Introduction: Why Question?
What if I just declared myself a questionologist? … Warren Berger, “The Power of Why and What If?,” New York Times, July 3, 2016.
we become more likable to others by asking questions … Karen Huang, Michael Yeomans, Alison Wood Brooks, Julia Minson, and Francesca Gino, “It Doesn’t Hurt to Ask: Question Asking Increases Liking,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Vol. 113, mentioned in the Boston Globe Ideas column by Kevin Lewis, May 12, 2017, www
when we’re working on questions in our minds we’re engaged in “slow thinking” … Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (New York: Farrar Strauss and Giroux, 2011).
children at that age may ask anywhere from one hundred to three hundred questions a day … Paul Harris, Trusting What You’re Told: How Children Learn from Others (Boston: Harvard Press, 2012). Studies also cited in the article “Mothers Asked Nearly 300 Questions a Day, Study Finds,” Telegraph, March 28, 2013.
Neurological research shows that merely wondering about an interesting question … “The Power of the Question,” Liesl Gloecker, The Swaddle (blog), March 3, 2017, www
Think of curiosity as a condition—“like an itch,” says the neuroscientist Charan Ranganath … Ibid.
The asking of questions (at least the ones that are verbalized by young students in school) tends to subside steadily … Right Question Institute study based on question-asking data gathered by the National Center for Education Statistics for the 2009 Nation’s Report Card. For more on the study, see www
we can easily fall into the “trap of expertise” … This is a widely used term. A recent article on the subject: www
“Some people see things that are and ask, ‘Why?’ ” … from Brain Droppings, by George Carlin (New York: Hyperion, 1997).
“I always asked why we’re doing things the way we’re doing them,” Jobs said … From Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview, a documentary released to theaters in 2012 consisting of an original seventy-minute interview that Steve Jobs gave to Robert X. Cringely in 1995 for the Oregon Public Broadcasting documentary, Triumph of the Nerds.
“People are united by questions. It is the answers that divide them” … From Elie Wiesel’s essay “The Loneliness of Moses” in Loneliness by Leroy S. Rouner (Boston: University of Notre Dame Press, 1998); quoted by Maria Popova in “Loneliness of Leadership, How Our Questions Unite Us, and How Our Answers Divide Us,” Brain Pickings, May 29, 2017, www
A growing body of research shows that human connection is central to leading a happier, more meaningful life … Scott Stossel, “What Makes Us Happy, Revisited,” Atlantic, May 2013.
“It’s hard to transcend a combative question” … Krista Tippett, Becoming Wise: An Inquiry into the Mystery and Art of Living (New York: Penguin Press, 2016).
“If we are not able to ask skeptical questions” … Carl Sagan’s last interview in 1996 on Charlie Rose. Available on YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8HEwO-2L4w.
“We’ve become less critical in the face of information overload” … From my interview with Daniel J. Levitin in Apr. 2017, and from his August 2014 Talks at Google, “The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload,” www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR1TNEHRY-U, uploaded Oct. 28, 2014. These themes are also covered in Levitin’s book Weaponized Lies: How to Think Critically in the Post-Truth Era (New York: Dutton, 2016).
we can do what Carl Sagan called “baloney detection” … Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit was featured on Brain Pickings on Jan. 3, 2014, in Maria Popova’s “The Baloney Detection Kit: Carl Sagan’s Rules for Bullshit-Busting and Critical Thinking,” www
Part I: Questions for Better DECISION-MAKING
“The science simply doesn’t support the value of following your gut” … From my interview with Katherine Milkman of the University of Pennsylvania, Sept. 2017.
“your gut is going to be wrong more than it is right” … From my email exchanges and interview with Daniel Levitin, Apr. 2017. Levitin also covers this theme in his book Weaponized Lies.
rather than spending time analyzing small decisions, “have fun with them” … Mike Whitaker’s advice in Stephanie Vozza’s “How Successful People Make Decisions Differently,” Fast Company, Aug. 7, 2017.
Questions enable us to “organize our thinking around what we don’t know” … From my interviews with Steve Quatrano of the Right Question Institute, at various points in 2014 and 2015. This quote also appeared in A More Beautiful Question.
“It’s going against evolution” … From my interview with Levitin, Apr. 2017.
humans resort to snap judgments because “we’re cognitive misers” … Jack B. Soll, Katherine Milkman, and John Payne, “Outsmart Your Own Biases,” Harvard Business Review, May 2015.
we are prone to falling into “a raft of traps” … John S. Hammond, Ralph L. Keeney, and Howard Raiffa, “The Hidden Traps of Decision Making,” Harvard Business Review, Jan. 2006.
We form a story in our heads based on what little we know, without allowing for all we do not know … Daniel Kahneman, “Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence,” New York Times Magazine, Oct. 19, 2011.
“Overconfidence arises because people are often blind to their own blindness” … Ibid.
Facebook’s newsfeed algorithm steadily feeds confirmation bias … Nelson Granados, “How Facebook Biases Your News Feed,” Forbes, Jun. 30, 2016.
he made a daily habit of asking what he called the “jugular question” … Arno Penzias said this at a Fast Company conference, and it was reported in The Art of Powerful Questions by Eric E. Vogt, Juanita Brown, and David Isaacs of the World Café (Whole Systems Associates: Mill Valley, CA, 2003).
What did I once believe that is no longer true? … Daniel Pink shared this question during an online interview with Adam Grant, conducted Aug. 2015 on Parlio.com, www
don’t overlook the “desirability bias” … Ben Tappin, Leslie Van Der Leer, and Ryan McKay, “Your Opinion is Set in Stone,” Gray Matter, New York Times, May 28, 2017.
“What are some reasons that my initial judgment might be wrong?” … Richard Larrick, “Debiasing,” a chapter in the Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making (New York: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004).
there is at least some scientific basis for the “Opposite George” strategy … “The Opposite” aired May 19, 1994, the twenty-first episode of the fifth season of Seinfeld. The idea originates when Jerry suggests to George, “If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would be right.”
You must be “humble enough to admit that you don’t know something” … From my interview with Daniel J. Levitin, Apr. 2017. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes from Levitin in this chapter are from that interview.
Am I a soldier or a scout? … From Julia Galef’s TED Talk, “Why You Think You’re Right Even When You’re Wrong,” Mar. 9, 2017, www
one quality the company looks for when hiring is intellectual humility … Thomas Friedman, “How to Get a Job at Google,” New York Times, Feb. 22, 2014.
Defined as “a state of openness to new ideas, a willingness to be receptive to new sources of evidence” … Cindy Lamothe, “How ‘Intellectual Humility’ Can Make You a Better Person,” The Cut, Feb. 3, 2017, www
We can’t compete with artificial intelligence unless we humans keep learning, experimenting, creating, and adapting … From my interview conducted with Edward Hess, Nov. 2017. Hess is also quoted from a podcast interview with Knowledge@Wharton, Jan. 24, 2017. www
Would I rather be right or would I rather understand? … Christopher Schroeder shared this question during my interview with him in Oct. 2017.
“If we really want to improve our judgment as individuals and as societies” … From Julia Galef’s TED Talk “Why You Think You’re Right …,” Mar. 9, 2017.
“It’s a terrible name” … From my interview conducted with Neil Browne at Bowling Green State College in Feb. 2017.
It’s really just a matter of asking a few fundamental questions … The five critical thinking questions featured are based on my interviews with Neil Browne and also drawn from his book Asking the Right Questions: A Guide to Critical Thinking, coauthored with Stuart Keeley (London: Pearson, 2007), as well as from my interviews with Daniel Levitin, and from the chapter on critical thinking/baloney detection in Carl Sagan’s 1996 book, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark.
An excellent resource for identifying common logical fallacies is Carl Sagan’s “baloney detection kit” … Featured on Maria Popova’s Brain Pickings blog, Jan. 3, 2014, www
a common behavior that he labeled “weak-sense critical thinking” … Dr. Richard Paul’s thoughts on critical thinking are featured at the website for his Foundation for Critical Thinking (www
Kahneman found that “people who face a difficult question often answer an easier one instead, without realizing it” … Daniel Kahneman, “Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence,” New York Times Magazine, Oct. 19, 2011.
A decision can be no better than the best option under consideration … Jack B. Soll, Katherine Milkman, and John Payne, “Outsmart Your Own Biases,” Harvard Business Review, May 2015.
