure that you do. You've seen it, You've watched it, you've written about it, you've studied it, you've taught it. But it is about, you know, ask the questions. As a professor, I'm sure that's exactly what you did in your classes. That's what I do all of the time. I'm constantly, I'll always say I'm going to ask you a series of what is unique about what I do in the classroom and it's and the kind of think about that. You know, what am I doing different than other professors do? And you know you've had plenty who lectured by PowerPoint, but me and I presume you it's always a derivative of who, what, where, when, why and how the basic questions we learn in the fifth grade in writing. Compositions, I think in a lot of ways are trying to suggest that this is a much better way of growing, of developing others, of engaging others in the process of making our organization better. What do you think about that?
Mike Marquardt:Yeah, I think, going back to my original point is that we say great leaders ask great questions. Great social workers ask great questions, all the great police officers ask great questions. All the great teachers ask great questions. You can find I could go to any school and say who's the best teacher in this building and I'll be the one who asks the best questions in the classroom, and they're the same. Who's the best police officer you have? It'll be the one who has the best questions, because by asking questions you change yourself and you become a different kind of leader and you develop the most critical skills of being a leader.
Mike Marquardt:So a great leader is someone who inspires others, who builds great teams, who displays humility. You can't ask great questions about humility because you reckon I don't know it all. I need your help. Who is courageous? Because sometimes it takes a lot of courage to ask a question. That might cause some conflict or might show that you're not the all expert you claim to be, but every single leadership skill can be improved, developed and practiced through questions. So if you want to be, say okay, I want to be more systems thinker. That's important leadership skill to be a systems thinker. You ask questions, you become a better systems thinker. The greater the question, the greater your systems thinker. You want to show people you care about the great leaders. Show respect and caring. Ask questions.
Steve Morreale:That's every leadership skill. Well, and what you just said is dead on, and that is, when I'm asking questions of somebody, I'm actually honoring their intellect, I'm asking them for input, but it's not something we've talked about. It seems to me, when you ask a question, as we have been taught for those of us who have to testify in court, is answer the question and put a period on it, which means wait for the next question. But for me, as it relates to our conversation, how important is listening after that question? Mike?
Mike Marquardt:Well, it's very important. It demonstrates to the person you've asked the question of that you really are interested in what you've asked. So many of us we ask a perfunctory question or we ask another question before they respond. The person being asked the question will quickly be able to feel and know that what you're asking of him or her is important to you. You're curious enough, you want to know that information can be valuable to you or to the organization. And so all great questions are great listeners, because usually you don't get a great question unless you've listened to previous questions you've asked.
Mike Marquardt:So the great question rarely is the first question you ask of your team, it's the third or fourth. So you ask the question and if you listen very carefully to the response you get to that question, you do a follow-up question and based upon that you do a third follow-up and I oftentimes do an exercise where you have to ask seven questions based upon what you've got from your first question. So an activity where I say the first question what's your greatest success in life? And based upon what they respond, you ask the second question. Third, and you change that person and seven questions. That person just has new confidence, new awareness. They take action they never considered before. So the more you listen, the better. Your next question is Great questions are always the second or third or fourth question.
Steve Morreale:You know, as a very young, I guess, leader with the Drug Enforcement Administration, I took over the asset forfeiture unit and financial investigation section. I'll never forget that. One of the first things I did I'm looking for your reaction to this is to bring everybody in, and I thought it would be a 20 minute half hour conversation. It turned out to be longer than that because people had never been asked questions about themselves. But one of the questions I asked that really stymied the civilians who worked for me is what are you most proud of that you have accomplished since you've been here?
Steve Morreale:Now, some of them I love to use the term think to talk and talk to think. Right, I have a tendency to talk to think. I don't know what the hell I'm gonna say at the other end. I'm hoping I'll make sense later, but so many people need time to contemplate that question so they can come back with you at you with a reasonable answer. So very often I would give them time. You at you with a with a reasoned, reasonable answer, so very often I would give them time. Just like you said a little bit ago, you're not ready for that question. I want you to ponder that and we'll talk about that tomorrow, and, and and I'm here to tell you that my experience was when they came back, they had great answers because I gave them the time not to be defensive but to think deeply about that question. What's your sense of that?
