Coaching your teams to solve collective problems

As we learn leadership skills we realize that we should probably spend more time asking with our teams and less time telling. I think a better way of figuring out this balance between asking and telling would be to help your teams frame the collective challenge. Put the tension on the table between current reality and desired future, by honestly defining both of those together. Then the role of the leader is to enable the team to creatively and collaboratively come up with strategies for reducing the tension between what you got and what your want—the solution being putting together a plan for better managing the gap.