“the first villain of decision making—‘narrow framing’ … Chip and Dan Heath, Decisive: How to Make Better Decisions in Life and Work (New York: Currency, 2013).
Milkman, Soll, and Payne suggest generating at least three options for any decision … from “Outsmart Your Own Biases,” Harvard Business Review, May 2015.
Paul Sloane suggests that the third option you generate should be an unusual one … From Paul Sloane’s blog, Destination Innovation, “Got a Big Decision to Make? Try the Three by Three Method,” May 2017, www
Whenever you’re trying to decide between existing choices, try asking yourself the “vanishing options” question … Chip and Dan Heath, Decisive: How to Make Better Decisions in Life and Work.
we give more sensible advice to others than we give ourselves … Dan Ariely, “A Simple Mind Trick Will Help You Think More Rationally,” Big Think, www
“When we think of our friends we see the forest. When we think of ourselves, we get stuck in the trees” … Chip and Dan Heath, Decisive: How to Make Better Decisions in Life and Work.
try asking yourself about a decision by using the third person … Ethan Kross’s research on using the third person to make decisions is covered in a number of articles, including Pamela Weintraub’s “The Voice of Reason,” Psychology Today, May 4, 2015, www
“If we got kicked out and the board brought in a new CEO, what do you think he would do?” … This anecdote involving Intel cofounders Andrew Grove and Gordon Moore has been widely reported. When Grove died last year, it appeared in a number of obituaries, including one by Phil Rosenthal, “What the Late Intel Boss Andrew Grove Can Teach about Managing,” Chicago Tribune, Mar. 22, 2016.
They needed to “step back from the process and see it objectively as I did” … Dave LaHote, “Improvement for the Sake of Improvement Means Nothing,” The Lean Post (blog of the Lean Enterprise Institute), Apr. 4, 2014, www.lean.org/LeanPost/Posting.cfm?LeanPostId=179.
“Most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70% of the information you wish you had” … From Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’s “2016 Letter to Shareholders,” Apr. 12, 2017, www
there are times when we should avoid making decisions—when we’re tired, stressed … Various sources, including Marcia Reynolds, “When You Should Never Make a Decision,” Psychology Today, Apr. 17, 2014. Also covered in Daniel Kahneman’s book Thinking, Fast and Slow (New York: Farrar Strauss and Giroux, 2011).
Is it possible to shoot holes in this decision? … A variation of this question is found in T. A. Frank, “The Fine Art of Making the Right Decision,” Monday (an online magazine from The Drucker Institute), Jan.–Feb. 2017.
Where in my life right now am I living under the fog of indecisiveness? … Todd Henry shared this question and other quotes on Srini Rao’s Unmistakable Creative podcast episode titled “Todd Henry: Becoming the Leader Creative People Need,” www
“we’ll end up dead and broke on the side of the road” … From my interview conducted with Khemaridh Hy, May 2017. Unless otherwise indicated, other quotes from Hy in this chapter are from this interview.
CNN dubbed him “an Oprah for millennials” … Heather Long, “Meet Khe Hy, the Oprah for Millennials,” CNN Money, Dec. 31, 2016. money.cnn.com/2016/12/30/news/economy/khemaridh-hy-rad-reads-oprah-for-millennials/index.html.
the “negativity bias” … Hara Estroff Marano, “Our Brain’s Negative Bias,” Psychology Today, June 20, 2003.
people continuing to choose to drive instead of fly long after the 9/11 tragedy … James Ball, “Sept. 11’s Indirect Toll: Road Deaths Linked to Fearful Fliers,” Guardian, Sept. 5, 2011.
those “jungle instincts”—the same ones that can cause us to feel we must react … From my fall 2017 series of interviews with Adam Hansen, coauthor of Outsmart Your Instincts: How the Behavioral Innovation™ Approach Drives Your Company Forward by Adam Hansen, Edward Harrington, and Beth Storz (Minneapolis: Forness Press, 2017).Unless otherwise indicated, subsequent quotes from Hansen in this chapter are from this interview.
Phil Keoghan, a lifelong adventurer and fear conqueror who hosts the television series The Amazing Race … These tips are extracted from my interview with Keoghan for the book No Opportunity Wasted (New York: Rodale, 2004).
The life coach Curt Rosengren points out that it’s critical to emphasize the Why? … Curt Rosengren, “8 Fear-Busting Questions,” Passion Catalyst (blog), www
What is the worst that could happen? … The benefits of asking this question are discussed by Eric Barker in “Stoicism Reveals 4 Rituals That Will Make You Mentally Strong,” Barking Up the Wrong Tree blog, Dec. 2016 www
when we think about failure, “we do so in a vague, exaggerated way” … From my interview with Jonathan Fields in 2013 for A More Beautiful Question. A couple of Fields’s comments here originally appeared in that book, as well as in my Mar. 10, 2014 post for Fast Company, “Scared of Failing? Ask Yourself These 6 Fear-Killing Questions,” www
decision-making expert Gary Klein is a proponent of using “premortems” … Gary Klein, “Performing a Project Premortem,” Harvard Business Review, Sept. 2007, www
“What if I succeed—what would that look like?” … Also from my 2013 interview with Jonathan Fields.
What would I try if I knew I could not fail? … This question, also featured in A More Beautiful Question, was used in a slightly different version by Pastor Robert H. Schuller in Possibility Thinking: What Great Thing Would You Attempt … If You Knew You Could Not Fail? (Chicago: Nightingale-Conant Corp., 1971). The question, worded as “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?,” was also featured in Regina Dugan’s March 2012 TED Talk, “From Mach 20 Glider to Hummingbird Drone” www
“In order for imagination to flourish, there must be an opportunity to see things as other than they currently are” … From my interview conducted in 2013 with John Seely Brown, also taken from an article by Brown and Douglas Thomas, “Cultivating the Imagination: Building Learning Environments for Innovation,” Teachers College Record, Feb. 17, 2011, www
An interesting variation of the “What if I could not fail?” question was explored … Ron Lieber, “ ‘What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?’ and 4 Money Questions from Readers,” Your Money, New York Times, Sept. 2, 2016, www
that question “caused me to re-examine my situation to make sure I wasn’t doing what was easy” … Ibid.
The economist Steven Levitt wanted to find out, and conducted a study … Levitt’s study is described in a column by Arthur C. Brooks, “Nobody Here but Us Chickens,” New York Times, Jul. 22, 2017.
people under age thirty today are much less likely than their counterparts in the past to relocate … Ibid.
A friend of Galef’s was offered a job that would amount to a $70,000 pay increase … This is story is told by Julia Galef in a video titled “Decision Making: Reframing,” featured on the Center for Applied Rationality website. (www
“Good decision-making is tied to our ability to anticipate future emotional states” … Ed Batista, “Stop Worrying about Making the Right Decision,” Harvard Business Review, Nov. 8, 2013.
If I look back years from now, will I wish that I’d made a change when the opportunity was ripe? … Rob Walker, “Finding a New Direction When a Plum Job Turns Sour,” from Walker’s Workologist column, New York Times, Apr. 17, 2016.
“Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they’re finished” … From Dan Gilbert’s March 2014 TED Talk, “The Psychology of Your Future Self,” www
Adam Grant offered several more targeted questions … Adam Grant, “Which Company is Right for You?,” New York Times, Dec. 20, 2015. (Additional quotes by Grant in this section are from this article.)
the social component of work—it is a large and often underrated factor … Ron Friedman is quoted in Ron Carucci’s “Before You Accept That Job Offer, Make Sure the Company Does These 3 Things Well,” Forbes, Jul. 27, 2016, www
“Why are people fully aware that benefits are important in their current job” … Ayelet Fishbach, “In Choosing a Job, Focus on the Fun,” New York Times, Jan. 13, 2017. (Other quotes from Fishbach are from the same article.)
think of each important decision as a chapter within a larger story … All quotes from Joseph Badaracco in this section are from a post by Jared Lindzon, “Ask Yourself These 5 Questions before Making Any Major Decisions,” Fast Company, Aug. 15, 2016. www
If I’m saying yes to this, what am I saying no to? … This question was shared by Michael Bungay Stanier during my interview conducted with him Sept. 2017.