Mike Marquardt:Well, we, as leaders, we have to know when we've asked a great question, and many times we know it before we ask it. But oftentimes we know it when we don't get an immediate response, because a great question usually requires the other person to say gee.
Mike Marquardt:I never thought of that before I looked at it that way. I never considered it or didn't realize how important whatever it was. So you can oftentimes get a sense that's a pretty good question because this person has to think about it for a while. If they just give a response, it's usually a closed question or it's not going to change them. But because great questions require reflection and reflection always creates greater responses. So we got to know. We want to keep improving our questions. We have to know was that a good question? How could I prove it next time?
Steve Morreale:And did it elicit a response and such, and I think to myself too. Your experience with leading with questions and obvious is imagine. Let me just go back in time. So here you are, a new professor. You've had a lot of experience in the workforce, you have trained and taught and interviewed and asked questions. You have trained and taught and interviewed and asked questions and now, at some point in time, there was this little thing that arose, called, I think, the basis. Exactly what you said is leading with questions and that's changed the trajectory of your life by identifying that. Tell me when.
Mike Marquardt:that moment was and what that meant to you. Well, I think it came, you know, from talking to people when I asked them who are the great leaders in the organization. So it was something I gained through research and I said, well geez, this is what a great leader was. And I was quite surprised when I developed the title for the book. I was surprised that no one had ever written a book about leading with questions. You know lawyers we talk we use that term frequently that you're leading. Particularly lawyers lead you. They have lawyers, don't, are not. They should never ask questions which they do not already have the answer for. And that's just the for a court case. That's appropriate, but it's totally inappropriate outside the legal profession, because you should not be only asking questions for which you already know the answer, because you gain nothing from it.
Mike Marquardt:But lawyers are not asking questions for purpose of changing whether they're asking questions that lead people to and the jury to a particular conclusion. So leading with questions is kind of just the opposite of what I said. You lead by asking questions for which you do not know what the answer will be. You ask questions for almost every other purpose than what a lawyer asks questions for, and oftentimes the police officer when he's getting data for his case somebody already knows, he just wants to confirm it, or he wants to test the person how honest he or she is et cetera.
Mike Marquardt:So oftentimes some of the questions they're asking, they know the answer. They just want to confirm whether this person is telling the truth or not, or whatever the case may be, or lock them into a lie.
Steve Morreale:That's one of our tactics, right, right, lie to me, no problem, I just want you to put that in writing.
Mike Marquardt:But the inside? It's innate because we grow when we're born. The moment we're born, our subconscious asks questions, and we ask two major questions the moment we're born. One is how can I communicate to those people around me so I get what I want food, being taken care of, whatever and how do I move around? How do I get to move myself? So your subconscious continuously asks these questions and you learn how to walk and talk within 18 months.
Mike Marquardt:It's the two most important skills of life and you only did it because of your questions. So the moment you could start speaking life, and you only did it because of your questions. So the moment you could start speaking, what do you start doing? You ask questions. Children love to ask questions because that's how they got to learn how to walk and talk, and they just love to ask questions. It's innate. It's an enjoyable experience for a two-year-old or three-year-old, but then they're told by their parents stop asking so many questions, I'm too busy, or in the classroom. Stop asking questions, have the answers. So the most important skill of life, which is asking questions, which is innate is stifled by parents and teachers and bosses.
Steve Morreale:And now we realize that the best bosses and the best teachers are those that encourage questions and develop work with. And the introduction was me asking questions what about this, what about that? What are you most proud of? And when's the last time the department was evaluated? And I'm here to tell you at one point in time, here I am talking to three or four high-level people and they looked at each other like what's an evaluation? What is a management evaluation? They looked at each other like what's an evaluation? What is a management evaluation? And so at that moment I thought, well, okay, there's an opening for me to help them here because it can be valuable.
