You explain something.
Your team member’s face goes blank.
They ask: “What?”

That’s it. That’s their entire clarifying question.

And now you’re stuck. Because “What?” could mean anything. Did they not hear you? Did they not understand the concept? Are they confused about the context? Do they not know what you mean by the jargon you used? Are they operating under a different assumption about the goal?

“What?” could point to any of these breakdowns.
So, you have to guess what they’re actually confused about. You’ll probably guess wrong. So you’ll repeat something, maybe louder, maybe slower, and it still won’t be what they actually needed to hear. And you’ll be back where you started.

Except now you’ve both wasted time, and you’re both a little more frustrated.
My friend, guessing is below your paygrade.

The Skill No One Teaches

When miscommunication happens, people naturally reach for the least-effort repair attempt. It’s human nature; we’re all inclined to do the minimum to get the result we need.

So they ask “What?”

This bare minimum repair attempt signals “something didn’t land” without requiring them to diagnose what. You have to guess what they’re confused about.

Sometimes “What?” works, but more often it doesn’t, and when it doesn’t, most people just ask it again in different ways, hoping eventually they’ll get lucky.
Ultimately, they don’t realize there are different types of repair attempts available. 

The skill we want to teach is pausing to figure out what kind of miscommunication happened, so we can choose the right repair attempt.

The 3 most common types of repair attempts are: 

Repetition: “I didn’t process it”

They missed something because they didn’t hear it or have an auditory processing delay. If the whole utterance needs to be heard again, we can say “Can you repeat that?” or “Can you say that again?” This is a similar effect to “what” except that it doesn’t put the burden on the speaker to figure out if they didn’t hear or didn’t understand something. If they only need a piece repeated, they can ask for repetition of the specific phrase or word. “Can you repeat that last part?” or “I didn’t catch the number—was it 50 or 500?” In the context of professional development, any of these statements sound more sophisticated than “what?” 

This repair attempt works best when the miscommunication is about hearing, not understanding.

Clarification: “I heard it but this specific part doesn’t make sense”

They understood most of what you said, but one element is unclear. The right repair attempt is asking for clarification on that specific aspect. We often do this with wh- questions. “Wait – which report did we need to send to finance?” or “What do you mean by ‘enterprise-ready’?”

Again, “what report?” is a much better clarification question than simply “what”.

This repair attempt works best when the miscommunication is about a specific detail or term.

Fundamentals: “I understand the parts but I’m confused about something fundamental”

They can hear all the words and follow the logic, but something isn’t clicking. The miscommunication is about context, relevance, how it connects to something else, what the larger goal is, or what success looks like. The right repair attempt is diagnosing what kind of fundamental confusion is happening, then asking about that.

“Is this the Q3 initiative or the platform rebuild?” or “I’m not sure how this connects to the work I’m already doing. Can you explain the relationship?” or “What problem are we actually trying to solve here?”

This repair attempt works best when the miscommunication is deeper than a detail.

The Cost of “What?”

Let’s consider a real example. A director in a weekly leadership meeting assigns a task to a report (let’s call her Sarah). The task is clear in the director’s mind. She explains it. Sarah says “Got it,” and leaves the meeting.

Next week, Sarah hasn’t done the task, saying she didn’t really understand and needs the instructions repeated. So the director re-explains. 

Sarah confirms that ok now she’s got it, but
the same thing happens at their next meeting.
This goes on for weeks.

Finally, in frustration, the director doesn’t just re-explain the task.
She asks: “Sarah, what part of this is confusing?”

And Sarah says: “I’m not sure. I just don’t understand why it makes sense to do this task for this project…”

And Sarah describes…
a completely different project.

A different project entirely.
No wonder the instructions didn’t make sense.
Sarah wasn’t confused about the task.
Sarah was confused about why the task made sense for that project.
A question about the Fundamentals would have made a huge difference here.
Because she didn’t know how to articulate that she just kept asking “What?” in new ways, hoping eventually the director would accidentally explain it in a way that cleared up her fundamental misunderstanding.

The director kept re-explaining the same task, because she was answering Sarah’s direct question. But she was getting more frustrated each time, because clarity wasn’t happening.
Because she was clarifying the wrong thing.

All of that could have been solved in one conversation if either of them had skills in Unmiscommunication:

• Sarah had the skill to ask a fundamental question 
• Or, her director had the skill to elicit more information for diagnosis

(In this story, the director did eventually unmiscommunicate, but more accidentally than strategically.)

Choosing the Right Repair Attempt

The skill is recognizing when a miscommunication has happened, pausing to diagnose where the confusion was, and then choosing the right repair attempt.

Questions for Diagnosing where the Confusion Is

• Did I just miss something? (Repetition—ask them to repeat the specific part)
• Do I not understand a specific detail? (Clarification—ask them to clarify that detail)
• Do I understand the parts but something doesn’t fit together? (Fundamentals—diagnose the fundamental confusion and ask about that)

Building the Skill 

When someone keeps asking “What?” without pausing to diagnose what type of miscommunication is happening, you have an opportunity to help them shift their repair attempt.

Don’t just repeat yourself. That keeps them defaulting to “What?” Instead, invite them to diagnose. Ask: “Do you want me to just say it again or was there a specific part you didn’t understand?”

This coaches them to diagnose where the miscommunication is. Instead of you getting to guess, they get to practice. And it does take practice. Sometimes, at least at first, they won’t be able to identify the breakdown.

So what we can do is elicit more information. If they can’t figure out where the breakdown in communication is, we can figure out where they’re coming from and, hopefully, identify the breakdown in communication ourselves. 

This is what happened with Sarah. The director finally asked: “What part of this is confusing?” And Sarah shared enough information for her director to realize that she was thinking about a different project. 

Make it safe to attempt diagnosis. People often stick with “What?” because they’re embarrassed or afraid of looking confused. There’s a real risk in divulging that you don’t understand something. Furthermore, if they sense frustration or impatience in your response, they’ll keep asking “What?” because it feels safer than attempting diagnosis.

If you respond with genuine curiosity,
“Let me understand where you’re stuck”
they’re much more likely to attempt diagnosis.

Building Skills in Unmiscommunication

When someone defaults to “What?” and you repeat yourself, we’re making Unmiscommunication harder than it has to be. Let’s instead take a moment to prompt a diagnosis, so we can clarify the right thing, and unmiscommunicate faster.