He calls it the “cancel-elation” question … Dan Ariely shared this question during an interview with Ron Friedman during the Peak Work Performance Summit (www
“What if putting experience first makes us happier, more fulfilled, more creative and more memorable people?” … Carl Richards, “A Life Full of Experiences May Not Mean Less Financial Security,” Your Money, New York Times, May 24, 2016.
When I look back in five years, which of these options will make the better story? … This question from John Hagel also appeared in A More Beautiful Question, and originated in Hagel’s post “The Labor Day Manifesto of the Passionate Creative Worker,” Edge Perspectives with John Hagel (blog), Sept. 2012, www
Young people get paralyzed by the idea that ‘I’m going to find this thing I’m meant to do’ ” … Cal Newport said this to Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman on Kaufman’s The Psychology Podcast, Episode 47: “Deep Work,” www
Elizabeth Gilbert says she has stopped advising people to “follow your passion” … OWN’s Super Soul Sessions, “The Advice Elizabeth Gilbert Won’t Give Anymore,” Oct. 13, 2015, www
“They remind me of a dog chasing a tennis ball” … Drew Houston’s comments excerpted from his commencement speech at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Jun. 7, 2013.
What personal strengths did I display when I was at my best? … Martin Seligman discusses this in Julie Scelfo, “The Happy Factor: Practicing the Art of Well-Being,” New York Times, April 9, 2017.
What are my superpowers? … This question was shared by Keith Yamashita during my 2013 interview with him for A More Beautiful Question.
Tom Rath’s popular “StrengthsFinder 2.0” program, with its menu of thirty-four traits … Tom Rath, StrengthsFinder 2.0 (New York: Gallup Press, 2007).
The idea is to become “an anthropologist of your own life” … Greg McKeown, “How to Design Your Life’s Mission into Your Career,” posted Nov. 27, 2014 on McKeown’s blog, www
What did I enjoy doing at age ten? … From my 2012 interview with Dr. Eric Maisel for A More Beautiful Question.
What makes me forget to eat? … Mark Manson, “7 Strange Questions That Help You Find Your Life Purpose,” posted Sept. 18, 2014 on Manson’s blog, www
the work of psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmahalyi on “flow” … Mihaly Csikszentmahalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (New York: Harper & Row, 1990).
people who pursue the “Well-Planned Life” … David Brooks, “The Summoned Self,” New York Times, Aug. 2, 2010, www
In what way do I wish the world were different? … Angela Duckworth, “No Passion? Don’t Panic,” Preoccupations, New York Times, Jun. 5, 2016.
“You can think of Purpose with a capital P” … Daniel Pink shared this during his interview with Ron Friedman during the 2017 Peak Performance Summit.
But even if you do find an opportunity that seems to answer that question, Cal Newport has a warning … From Newport’s discussion with Scott Barry Kaufman on The Psychology Podcast, episode 47.
Considering how hard it is to do anything worthwhile, perhaps a good question to keep in mind is this off-color one … From Manson’s post “7 Strange Questions That Help You Find Your Life Purpose.”
What is my sentence? … Pink’s quotes, plus the original quote by Clare Booth Luce, drawn from Daniel Pink’s Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us (New York: Riverhead Books, 2009). This question and the description of its origin also was featured in A More Beautiful Question.
Part II: Questions for Sparking CREATIVITY
Some years ago, David Kelley, founder of one of the most successful consulting firms … Kelley’s story comes from my Sept. 2017 interview with Tom Kelley, earlier interviews (between 2008 and 2012) with Tom Kelley and David Kelley, plus their book Creative Confidence: Unleashing the Creative Potential Within Us All (New York: Crown Business, 2013). See also David Kelley’s 2012 TED Talk “How to Build Your Creative Confidence,” www
“an angel of the Lord appears” … Linda Tischler, “IDEO’s David Kelley on Design Thinking,” Fast Company, Feb. 1, 2009, www
The psychologist Robert Sternberg studied successful creative people … Tom Kelley and David Kelley, Creative Confidence.
Research has shown that just doing one creative task, no matter how small … Girija Kaimal, Kendra Ray, and Juan Muniz, “Reduction of Cortisol Levels and Participants’ Responses Following Art Making,” Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy Association, Vol. 33, Apr. 2016.
“Creativity is yoga for the brain” … Phyllis Korkki, The Big Thing: How to Complete Your Creative Project Even if You’re a Lazy, Self-Doubting Procrastinator Like Me (New York: Harper, 2016).
“The excitement of the artist at the easel or scientist in the lab” … Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Creativity: The Work and Lives of 91 Eminent People (New York: HarperCollins, 1996).
“I write in what is probably a vain effort to somehow control the world in which I live” … Quote from poet and author Kwame Dawes, drawn from Jeremy Adam Smith, Jason Marsh, “Why We Make Art,” Greater Good Magazine, Dec. 1, 2008, www
The “sense of control” associated with creation is also cited by Gina Gibney … Ibid.
“In the twenty-first century, what the market values is the ability to produce something rare and valuable” … Cal Newport said this to Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman on Kaufman’s The Psychology Podcast, Episode 47: “Deep Work,” www
one of the primary myths is what he calls the “breed myth” … from my Sept. 2017 interview with David Burkus, also discussed in his book The Myths of Creativity: The Truth About How Innovative Companies and People Generate Great Ideas (New York: Jossey-Boss, 2015). Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes in this chapter from Burkus are from this interview.
a third of those she interviewed could recall a “creativity scar” … From Creative Confidence. Brené Brown has talked about creative scars on Elizabeth Gilbert’s Magic Lessons podcast.
even experienced creative people had trouble predicting whether their individual projects would be successful … Thomas Oppong, “To Get More Creative, Become Less Judgmental,” The Mission (blog), Nov. 19, 2017. www
Fadell didn’t have to search for his idea—it was staring him in the face … Unless otherwise indicated, all of Fadell’s quotes in this chapter are from his May 2012 talk at the 99U conference titled “Tony Fadell on Setting Constraints, Ignoring Experts, and Embracing Self-Doubt,” www
As for playwright Miranda, his idea was waiting for him in a bookstore … Blake Ross, “Lin-Manuel Miranda Goes Crazy for House and Hamilton,” Playbill, Sept. 21, 2009, and many other sources.
as he began reading it, something clicked for him … Rebecca Mead, “All about the Hamiltons,” New Yorker, Feb. 9, 2015.
creativity arises “from looking at one thing and seeing another” … Quote from the designer Saul Bass is from his 1968 short film, “Why Man Creates.” www
Miranda looked at the story of the immigrant Hamilton … Rebecca Mead, “All About the Hamiltons.”
“smart recombinations” … This term was used and defined in John Thackara’s book In the Bubble: Designing in a Complex World (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005).
“What is at issue is not the fact of ‘borrowing’ or ‘imitating’ ” … Oliver Sacks, from the essay “The Creative Self,” in the posthumous book The River of Consciousness (New York: Knopf, 2017).
“It is the discovery and creation of problems” … Csikszentmihalyi and Getzel’s study is described in Maria Popova’s interview of Daniel Pink in “Ambiverts, Problem-Finders and the Surprising Psychology of Making Your Ideas Happen,” BrainPickings, Feb. 1, 2013. www
“Something about it just grabbed me” … Blake Ross, “Lin-Manuel Miranda Goes Crazy for House and Hamilton,” Playbill, Sept. 21, 2009.
When asked about the source of his creativity, Fadell focuses on the word “frustration” … “Tony Fadell on Setting Constraints,” 2012 99U Conference.
Grant collects ideas in a notebook … From my interview with Adam Grant, Sept. 2017. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes from Grant in this chapter are from this interview.
“didn’t recognize it until about my seventh book” … Anthony Breznican, “Dennis Lehane’s Place in the Sun,” Entertainment Weekly, May 12, 2017.
we must “shift our focus from objects” … Robert I. Sutton, Weird Ideas That Work: 11 and ½ Practices for Promoting, Managing and Sustaining Innovation (New York: The Free Press, 2000).
“customers are always beautifully, wonderfully dissatisfied” … From Bezos’s “2016 Letter to Shareholders,” Apr. 12, 2017, www
One study found 85 percent of companies surveyed admitted they had trouble diagnosing their own problems … Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg, “Are You Solving the Right Problems,” Harvard Business Review, Jan.–Feb. 2017.
