Better Questions, Better Answers
In Questions Are the Answer, MIT professor Hal Gregersen argues that asking better questions is the only way to arrive at better answers.
He writes: “In fact, I would push this to a bolder declaration that no dramatically better solution is possible without a better question. Without changing your questions, you cannot get beyond incremental progress along the same path you’ve been pursuing.”
Gregersen cites many examples of companies’ breakthrough innovations arising from those shifts in thinking.
But it’s also easy to grasp the concept if we think about the difference between asking How can we grow revenue? and How can we meet more of our customers’ needs?
Between How do I get promoted? and What next job would improve my life?
Between What’s my five year plan? and What if I only had five years left?
One first step in analyzing whether the questions your team is asking are the right ones is to notice them. In your next monthly or quarterly business review, think: What is the underlying question we’re addressing? What’s missing from that?
And of course, you can ask yourself the same question when writing your next to-do list!
A Tool You Can Use
To facilitate asking more and better questions, Gregersen suggests we shift our brainstorming sessions to something called a Questions Burst. Instead of coming up with new answers, the Question Burst says to spend four minutes coming up with new questions.
While brainstorming can generate new ideas, if you use the questions you’ve already been asking yourself, it’s more likely that the new ideas are similar to what you already have.
In contrast, the question burst leads us to reach closer to the fundamental issues. When I tried the exercise, it led to questions like: What if [my core assumption] isn’t true? What are my assumptions, anyway? What if…? Why is that the case…?
Those are the kinds of questions that lead to completely new pathways—completely new sandboxes—rather than playing in the same sandbox. This is even more the case if one uses Gregersen’s framework for choosing which questions to explore further:
“Is it one you have not asked or been asked before? Is it one for which you honestly don’t have a good answer? Is it one that evokes an emotional response, positive or negative?”
Read more: The tactics of the Question Burst can be found in my notes here.
A Question for You
Gregersen defines keystone questions as those “we ask of ourselves in the attempt to be our best selves.”
For example, Nandan Nilekani, the founder of Infosys stated his keystone question as: “Given my unique position and capabilities, what is it that I can do to have the best possible impact on the most possible people?”
Gregersen asks—and I ask you here: “Do you know what your own keystone question is? Would you know if it was time to revisit it? And would you recognize a better one if it occurred to you?”