I’m going to pay forward a book rec found via a Hacker News comment: Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss.
It’s mostly tactics on how to negotiate well, and one piece of advice I’ve adopted is to start my questions with “what” or “how”, not “why”.
“Why” comes across as interrogative; forcing “what” or “how” creates enough time to reassess the actual uncertainty and rephrase as a curiosity question, not an implicit accusation of wrongheadedness.
“Why did you choose this algorithm” becomes “how did you choose this algorithm?” or “what factors did you consider when choosing this algorithm?”
It can be manipulative when done in isolation. My other main takeaway from the book was to have a genuine interest and concern for the other person’s needs, even when you disagree.
Between the trick and the mindset, I’ve found it’s served me well.
A lot of this comes down to personal preferences. As someone who prefers direct language and doesn’t take things personally, I’d rather by asked “why”. I understand that you’re asking for reasons, I can share my reasons without feeling like I’m interrogated.
I used to use a lot of direct language and I've switched. I think a lot of it has to do with whether it is done in person, where you have intonation and body language to interpret. The exact same question can be taken in totally different ways when only in writing, especially if you've either never met someone even over video or you've not had the best first experience with them.
To take the example from your parent, some sort of problem where you had to choose an algorithm to solve some problem. There are multiple choices that have their pros and cons.
Mh, very interesting! Why did you choose that algorithm?
Imagine this in person. The "Mh" comes out finger placed on mouth, thinking and exclaiming an excited "Very interesting!" as he has some realization from thinking about it. Then, with an excited face expression and in a tone that signals he is interested in comparing notes asks the "Why did you choose that algorithm?" question. Totally OK. You now go on to discuss the pros and cons and why you chose that particular algorithm over another one.
Now the very same one:
Mh, very interesting! Why did you choose that algorithm?
Imagine this either in person or in writing where you've had previous "run-ins" with the other person, so you imagine it like this: The "Mh" comes out scoffing, almost barking. A mischievous "very interesting!" that transports his contempt for your choice. He knew you'd make this totally inadequate choice of algorithm even though better ones exist. Followed by a condescending "Why did you choose that algorithm?". That conversation is dead Jim!
The point after all this being that the word why can very easily be interpreted this way, which is harder to do when using these other words in part also because you have to structure the sentence in a less 'violent' way.
"How did you choose this algorithm?" can be ever worse than "why" because you're questioning my "processes", which are closer to my "self", whereas "why" can be interpreted as questioning the outcome.
Perhaps even better, albeit informal: "Why this algorithm?"
"Why" is a question of motives and limiting factors, not outcome. The outcome itself isn't the question being asked as it's already a known or imminent by the time one asks the question.
This is a great suggestion but I wonder how it would hold in other languages both in terms of finding equivalent language elements as well as the weight of those language equivalents in that culture. Seems very English specific but arguably a large fraction of business is in English anyway.
If someone who genuinely wanted to question your expertise and intended to offend you asked "why did you choose this algorithm?" you would be justified in feeling offended. If someone who genuinely wanted to learn and didn't intend to offend you asked the same question your offense would in reality be unjustified.
The point is you can only make a judgement based on the context as the article states, intention is often invisible and difficult to communicate. Changing "why" to "how " is one potential way of communicating intention but it's not perfect. People will always make a judgement based on the total sum of the context that conversation might be happening in.
It’s mostly tactics on how to negotiate well, and one piece of advice I’ve adopted is to start my questions with “what” or “how”, not “why”.
“Why” comes across as interrogative; forcing “what” or “how” creates enough time to reassess the actual uncertainty and rephrase as a curiosity question, not an implicit accusation of wrongheadedness.
“Why did you choose this algorithm” becomes “how did you choose this algorithm?” or “what factors did you consider when choosing this algorithm?”
It can be manipulative when done in isolation. My other main takeaway from the book was to have a genuine interest and concern for the other person’s needs, even when you disagree.
Between the trick and the mindset, I’ve found it’s served me well.