Description: Tired of conversations that feel more like interrogations than meaningful discussions? Or maybe you’ve tried asking open questions but find they either lead nowhere or go off track? This training is designed to help you refine your Motivational Interviewing skills in asking open questions—questions that build partnership, encourage self-discovery, and support positive change. You’ll learn a formula for crafting impactful questions, how to move beyond checklists to foster collaborative conversations, and gain hands-on practice that makes asking open questions second nature. Come ready to engage, participate, and practice asking open questions with purpose!
Objectives: After this training, you will be able to:
Describe the utility of open questions in conversations about behavior change
Distinguish between open versus closed questions
Use open questions to build partnership
Generate open questions that evoke change talk
Integrate open questions into conversations about behavior change
Target Audience: Service providers who want to build their capacity to use open questions in conversations about change. Clinical and non-clinical service providers welcome! This training can support anyone working to incorporate Motivational Interviewing (MI) techniques into their conversations about behavior change and substance use, as well as those engaging in SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention, Referral to Treatment). Prior exposure to MI and open questions is helpful.