“Look at your work and ask, When am I most resonant? What are people responding to in my work? ” … From Todd Henry’s interview on Srini Rao’s Unmistakable Creative podcast episode titled: “Harnessing the Power of Your Authentic Voice with Todd Henry,” https://
when she can frame the idea she’s working on as a question, it provides “a focus” … Amy Tan, “Where Does Creativity Hide?” TED Talk, Feb. 2008, www
Miranda began to immerse himself in research on the man and his life … Edward Delman, “How Lin-Manuel Miranda Shapes History,” Atlantic, Sept. 29, 2015, www
Research feeds creativity … KH Kim, The Creativity Challenge: How We Can Recapture American Innovation (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2016).
“they don’t come into existence from nothing” … John Kounios, “Eureka? Yes, Eureka!” Gray Matter, New York Times, Jun. 11, 2017.
“I read the script and ask, ‘Why?’ until there’s no more ‘Why?’ to ask” … Camille Sweeney and Josh Gosfield quoting Laura Linney in The Art of Doing: How Superachievers Do What They Do and How They Do It So Well (New York: Plume, 2013).
A few years ago, while watching one of Cleese’s creativity talks … Cleese has discussed this in speeches on creativity, as noted in Chris Higgins, “John Cleese: Create a Tortoise Enclosure for Your Mind,” Mental Floss, Nov. 11, 2009.
does his best work in close proximity to the buzz of a crowd … Scott Adams, “Creativity Hack,” Aug. 18, 2014, www
“Focus is the new IQ” … Cal Newport said this to Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman on Kaufman’s The Psychology Podcast, Episode 47: “Deep Work,” www
“the tiny cracks of inactivity in our lives” … Andrew Sullivan, “I Used to Be a Human Being,” New York magazine, Sept. 19, 2016 issue.
“It is easier to react than to create” … Stefan Sagmeister said this to me in my 2008 interview with him for my book Glimmer (New York: Penguin Press, 2009).
What if we saw attention in the same way that we saw air or water, as a valuable resource that we hold in common? … Matthew B. Crawford, “The Cost of Paying Attention,” New York Times, Mar. 7, 2015, www
“Instead of taking breaks from digital media” … Cal Newport said this to Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman on Kaufman’s The Psychology Podcast, Episode 47: “Deep Work,” www
For those who can’t bring themselves to disconnect completely … Khe Hy shared these tips with me during my May 2017 interview with him.
Recent studies have shown that bored people tend to come up with more ideas … Clive Thompson, “How Being Bored Out of Your Mind Makes You More Creative,” Wired, Jan. 25, 2017, www
“the maker’s schedule” and “the manager’s schedule” … Paul Graham in a July 2009 post on his blog: “Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule,” www
“You open your calendar and you see a blank space” … Dan Ariely, “Forget Work-Life Balance. The Question is Rest Versus Effort,” Big Think, www
You must make a conscious effort to “prune the vine” … From Todd Henry’s interview with Ron Friedman during the 2017 Peak Work Performance Summit. www
suggests giving yourself a “flow test” … from Pink’s 2009 book Drive; also discussed in his new book, When: Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing (New York: Riverhead Books, 2018).
72 percent of them did their best work in the morning … Paul Thagard, “Daily Routines of Creative People,” Psychology Today, Apr. 27, 2017, www
“To have the full benefit of the richness of the unconscious” … Dorothea Brande, Becoming a Writer. This book was originally published in 1934, and has been subsequently republished by TarcherPerigee in 1981, and by other publishers.
“No matter what happens at the end of this 45 [minutes], you are free” … Jessie Van Amburg, “Elizabeth Gilbert Never Imagined Being a Childless Adult,” Time, Nov. 25, 2016.
“if you let your mind wander” … From my interview with Kaufman in July 2017.
Tending the garden is a favorite of many artists … KH Kim, The Creativity Challenge: How We Can Recapture American Innovation.
Michael Stipe of REM composed songs in his head … Marc Myers, Anatomy of a Song: The Oral History of 45 Iconic Hits That Changed Rock, R&B and Pop (New York: Grove Press, 2016).
What one needs, according to Scott Adams, are “distractions that don’t distract” … Scott Adams, “Creativity Hack,” Aug. 18, 2014, www
“Museums are custodians of epiphanies” … Hugh Hart, “7 Pieces of ‘Damn Good’ Creative Advice From ’60s Ad Man George Lois,” Fast Company, Mar. 22, 2012, www
“the cacophony in which it is impossible to hear your own voice” … William Deresiewicz, “Solitude and Leadership” lecture at West Point, NY, Mar. 1, 2010.
“I reach up and pluck the butterfly from the air” … Ann Patchett’s quotes about “killing the butterfly” are from her essay “The Getaway Car: A Practical Memoir About Writing and Life,” which appears in the book This is the Story of a Happy Marriage (New York: Harper, 2013).
“A surplus of ideas is as dangerous as a drought” … Scott Belsky, Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles between Vision and Reality (New York: Portfolio, 2010).
“Projects that you do quietly by yourself are much easier to abandon” … From Phyllis Korkki’s interview with Chris Baty in her book The Big Thing: How to Complete Your Creative Project Even if You’re a Lazy, Self-Doubting Procrastinator Like Me (New York: HarperCollins, 2016).
Bruce Mau shares a story about a writer friend of his who was about to embark on an ambitious new book … From my 2008 series of interviews with Bruce Mau for the book Glimmer.
“What can I do with what I have?” … Scott Sonenshein, “How to Create More from What You Already Have,” Time, Feb. 27–Mar. 6, 2017.
a favorite quote from the maverick composer John Cage: “Begin anywhere” … From my 2008 series of interviews with Bruce Mau for the book Glimmer.
“I saw it with such clarity and intensity that I couldn’t get it out of my head” … William Grimes, New York Times obituary of novelist and critic William McPherson, Mar. 29, 2017.
If you shift to the “editor off” mode of your mind … Stephen Watt, “Questions for Robert Burton,” Rotman Magazine, Winter 2010.
“You start out making something wrong and then see if you can turn that bad thing into something good” … From my 2012 interview with Tom Monahan for A More Beautiful Question.
Grant describes five stages that tend to trigger different emotional responses in the creator … From my interview with Grant in Sept. 2017.
Lee Clow, felt that a good idea should be able to withstand scrutiny … I interviewed Clow many times during the late 1990s and early 2000s in my reporting for Advertising Age, Wired, and other publications.
Seth Godin has a word he uses often and persuasively, and that word is “ship” … Seth Godin, “Fear of Shipping,” Seth’s Blog, June 11, 2010, sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/06/fear-of-shipping.html.
“Creativity is a consequence of sheer productivity” … Dean Keith Simonton quoted by Robert I. Sutton, “Forgive and Remember: How a Good Boss Responds to Mistakes,” Harvard Business Review, Aug. 19, 2010, www
“We have the words ‘Done is better than perfect’ painted on our walls” … From Mark Zuckerberg’s 2012 letter to investors, “The Hacker Way,” published in Wired, Feb. 1, 2012, www
“if you wait for ideal circumstances … the market will pass you by” … Guy Kawasaki, The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone (New York: Portfolio, 2004).
we have a strong need “to feel accepted, respected and safe” … Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen, Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well (New York: Viking, 2014).
“If you know that feedback will meet resistance or dismissal from you” … From my interview with Kwame Dawes, Oct. 2017.
“ask them hard questions like: ‘What do you like least about the script?’ ” … Mike Birbiglia, “6 Tips for Making It Small in Hollywood,” New York Times, Sept. 4, 2016.
How do you figure out when to listen to other people—and when to listen to yourself? … Laurel Snyder, “When to Listen to Other Readers … and When to Ignore Them,” The NaNoWriMo Blog, Jan. 13, 2014, http://
“he doesn’t do it to be told what the movie’s vision should be” … Mike Birbiglia, “6 Tips for Making It Small in Hollywood.”
“A good note says what’s wrong, what’s missing, what makes no sense” … Ed Catmull, Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration (New York: Random House, 2014).
a then-young comedian Jon Stewart interviewed a then-aging comedian George Carlin … From a YouTube video, “George Carlin Dropping Words of Wisdom,” posted Aug. 20, 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WmTt0ynTdQ.
her father’s willingness to continually “begin again” … Kelly Carlin said this in my Nov. 2016 interview with her.
“As expertise goes up, creative output tends to go down” … from my Sept. 2017 interview with David Burkus.
