Ever since I started photographing people I have started to have a debate, whether to pose or not to pose. Sometimes it is with other photographers and sometimes it is with my self. Though I started on the end of the spectrum where I did not want to pose people, today I am closer to the other end of wanting to pose people. In fact after reading about posing, I have now stated to nit pick the posing mistakes I see in photographs!!!
Whether you pose a subject or not you still need to know what makes a strong or a weak pose. You can capture it in photo journalistic style a strong pose, but to do that you need to know what's a strong pose. Below is a link about how to pose, simply the head for a head shot by Peter Hurley. I think after you see this you will have a change of mind about posing.