We are smarter together when we work from well-timed questions. We know we're working from well-timed questions because they feel focusing, inspiring and engaging. Mistimed questions feel anxiety provoking, frustrating and unproductive. The core difference between great and awful meetings is the quality of questions that shape them.
There are many ways to craft well-time questions. Here is a handful to consider.
Dreaming
Turn into new questions anything we want to see possible, anything you consider a progress or success indicator. Use these as lenses to see new questions more clearly.
Uncertainty & ambiguity
Think about what in this context seems unclear, unverified, unpredictable or a concern and translate each into new questions.
Beliefs
List out everything you believe, expect and assume are true. You don't have to include what we already know for sure because we have data or trusted knowledge of it. Translate each into a new question.
Discover & decide
Identify anything we think we need to discover and decide in this context. Include anything we think we should research or come to conclusions together about.
Diverse inquiry
Generate new questions across the entire inquiry spectrum of who, what, when, where, why, how, which, what else, what if, what could we, what should we and what will we.
Each of these approaches, and in combination, can generate and iterate better and better questions that make us smarter and faster together. Well-timed questions create inspiration, alignment and velocity. Nothing else has this power.