Steve Morreale:We're talking to Mike Marquardt, dr Mike Marquardt, author and a retired professor at George Washington University. I ask police agencies if they do surveys both internal and external, you know for their people, to understand what's on their mind, and for the people they serve. What I find very often is many leaders are afraid of those answers, and I'd love you to talk about the value of that feedback and what it can do for an organization if they accept the answers and the feedback from people as an opportunity to improve. What's your thought on that?
Mike Marquardt:Well, again, I think it refers to the culture in which the questions are being asked and the expectations or respect they have for the results that will occur. Some say, well, they're just asking questions and they're not going to do anything without my opinion anyway. Or if my opinion is different, my response is different. I may get in trouble.
Steve Morreale:Well, that's that culture of fear.
Mike Marquardt:There's a fear and so there's not much value in having surveys if there is a feeling of fear or a feeling it's not going to be used. So you have to create an atmosphere or culture around that question, saying you know surveys in the past, you know we may have not used them or you may have been uncomfortable. You have to kind of lay it out front. But now we're a different organization, we have different leadership here. We really need your best ideas. We need you to be honest with how you feel we're doing, but also to give us ideas on how we can improve. And so I think if you create that kind of context and the opening of the introduction to the survey, you indicate that then you can get valuable information. But without that, the information you get may not be very helpful to the organization.
Steve Morreale:Well, so what you're doing too and I love to say this elephants in the room all of the time. You know you walked into a faculty meeting and something's going on and nobody wants to talk about it. I happen to open it up. You know this is what's going on. I can't tell you everything about it, but here's what we know, here's how it's going to impact. You know, even a police department Think about COVID, or during the Rodney King riots, or even, most recently, the George Floyd riots, or the current riots having to do with no kings or immigration, whatever it is Someone has to say stay the course.
Steve Morreale:We still have a responsibility to serve people. We want you to go out there and don't get you know, don't become downtrodden. A lot of people are relying on you to respond and it seems to me and I want to move on from leading with questions, with other work that you have done but I'd like you to sort of reiterate what you feel the value is for a leader, new or old, in a police agency to begin asking questions, model asking questions, and begin to drive that approach through the organization. So not just the big leader does it, but all of the sub-leaders are doing the same thing with their people to drag information and to draw people into the, into the improvement process.
Mike Marquardt:Well, I think the police leader has to be very upfront and with his people, or people, saying that you know we in the past we may have been top down directive, making statements, statements. We realize now that to be a successful organization and be successful with the people we serve, we have to be much more creative. We have to continuously improve and learn. We have to ask questions. So I'm going to spend more of my time when I'm with you asking questions. I encourage you to ask questions of me because together we can do that. And I'm occasionally going to ask what do you think of my questions? How could I ask better questions? That would help you.
Mike Marquardt:So you have to create the whole new culture, be humble, indicate that you're going to be changing your behavior for the betterment of the organization and the betterment of each individual in that organization. And initially it may be difficult for you to ask me questions because you're afraid that I might respond to a question or you should have known the answer in advance. But I do not expect everyone to have all the answers, to do everything correctly. So it's normal that we all have to learn and make improvements. So I'm going to try to be comfortable asking questions of you and I want you to be comfortable asking questions of me, and when we have meetings, we're going to spend a lot of our time answering great questions of each other, so you have to be the model saying, okay, I'm going to work at this.
Mike Marquardt:I may not be the best at it, but I realize it's important for me to be a powerful and valuable leader, to ask questions. I'm going to do the best I can, but I have to keep improving. I have to reflect on myself, but occasionally I'm going to ask you. You know what are some of the questions I've asked over the past six months, yet you have found most valuable. What are some questions I've not asked that you think would help our department organization run more effectively? You think?