Elizabeth Gilbert, in a talk extolling the benefits of “the curiosity-driven life” … From Gilbert’s talk on Oprah Winfrey’s SuperSoul Conversations, Oct. 17, 2015. www
If curiosity is unfocused (or, to use the term applied by researchers, “diversive”) … Ian Leslie, Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It (New York: Basic Books, 2014).
“You have to reject one expression of the band first before you get to the next expression” … Quote from Bono, the lead singer of the band U2, in the documentary From the Sky Down, directed by Davis Guggenheim and broadcast on Showtime Oct. 2011.
“To reach a new generation of music fans, he reinvented his approach to performing” … Jon Friedman, “Bob Dylan’s Relentless Reinvention,” Boston Globe, May 23, 2016.
“The minute you try to grab hold of Dylan, he’s no longer where he was” … Todd Haynes, director of the 2007 film I’m Not There, which was about Dylan, said this, and it has been widely quoted, including here: www
The late novelist Ursula K. Le Guin did just that when, at age eighty-one, she started her own blog … Robert Minto, “What Happens When a Science Fiction Genius Starts Blogging?,” New Republic, Sept. 7, 2017.
Where is my petri dish? This question was shared by Tim Ogilvie during my 2013 interview with him for A More Beautiful Question.
Part III: Questions to Help CONNECT WITH OTHERS
Arthur Aron and Elaine Spaulding, a pair of psychology students … Interview with Arthur Aron, Oct. 2017. Additional information from: Yasmin Anwar, “Creating Love in the Lab: The 36 Questions That Spark Intimacy,” Berkeley News, Feb. 12, 2015, www
“To Fall in Love with Anyone, Do This” … Mandy Len Catron, Modern Love, “To Fall in Love with Anyone, Do This,” New York Times, Jan. 11, 2015, www
at the FBI, Robin Dreeke’s job … From my interview with Robin Dreeke, Dec. 2017. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes from Dreeke in this chapter are from this interview.
Children come to realize, at an early age, that a question is a means to engage … Paul L. Harris, Trusting What You’re Told: How Children Learn from Others (Boston: Belknap Press, 2012). Studies also cited in the article “Mothers Asked Nearly 300 Questions a Day, Study Finds,” Telegraph, March 28, 2013.
But research suggests that if we truly want to be happy … Tara Parker-Pope, “What Are Friends For? A Longer Life,” New York Times, Apr. 21, 2009.
Various studies, including the landmark Grant Study … Scott Stossel, “What Makes Us Happy, Revisited,” Atlantic, May 2013.
“Only connect!” … E. M. Forster, Howards End, originally published in 1910 by Edward Arnold (London).
People who have companionship are not only happier and healthier, but they also are likely to have a greater sense of “meaning” … Emily Esfahani Smith, “Psychology Shows It’s a Big Mistake to Base Our Self-Worth on Our Professional Achievements,” Quartz, May 24, 2017, www
having friends at work is critical … Sarah Landrum, “Millennials Are Happiest When They Feel Connected to Their Co-Workers,” Forbes, Jan. 19, 2018, www
Why do we go around asking each other such pointless questions? … Tony DuShane, “Chris Colin, Rob Baedeker Are the Kings of Conversation,” SFGate, Mar. 16, 2014, www
coauthors of the 2014 book What to Talk About … Chris Colin and Rob Baedeker, What to Talk About: On a Plane, at a Cocktail Party, in a Tiny Elevator with Your Boss’s Boss (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2014).
writer Tim Boomer, who believes we should be should be asking just such questions … Tim Boomer, “Dating in the Deep End,” Modern Love, New York Times, Jan. 17, 2016.
Did your family throw plates? … Eleanor Stanford, “13 Questions to Ask Before Getting Married,” New York Times, Mar. 24, 2016.
What would marriage offer us that we don’t already have? … Mandy Len Catron, “To Stay in Love, Sign on the Dotted Line,” Modern Love, New York Times, Jun. 25, 2017.
Questions to ask your spouse instead of How was your day? [box] … The six questions in the box were selected from a longer list compiled by Sara Goldstein, “21 Questions to Ask Your Spouse Instead of “How Was Your Day?,” Mother.ly, Mar. 16, 2016, www
her father would ask his children, What was the most difficult problem you had today? … Adam Bryant, “Deborah Harmon, on Playing to Your Team’s Strengths,” Corner Office, New York Times, Nov. 1, 2014.
her father often asked at the dinner table: What have you failed at this week? … From an Oct. 2017 Quiet Revolution interview, “ ‘The Power of Moments’: An Interview with Chip and Dan Heath,” www
consider using a question jar, a strategy recommended by Glennon Doyle … “Save Your Relationships: Ask the Right Questions,” Momastery, Jan. 16, 2014, www
“The simple act of asking, and of listening without comment or judgment” is powerful … From my 2017 interviews with Frank Sesno, and this is covered in his book, Ask More: The Power of Questions to Open Doors, Uncover Solutions, and Spark Change (New York: AMACOM, Jan. 10, 2017).
“Increasingly, listening is a forgotten skill” … Nick Morgan, “How to Use Improv to Make Your Work Day Better: Interview with Cathy Salit,” Public Words, Jul. 28, 2016, www
“Your office space is a breeding ground for distractions” … Alison Davis, “Dramatically Improve Your Listening Skills in 5 Simple Steps,” Inc., Jul. 27, 2016, www
“Good listeners have a physical, mental, and emotional presence” … Judith Humphrey, “There Are Actually 3 Kinds of Listening–Here’s How to Master Them,” Fast Company, Aug. 16, 2016, www
“picture what the speaker is saying” … Dianne Schilling, “10 Steps to Effective Listening,” Forbes, Nov. 8, 2012, www
“The second that I think about my response, I’m half listening to what you’re saying” … Eric Barker, “How to Get People to Like You: 7 Ways from an FBI Behavior Expert,” Barking Up the Wrong Tree interview with Robin Dreeke, Oct. 26, 2014, www
As a reminder to talk less and listen more, try asking yourself the “WAIT question” … Ronald Siegel, “Wisdom in Psychotherapy,” Psychotherapy Networker, Mar.–Apr. 2013.
if social media users got into the habit of asking the WAIT question … Michael J. Socolow, “How to Prevent Smart People from Spreading Dumb Ideas,” New York Times, Mar. 22, 2018.
people are prone to “conversational narcissism” … Heleo editors in conversation with Celeste Headlee and Panio Gianopoulous, “Conversation Is a Skill. Here’s How to Be Better at It,” Heleo, Oct. 2, 2017, www
the analogy of a tennis match … Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone (New York: AMACOM, 2010). Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes in this chapter from Goulston are from this book.
a shortened form of paraphrasing known as “mirroring” … “Influence Anyone with Secret Lessons Learned from the World’s Top Hostage Negotiators with Former FBI Negotiator Chris Voss,” The Science of Success podcast, Oct. 20, 2016, www
the “AWE” question … From my interview with Michael Bungay Stanier, Oct. 2017, and also appearing in his book The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever (Toronto: Box of Crayons Press, 2016).
Salit recommends using what she calls “empathetic listening” … Nick Morgan, “How to Use Improv to Make Your Work Day Better: Interview with Cathy Salit.”
“powerless communicators” who listen and ask questions … Susan Cain, “7 Ways to Use the Power of Powerless Communication,” Quiet Revolution, Apr. 2015, www
Why are we inclined to advise others on what they should do? … From my interview with Michael Bungay Stanier, Oct. 2017.
see through what Hal Mayer calls the “fog” … Hal Mayer, “Can You Actually Help People by Just Asking Them Questions?” Leading with Questions, Apr. 27, 2017, www
if you’re thinking of criticizing friends and family, “the professional consensus boils down to one word: don’t” … Martha Beck, “The 3 Questions You Need to Ask Yourself Before Criticizing Someone,” Oprah.com, Oct. 5, 2017, www
This type of question “is, unfortunately, the starting point of 80 percent of meetings in management” … From my interview with David Cooperrider for my Harvard Business Review article “The 5 Questions Leaders Should Never Ask,” Jul. 2, 2014, www
When she first went to Reading in 2011, she said, “I did not know anything about the city” … “Another Round with SWEAT: In Conversation with Lynn Nottage and Kate Whoriskey, posted on YouTube by Sweat Broadway, Mar. 22, 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfGaZuCE6TY.
