One Rule To Rule Them All

Early in my career I used to think asking questions made me look stupid.

Especially in meetings where I was supposed to be the “expert.”

But the smartest people I know ask the most questions.

Take one of my former managers.

He’d walk into meetings and ask things like “Help me understand why this approach works better.”

Because he wanted to really understand.

And sometimes he asked the questions in a big meeting, naming the “elephant in the room”.

I started copying him. Instead of pretending I had all the answers, I got curious:

“What am I missing here?”
“What assumptions are we making?”
“What is the biggest risk of this approach?”

Curiosity builds trust faster than pretending to know everything.

Because there’s no one who knows everything, and people know it.

Now when I’m stuck on a problem, I don’t go for solutions first.

I ask questions. It’s uncomfortable, but it works.

What’s the last question you were afraid to ask at work? Why didn’t you ask it?