Steve Morreale:would help our department organization run more effectively. That's great. What I want to ask you to do we've got a bit more time to talk about the other areas that you began to morph into action learning, the learning organization, how that plays in. I presume all of these are interrelated, but talk about the other books that you've written and how that came to pass.
Mike Marquardt:Yeah, well, they're all interrelated. My earlier books because I'd worked in 50 countries done a lot of global work. Much of my earlier work were on globalization how to build a global teams, how to communicate across cultures. Then, as I moved into becoming a professor, I moved from doing work in global to the leadership and questions and everything's kind of tied around questions.
Mike Marquardt:The whole essence of action learning is the ability to ask questions of yourself and others from any experience that you have had individually or the group has had or the organization has had. So the basics of action learning is that you have an experience and you say what happened here and how can I do it better next time? That's simple action learning. But great action learning is that I'm going to be meeting with my staff tomorrow. How can I make it a great meeting? So action learning can you have learning preparing yourself for the event.
Mike Marquardt:Much of the time we do action learning after an event has occurred. We met with a sales representative or we had just had an encounter in Los Angeles and after it's over, you ask what happened and how can we have done it better, what did we do well and how can we do it better next time? Now great leaders are able to while they're in the environment itself, while they're interacting with the protesters. What is going well here and what can I do better? You got to do it while it's happening. That's action learning. It's premium, but we can do action learning after the event and before the event, but great action learning is while it's happening, during the event.
Mike Marquardt:Yes, and so all great salespeople are action learners because they're interacting with their customer and they're reading the customer's language and perspective and they sell the product. All great leaders are asked great questions. All great salespeople, the best salespeople in the world, are action learners because as they're interacting, they're changing their pitch, they're changing what they emphasize. So the learning organization obviously is built on questions. The great learning organizations are those that number one have leaders ask questions, but it's a culture of questions.
Mike Marquardt:So in a learning organization when you do a performance appraisal, you ask the the person what have you learned over the past six months that we, or what have you learned that will help the organization improve? So when you come in for your performance appraisal, I don't, I don't just ask you what you've done. I ask what have you learned over the last six months that you have used to benefit the organization? Because learning is much more powerful and valuable to an organization than actions. So the emphasis and when you meet someone in the hallway and say how are you doing, you don't just say how are you doing, you say what have you learned that might help me? You know so two police officers. They come across how are you doing? What's happening In a learning organization. They start saying well, is there anything you've learned in your police work or interacting with? You know protests or what? So if you ask each other learning questions, you get much more than you just saying what are you doing, what did you do?
Steve Morreale:So that harkens back to myself and it may be with you. When I was the chair of the department, one of the things I started to do was talk about Pedagogy Corner, what's working, what's going on, and what I watched happen by saying who wants to talk about something they tried in the classroom that worked, and maybe it didn't work the first time that they had sort of tweaked it a little bit, and the first person out of the gate came in and was actually proud of what they had accomplished. And what I watched happen were other faculty members or independent contractors, but police officers are too. I'm in my little silo and you understand that, right, but when that happened, a couple of things was going on. It was that, you know, somebody said, hey, can I get a copy of that? I love that idea and I have something similar, and so the sharing began just by asking that question Tell us about something that worked, what worked for?
Intro-Outro:you.
Steve Morreale:And I think that that can be used over and over again. You may have had that same experience well.
Mike Marquardt:One of the most valuable questions you can ask anybody in almost any situation what are you doing well or what? What's happening here? It's going well, but a key follow-up question is what could be done better? You don't have to get a response to that question because the subconscious will work and even though they said well, it really went very well, I can't think of anything to do better. I can assure you, a week later they will have come up. Geez, if we'd done that, that would have made it even more effective.
Steve Morreale:Yeah, I got another idea. Well, I mean again. What we're talking about is the creative juices. Drawing the creative juices out of people, I say over and over again, and in many police organizations I know how it works, having been there You're the new kid on the block and hey, kid, just do what you're told, shut up. I'm not looking for input, right? I think that's a big mistake, because we hire the best and then we underutilize them. And when we engage them into asking you've been on the job for six months, what do you think? What could we do better? What is working? Have you tried something that works or something that doesn't?