But as Nottage told the New York Times, “I like to replace judgment with curiosity” … Liz Spayd, “New Voices, but Will They Be Heard?,” Public Editor, New York Times, Apr. 23, 2017.
As she told the New Yorker, these laid-off workers felt helpless, ignored, and invisible … Michael Schulman, “The First Theatrical Landmark of the Trump Era,” New Yorker, Mar. 27, 2017.
hailed as the “first theatrical landmark of the Trump era” … Ibid.
“I feel that my role as an artist” … Liz Spayd, “New Voices, but Will They Be Heard?”
“Broadway audiences who might not have thought they could empathize with a marginalized steelworker” … Alexis Soloski, “Breaking ‘Sweat’: How a Blue-Collar Drama Crossed Over to the Great White Way,” Village Voice, Apr. 5, 2017.
most evidence suggests you’re unlikely to succeed … Elizabeth Kolbert, “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds,” New Yorker, Feb. 27, 2017.
Researchers of curiosity have stated that it exists in the gap between … Ian Leslie, Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends On It (New York: Basic Books, 2014).
The author Tom Perotta tells a story about a discovery he made … From Terry Gross’s interview with Tom Perotta on NPR’s Fresh Air radio program, Jul. 31, 2017.
It can be extremely valuable to have a “trusted other” … From my 2017 interview conducted with Edward D. Hess, author of multiple books on innovation and a professor of business administration at University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business.
Adam Hansen, coauthor of Outsmart Your Instincts, observes that to the extent we can gain a glimmer of awareness … From my 2017 interview with Hansen.
“The decisions we make, the attitudes we form, the judgments we make” … Sean Illing, “Why We Pretend to Know Things, Explained by a Cognitive Scientist,” Nov. 3, 2017, Vox, www
“what is it that my culture is preventing me from seeing?” … Kenneth Primrose interview of Iain McGilchrist on The Examined Life (blog), Dec. 2016, www
In a popular 2017 New Yorker article … Elizabeth Kolbert, “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds.”
it can be effective to show “aggressive interest” by asking questions … Jay Heinrichs, “How to Talk to Someone You Hate,” Vice’s Tonic blog, Nov. 8, 2017, www
two good bridge questions, borrowed (and slightly adapted) from the radio host Krista Tippett … Krista Tippett, Becoming Wise: An Inquiry into the Mystery and Art of Living (New York: Penguin Press, 2016). The questions were shared with Tippett by Frances Kissling, retired head of Catholics for Choice.
Ask people to rate something they don’t like on a scale of one to ten … This “motivational interviewing” technique is described by Yale professor Michael V. Pantalon in his book Instant Influence (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2011). Hat tip to Adam Grant for calling this to my attention.
“Science Guy” Bill Nye reminds us that we must be patient … From “Hey Bill Nye! How Do You Reason with a Science Skeptic?,” Big Think, April 4, 2017, www
we must dispense with “the sense that we have a monopoly on the truth” … Carl Sagan in his 1996 book The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, and as quoted by Maria Popova in “Carl Sagan on Moving Beyond Us vs. Them, Bridging Conviction with Compassion, and Meeting Ignorance with Kindness,” on her Brain Pickings blog, Nov. 9, 2016, www
“She Divorced Me Because I Left Dishes by the Sink” … Matthew Fray, from a Jan. 14, 2016 post on his blog, Must Be This Tall to Ride, www
“The person I love and married is telling me” … These and other Matthew Fray quotes are from an Aug. 2017 interview I conducted with Fray.
Close relationships can suffer if we fail to pay attention to what’s going on right in front of us … Emily Esfahani Smith citing psychologist John Gottman in “The Secret to Love Is Just Kindness,” Atlantic, June 2014.
“Questions to ask your best bud” [box] … The five questions in the box were selected from a longer list compiled by Kaitlyn Wylde, “20 Things to Ask Your Best Friend to Make Your Relationship Even Stronger,” Bustle, Oct. 26, 2015, www
Shelly Gable, a psychologist at UC Santa Barbara, refers to this as “active constructive responding” … Jeremy McCarthy, “The 3 Magic Words That Create Great Conversations,” HuffPost, Dec. 12, 2013, www
Have you made clear your concerns about the relationship? … Eric V. Copage, “Questions to Ask Before Getting a Divorce,” Vows, New York Times, May 28, 2017.
If there is a way to save the marriage, what would it be? … Ibid, quoting Rev. Kevin Wright, minister of Riverside Church in New York.
It may seem an apology is enough, but the life coach Michael Hyatt says … Michael Hyatt, “Ten Difficult, But Really Important Words,” an Aug. 4, 2017 post of Hyatt’s blog, www
“We have a primitive instinct to prove that we’re right” … From my 2017 interview with Brown University cognitive scientist Steven Sloman, coauthor with Philip Fernbach of The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone (New York: Riverhead Books, 2017).
“Proving I was right used to be a major character flaw” … Oprah Winfrey, “What Oprah Knows for Sure about Letting Go,” Oprah.com, Jul. 11, 2017, www
What does your ideal employee look like? … Wanda Wallace, “Questions Employees Should Ask Their Managers,” Jan. 5, 2017, in a guest post on Leading with Questions, www
What is most important on your list to accomplish today … From my Aug. 2017 interview with Katherine Crowley of K Squared Enterprises in New York.
“it reminds the employee who is in charge,” says Cathy Littlefield … Lydia Dishman, “This Is Why We Default to Criticism (and How to Change),” Fast Company, Nov. 3, 2017, www
only 30 percent of workers feel “fully engaged” in their jobs … Mark C. Crowley, “Gallup’s Workplace Jedi on How to Fix Our Employee Engagement Problem,” Fast Company, Jun. 4, 2013, www
today’s most effective managers must be able to show they care … Ibid.
those who listen and ask questions tend to bring in far more revenue … Adam Grant in “The Power of Powerless Communication,” a May 2013 TedxEast talk, www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_ffqEA8X5g.
the story of Bill Grumbles, an inexperienced salesman … Ibid.
“This is axiomatic in sales and persuasion” … Daniel Pink, “How to Persuade Others with the Right Questions,” Big Think, May 21, 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAL7Pz1i1jU. Ideas derived from Pink’s book To Sell is Human: The Surprising Truth about Moving Others (New York: Riverhead Books, 2012).
“Peter Drucker understood, long ago, that he could best serve clients by asking questions” … Drucker’s belief in the power of questions was described to me by Drucker Institute executive director Rick Wartzman in our 2013 conversations, as well as in Wartzman’s article “How to Consult Like Peter Drucker,” Forbes, Sept. 11, 2012.
Part IV: Questions for Stronger LEADERSHIP
“Who has influenced you most in your life?” … Posted on Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York Facebook page, Jan. 19, 2015, www
“What can we do to right this wrong?” … Footage of Nadia Lopez in action at the school from “Why Principals Matter,” Atlantic, Feb. 26, www
use diagnostic questions to try to uncover what might be wrong with a patient … From my Jan. 2018 interview with Nadia Lopez.
“VUCA environment,” a term borrowed from military commanders … Lisa Kay Solomon, “How the Most Successful Leaders Will Thrive in an Exponential World,” SingularityHub, Jan. 11, 2017, www
“Today’s leader must be a flexible thinker” … From my interview with Angie Morgan of Lead Star, Oct. 2017. Morgan also discusses this concept in her book Spark: How to Lead Yourself and Others to Greater Success by Angie Morgan, Courtney Lynch, and Sean Lynch (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017).
leadership “is more about influence than control” … David B. Peterson, “The Paradox of Leadership: Navigating the New Realities,” speech from World Business Executive Coach Summit 2017, June 15, 2017, www
we are in the midst of a leadership crisis. That’s the view of 86 percent of those surveyed … Shiza Shahid, World Economic Forum, “Crisis in Leadership Underscores Global Challenges,” Nov. 10, 2014, https://
“The recent past has showcased a leadership stage featuring Greek tragedies filled with leaders who are toxic and corrupt” … Deborah Ancona and Elaine Backman, “Distributed Leadership: From Pyramids to Networks: The Changing Leadership Landscape,” MIT whitepaper, Oct. 2017, https://
becoming a better leader is an “inside out” process … From my interview with Douglas Conant in Jan. 2018. The concept of “inside out” leadership is also featured in Conant’s essay “Leaders, You Can (And Must) Do Better. Here’s How” on LinkedIn, (www
“climb the greasy pole of whatever hierarchy they decide to attach themselves to” … William Deresiewicz, “Solitude and Leadership,” The American Scholar, Mar. 1, 2010.