Mike Marquardt:And it begins exactly.
Steve Morreale:It inspires ideas which I think become important. So we're talking to Mike Marquart and we're beginning to wind down on the Cop Talk podcast and I very much appreciate all of the time that you're taking. You know when somebody pushed back on you or you ask somebody. You know when you ask a question and somebody says why are you asking me? You're the boss, how would one handle that?
Mike Marquardt:Well, I would say that, yes, in the past you would expect the boss to have the answers, and bosses never asked you questions, and that's not a way to run a police department, particularly in today's environment. We have to run it differently. We have to get more and more ideas from other people, and we think there's ideas that you have that I could never get because I'm not in the front line like you are. I'm not in that part of the city like you are, so you're the only one that perhaps can give me insight and help other people in other departments insight. So that's the reason I'm asking questions.
Mike Marquardt:I generally want to get your ideas, your experiences, that you're the only one who maybe had that experience and can help me and maybe help people in other parts. So you have to recognize that, yes, it is a little bit different than in the past, and normally we've not asked you questions and you've not, you know, been able to give your ideas. But it's a new world and your ideas are important to me. You may have done something in your part of the city or your department that could benefit other departments, and so a great idea can be applied in many places, and so I'm asking if there's anything you've tried that you think worked well. Now that part of my job is to to maybe adapt that other parts. But I'm not going to be able to get all the great ideas unless I ask people, and and the fact that I asked you what you think we should do should indicate to you that I really care and I appreciate the work you've done thus far.
Steve Morreale:You know, one of the experiences I had recently is that I was running a command college and I was asking a number of questions and obviously you have to break down the barriers. They're not sure they want to talk in front of other people. They've never been with these 20 people, you know. I mean you've had.
Steve Morreale:And what I find is there's always someone that will answer and somebody will think about what somebody else answered. And at the end, one of the things that they said and I'm sure you've had this experience was I didn't just learn from the facilitator, I learned from my 20 colleagues because they opened their mind right. Well, if he thinks that way, why shouldn't I? And I find that very good, because part of this is about getting them comfortable, about sharing with each other, right Sharing and learning and evolving and constantly moving on. You said something, Mike, in the book about the question behind the question. Can you talk about that?
Mike Marquardt:Well, I guess when you ask a question it's oftentimes based upon your whole life experience that caused you to ask that question of this person at that particular time. But sometimes you have to get information that will explain or help the person understand why you have your second question. So you have to get some initial information and they say, well, the reason I asked that question. I needed that information to ask you this next question, just like what has worked well in your, your part of the city and the reason I asked that question, because I want to use those ideas you give me for that so I can apply it to other parts of the city.
Steve Morreale:A very good illustration. So talk about your books a little bit and how people can get them, because not everybody has read that book even though it's been around for a long time. I know in your third edition Bob Teedy's joined you in some of the writing and I've been able to chat with him and how they might get in touch with you if they're interested.
Mike Marquardt:Okay, well, leading With Questions. As you mentioned, it's the third edition. The first two editions I wrote by myself. The third one, I asked Bob to join me and to use all of his ideas and experience on questions, so it's with Wiley. It's a very large publisher and, like most people nowadays on Amazon, if you either put in the words leading with questions or Marquardt or T-I-E-D-E, you can find the book. It's been out for two years now, so it's been almost 20 years since the first edition.
Steve Morreale:That's longevity, my friend.
Mike Marquardt:Yeah, organizations all over the world that use the book, and so I'm very pleased and proud of it. If you put my name into the Amazon inquiry, you'll see I've written 27 books over my career, as you already mentioned. I've written several on learning organizations, how to build a learning organization. I have three editions of one book on learning organizations and I've done a lot of books on teams, how to build teams and develop teams and so forth. So those are, and then, of course, the action learning. The past 30 years that's been my passion, because action learning has helped me to develop and learn and write better questions and to build learning organizations. But I'm delighted to have this opportunity of sharing some of my ideas about questions and action learning and learning organizations. I hope that people feel comfortable in going on Amazon and getting any of my books and certainly feel free to contact me if I can answer any questions you may have.
Steve Morreale:And so you're involved with the World Institute for Action Learning, right, that's one way for people to get in touch with you, the World.
Mike Marquardt:Institute for Action Learning was established about 20 years ago. It certifies coaches that can work with teams to help the team learn, and if the team learns, they tend to ask better questions and get more results. So it's a leadership development, team building, problem solving methodology that I developed about 30 years ago, and so the World Institute of Action Learning has 500 certified coaches and affiliates in countries all over the world.
Steve Morreale:Well, we have been very honored and I mean I've been honored to be able to chat with Dr Mike Marquardt, who has 50 years experience both in academia and in the field. A lot of the things that you've been talking about, mike, have been extremely valuable for police leaders in the future that are looking for a better way to understand this generation and to engage the people who they employ and they serve by asking questions so that they can make better decisions and provide better service. As you leave, what are you most proud of that you're still in the game at this point. That's just an amazing thing. You must pinch yourself sometimes to say people still want me.
Mike Marquardt:Well, I felt very fortunate, as I was a consultant and advisor for many years. You reach 10, 20, 30 people at a time and quite effectively with them, but when you become a professional, you start writing books, and books can reach thousands of millions of people, and so I'm very proud that I've developed this methodology called action learning, which has proved to be very powerful for organizations and individuals in over 150 countries. So I'm very proud of that, and the leading with questions, the insight which I'm sure leaders had but they never were able to publish. I was able to take their ideas about questions and leadership and be known for that, whereas it's really the leaders themselves who have done this for thousands of years and more recently in the last 20 years, to become great leaders. So I'm very proud of having the opportunity of being able to influence people and make the world a better place.
Steve Morreale:So there's one turnaround question on you, based on what you were talking about. What question did I not ask you that I should have?
Mike Marquardt:I think you've asked a great question.
Steve Morreale:I'm talking to the expert.
Mike Marquardt:That's a great question, but one that requires reflection.
Steve Morreale:I'll get back to you.
Mike Marquardt:Because I have to go through, which I felt. You asked a lot of wonderful questions that enabled me to describe my ideas, thoughts, experiences and questions, particularly for the police, the field of police work and so forth. So if I think of one I will send it to you. But it's a great question to ask what could I have asked that you did not ask? I appreciate the question and having the opportunity of responding to those questions.
Steve Morreale:Well, mike, I'm so grateful I see you as an extreme thought leader that has made some changes. I'm trying to do my best to bring this concept, this idea that you have born and grown into, policing, because I think it has tremendous value, and, as I leave, I want you to know that there's people who listen to the podcast in 89 countries, which just blows my mind. But, more importantly, it is about trying to help leaders in policing that have a very difficult job as it is, get better, be their best selves, and to me, one of the key points is to do exactly what you're suggesting Start asking questions. Don't feel the need to have all the answers because you don't even know what you don't know. So thank you so much and I very much appreciate it.
Mike Marquardt:Thank you, best of luck to all and success to all of your listeners.
Steve Morreale:Thanks, very much. That's another episode of The CopDoc Podcast in the can, so happy to have been talking to Mike Marquardt Dr Mike Marquardt, who is in Virginia and the author, as we've said. So if you have any questions anybody I should be talking to have any thoughts about the show. Please reach out to me. You know how to get in touch with me. Have a good day, stay safe, take care of your people. Thanks for listening.
Intro-Outro:Thanks for listening to The Cop Doc Podcast with Dr Steve Morreale. Steve is a retired law enforcement practitioner and manager, turned academic and scholar from Worcester State University. Please tune into the Cop Doc Podcast for regular episodes of interviews with thought leaders in policing.