“They end up cutting corners to make shareholders happy” … Douglas Conant, “Leaders, You Can (And Must) Do Better. Here’s How,” on LinkedIn.
“to be a leader for the sake of being in charge, rather than in the name of a cause or idea [the student cares] about deeply” … Susan Cain, “Followers Wanted,” New York Times, Mar. 26, 2017.
Research by the Hay Group focused on overachievers who become leaders … Scott Spreier, Mary H. Fontaine, and Ruth Malloy, “Leadership Run Amok: The Destructive Potential of Overachievers,” Harvard Business Review, June 2006.
“first make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served” … Robert K. Greenleaf, “The Servant as Leader,” an essay first published in 1970, now available on from the Robert K. Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership (www
leaderless groups “have a natural tendency to elect self-centered, overconfident and narcissistic individuals as leaders” … Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, “Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?,” Harvard Business Review, Aug. 22, 2013, www
Overconfidence breeds hubris, which can then infect an organization’s culture … Jonathan Mackey and Sharon Toye, “How Leaders Can Stop Executive Hubris,” Strategy+Business, Spring 2018 / Issue 90.
“I’ve had to embrace the fact that I’m constantly going to be in uncharted waters” … Adam Bryant, “Brian Chesky: Scratching the Itch to Create,” Corner Office, New York Times, Oct. 12, 2014.
today’s leaders must ask, Am I courageous enough to abandon the past? … Roselinde Torres’s TED Talk, “What It Takes to Be a Great Leader,” Feb. 2014, www
a recent PriceWaterhouse study and elsewhere, as a top leadership quality for the twenty-first century … Taken from the 2015 CEO survey by PwC, “Responding to Disruption.” Published Jan. 2016, www
Do I surround myself with inspiring, sometimes even odd, big
thinkers? … John Marshall, “Why Relentless Curiosity Is a Must for CEOs,” TNW, Jul. 29, 2017, www
Am I bringing together diverse people who can share points of view that I might be missing? … Roselinde Torres’s TED Talk, “What It Takes to Be a Great Leader,” Feb. 2014, www
“It’s an interesting paradox that diversity correlates to higher performance” … David B. Peterson, “The Paradox of Leadership: Navigating the New Realities,” speech from World Business Executive Coach Summit 2017, June 15, 2017, www
“I insist on a lot of time being spent, almost every day, just to sit and think” … Erica Anderson, “23 Quotes from Warren Buffett on Life and Generosity,” Forbes, Dec. 2, 2013, www
“Reflection leads to better insights into innovation, strategy and execution” … Roselinde Torres, Marin Reeves, Peter Tollman, and Christian Veith, “The Rewards of CEO Reflection,” BCG blog, June 29, 2017, www
“can expose you to the risk of acting in ways inconsistent with your goals and your nature” … Ray Dalio, Principles: Life and Work (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2017).
“You’ll be the person who speaks the truth even when it’s uncomfortable to do so” … Angie Morgan, Courtney Lynch, and Sean Lynch, Spark: How to Lead Yourself and Others to Greater Success (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017). The “Galatea effect,” as described by Morgan, is defined here: www
If we disappeared tomorrow, who would miss us? … Shared with me during a 2013 interview I conducted with Doug Rauch for A More Beautiful Question.
What do we do that other organizations can’t or won’t do? … William C. Taylor, “Simply Brilliant: 8 Questions to Help You Do Ordinary Things in Extraordinary Ways,” ChangeThis, Issue 145, www
“There’s a turning point in what’s expected from business leaders” … David Gelles and Claire Cain Miller, “Business Schools Now Teaching #MeToo, N.F.L. Protests, and Trump,” New York Times, Dec. 25, 2017.
How might we be not just a company but a cause? … From my 2013 interview with business consultant Tim Ogilvie for A More Beautiful Question.
Why do otherwise successful people get tripped up by the trivial? … Greg McKeown’s question from “Essentialism,” Talks at Google, Apr. 29, 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQKrt1-IDaE. He also covers this theme in his book Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (New York: Crown Business, 2014).
an “essentialist” thoughtfully considers the question Which problem do I want?—as opposed to reflexively asking, How can I do both? … From Greg McKeown’s book Essentialism.
“Jobs would slash the bottom seven and announce, ‘We can only do three’ ” … Walter Isaacson, “The Real Leadership Lessons of Steve Jobs,” Harvard Business Review, April 2012.
“When a leader says no to something, she is also usually saying no to someone and that takes courage” … From the interview I conducted with executive coach Michael Bungay Stanier Sept. 2017.
“systematic abandonment” … The concept, sometimes referred to as “purposeful abandonment,” is described in Leigh Buchanan, “The Wisdom of Peter Drucker from A to Z,” Inc., Nov. 19, 2009. www
What stupid rule would you most like to kill? … Lisa Bodell for futurethink, “Killer QuickWin: Kill a Stupid Rule,” Mar. 9, 2012, www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqN3AYjkxRQ.
Harvard University’s James Ryan, who uses What truly matters? as one of his own five essential questions … From my interview with James E. Ryan Oct. 2017. Ryan’s five questions are featured in his book Wait, What? And Life’s Other Essential Questions (New York: HarperOne, 2017).
What is the one thing I can do that would make everything else easier or unnecessary? … Dan Schawbel, “Gary Keller: How to Find Your One Thing,” Forbes, May 23, 2013. Also see Gary Keller’s book, coauthored with Jay Papasan, The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results (Austin: Bard Press, 2013).
“The manager has his or her eye always on the bottom line; the leader’s eye is on the horizon” … Warren Bennis, On Becoming a Leader (New York: Basic Books, 2009; originally published in 1989).
The first wave “is the wave you’re on at the moment, the current core business” … Adam Bryant, “Surfing the Three Waves of Innovation,” Corner Office, New York Times, Oct. 8, 2017.
“If I’m a leader I obsess about the small problems of the moment and don’t give enough thought to the major problems a few years down the road” … From multiple interviews I conducted with business consultant Don Derosby in the fall of 2017.
New York restaurateur Danny Meyer, who likes to ask: How can we become the company that would put us out of business? … Leigh Buchanan, “100 Great Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” Inc., April 2014.
What would the seventh generation think about what we’re doing? … Molly Larkin, “What Is the 7th Generation Principle and Why Do You Need to Know About It?,” from her blog, May 15, 2013, www
he waded into a “toxic culture” … Rodger Dean Duncan, “How Campbell’s Soup’s Former CEO Turned the Company Around,” Fast Company, Sept. 18, 2014, www
“They literally began to take some of the chicken out of the chicken noodle soup” … Art Kleiner, “The Thought Leader Interview: Douglas Conant,” Strategy+Business, Autumn 2012 / Issue 68.
“brush these interactions aside because they’re too busy trying to get the ‘real work’ done” … Ibid.
By some measures, a third of working Americans feel disengaged at their jobs … Mark C. Crowley, “Gallup’s Workplace Jedi on How to Fix Our Employee Engagement Problem,” Fast Company, June 4, 2013, www
poor upward communication—it’s “a major pathology” … Tim Kuppler, “Leadership, Humble Inquiry & the State of Culture Work—Edgar Schein,” Mar. 10, 2014, CultureUniversity.com, www
“Every day spent behind your closed door is a day you’re not out learning about your people” … Jack and Suzy Welch, “The One Question Every Boss Should Ask,” LinkedIn, Dec. 2, 2014, www
David Cooperrider, one of the creators of the now-widely-used practice known as “Appreciative Inquiry” … David L. Cooperrider and Diana Whitney, Appreciative Inquiry: A Positive Revolution in Change (Oakland: Berrett-Kohler, 2005).
“When someone hears ‘why’ or ‘why not,’ they are primed to justify the current situation” … Nathaniel Greene, “Misguided Questions Kill Businesses,” Leadership Freak (blog), Apr. 5, 2017, www
“of all the events that can deeply engage people at work, the single most important is simply making progress on meaningful work” … Teresa Amabile, “The Progress Principle,” TEDxAtlanta Talk, Oct. 12, 2011, www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD6N8bsjOEE.
“Is it because they can’t do it, they won’t do it, or they don’t know how to do it?” … John Barrett, “The Can’t, Won’t, Don’t Question …,” John Barrett Leadership (blog), Nov. 21, 2017, www
How would you like to see yourself growing in this role? … William Arruda, “Coaching Skills Every Leader Needs to Master,” Forbes, Oct. 17 2015, www
Would my employees, if asked, be able to articulate the company’s vision and priorities? … Robert S. Kaplan, “What to Ask the Person in the Mirror,” Harvard Business Review, Jan. 2007.
“No one likes getting questioned by the Spanish Inquisition, although that does appear to be the inspiration for many managers’ approaches” … Michael Bungay Stanier, “The Right Way to Ask a Question,” Toronto Globe and Mail, Apr. 6, 2016.
“All of us are smarter than any of us” … Socrates says this to the playwright Agathon at a dinner party at the start of Plato’s dialogue, the “Symposium.” Ronald Gross, Socrates’ Way: Seven Keys to Using Your Mind to the Utmost (TarcherPerigee, Oct. 2002).
research suggests many people are apt to leave their jobs if and when they stop learning … Annie Murphy Paul, “This Is the Biggest Reason Talented Young Employees Quit Their Jobs,” Business Insider, Sept. 18, 2012, www
“Research on curiosity shows that it tends to flourish in an environment” … This has been the focus of work by educator Susan Engel and is covered in her article “The Case for Curiosity,” Educational Leadership, Feb. 2013. Environmental effects on curiosity are also discussed Ian Leslie’s book Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It (New York: Basic Books, 2014).
“Leaders must be role models for good thinking” … From my Dec. 2017 interview with Ed Hess of the University of Virginia.
“they share a habit of mind best described as ‘applied curiosity’ ” … Adam Bryant, “How to Be a CEO, from a Decade’s Worth of Them,” Corner Office, New York Times, Oct. 27, 2017.
start meetings “by asking open-ended questions” … Chuck Leddy, “The Seven Principles of Productivity: Author Morten Hansen Explains How to Be Great at Work,” National Center for the Middle Market, Jan. 22, 2018, www
“so people see that somebody whom I value can debate with me” … Adam Bryant, “Pedro J. Pizarro: A Leader Who Encourages Dissent,” Corner Office, New York Times, Oct. 27, 2017.
How can we make questioning safe? How can we make it rewarding? How can we make it productive? … Warren Berger, “5 Ways to Help Your Students Become Better Questioners,” Edutopia, Aug. 18, 2014, www
many employees—about two-thirds of them, according to one survey—feel “unable to ask a question at work” … Todd Kashdan, “Companies Value Curiosity, But Stifle It Anyway,” Harvard Business Review, Oct. 21, 2015, www
a new teaching approach called “Inquiry-Based Learning” (IBL) … Heather Wolpert-Gawron, “What the Heck is Inquiry-Based Learning?” Edutopia, Aug. 11, 2016, www
“you want to have real debate among your people, because that supports the best decision-making” … Chuck Leddy, “The Seven Principles of Productivity: Author Morten Hansen Explains How to Be Great at Work,” National Center for the Middle Market, Jan. 22, 2018, www
I know we disagree on this, but will you gamble with me on it? [Can we] disagree and commit? … From Bezos’s “2016 Letter to Shareholders,” Apr. 12, 2017, www
curiosity “is a state not a trait.” It waxes and wanes depending on circumstances … Ian Leslie, Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It (New York: Basic Books, 2014).
The consultants Jane Hyun and Audrey Lee urge leaders to ask, Whose voice might I have missed hearing … Leigh Buchanan, “100 Great Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” Inc., April 2014.
Conclusion: The Inquiring Life
Think of a surgeon or airline pilot, for example, who refers to a printed checklist of important reminders … The effectiveness of checklists is explored at length in Atul Gawande’s The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right (New York: Henry Holt & Co., 2009).
if each of us devotes just four minutes a day to thinking of questions to ask ourselves, it adds up to twenty-four hours … Hal Gregersen of the MIT Leadership Center created an initiative, the 4-24 Project, encouraging 4 minutes a day of questioning. The project’s website: www
Reid Hoffman, a cofounder of LinkedIn, spends a few minutes each night before bed asking himself questions … Michael Simmons, “Why Successful People Spend 10 Hours a Week on Compound Time,” The Mission (blog), August 10, 2017, www
when you’re trying to establish a new habit (or break an old one), you should use a system of rewards … For more on how to use rewards to encourage habit changes, see Charles Duhigg, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life and Business (New York: Random House, 2012).
among the best is the Question Formulation Technique … For more on this technique, visit the Right Question Institute website (www
Combating stinkin’ thinkin’ … to borrow a phrase from the Saturday Night Live character Stuart Smalley, played by Al Franken.
by various measures of global health and well-being, the world is actually getting better all the time … Here’s just one of a number of articles that makes this point: Nicholas Kristof, “Good News, Despite What You’ve Heard,” New York Times, July 1, 2017.
Is this bad feeling you have really true? … the negative-thinking questions were shared by psychologist Judith Beck in my interview with her in 2013 for A More Beautiful Question.
What went well today? … Psychologist Martin Seligman discusses the importance of reflecting on positive events in an article by Julie Scelfo, “The Happy Factor: Practicing the Art of Well-Being,” New York Times, April 9, 2017.
Innovators and inventors often tackle problems by asking “Why?,” “What If?,” and “How?” questions … This is covered at length in A More Beautiful Question, but for a shorter explanation of the “Why?,” “What If?,” and “How?” questioning cycle, see my post “Tackle Any Problem with These 3 Questions,” Fast Company’s Co.Design site, May 19, 2014, www
Seth Grahame-Smith, came up with his mashup idea while in a bookstore … In this video interview, posted March 22, 2012 on the site ComicBookMovie.com, Grahame-Smith discusses the inspiration for his mashup idea. www
keep pausing to ask the other person, What do you think? … James Ryan’s quote comes from an article by Christina Nunez, “These 5 Questions Might Boost Your Curiosity—and Make You Happier,” National Geographic, May 26, 2017, news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/05/wait-what-book-talk-chasing-genius-jim-ryan-commencement-speech.
L.I.F.E. questions … This is an original exercise created for this book by Laura E. Kelly, based on her research of family conversation techniques.
Sara Blakely, the entrepreneur who founded Spanx apparel, was inspired by this question … From an Oct. 2017 Quiet Revolution interview, “ ‘The Power of Moments’: An Interview with Chip and Dan Heath,” www
Using questions instead of giving advice … The list of questions is inspired by Hal Mayer, “Can You Actually Help People by Just Asking Them Questions?” Leading with Questions, Apr. 27, 2017, www
The following “killer interview questions” were inspired by those shared by chief executives … Jason Karaian, “We Got 10 CEOs to Tell Us Their One Killer Interview Question for New Hires,” Quartz, Feb. 4, 2016, www
a mission question. What if the leaders of families did this? … Author Bruce Feiler has explored the idea of having a family mission/purpose in his book, The Secrets of Happy Families: Improve Your Mornings, Rethink Family Dinner, Fight Smarter, Go Out and Play, and Much More (New York: William Morrow, 2013). In addition, ideas for this passage on family questioning, and several of the questions listed, were drawn from Paul Sullivan, “Keeping the Family Tree Alive,” New York Times, Dec. 29, 2017.
Research indicates that creating a resolution in question form may be more effective … Based on more than 100 studies spanning forty years of research, as reported in, among other sources, Cheyenne MacDonald, “Will You Stick to Your New Year’s Resolutions? Psychologists Say Asking Questions Rather than Making Statements Helps People Follow Goals,” The Daily Mail, Dec. 28, 2015.
“How might” questions free you to do your best creative thinking … Quote is from my interview with Tim Brown for my post “The Secret Phrase Top Innovators Use,” Harvard Business Review, Sept. 17, 2012.
“a question that is hard (and interesting) enough that it is worth answering—and easy enough to actually answer it” … From my email interview with physicist Edward Witten in Feb. 2013 for A More Beautiful Question. Witten originally said this in an interview for “Physics’ Sharpest Mind Since Einstein,” CNN, Jul. 5, 2005.