What’s your burning question? How a practice of asking and answering creates better work
Have you ever found yourself staring at a blank page, wondering what to write? Have you ever found yourself at the beginning of a project, uncertain about the outcome, and even less certain about how to start? Any creative work is challenging because it demands answers from the unknown.
Luckily, we each have the tools to face these challenges. Humans enter the world equipped with curiosity and the ability to apply it to creation. We are most creative when we ask powerful questions and seek genuine solutions.
In this article, we’ll look at how to ask questions throughout the creative process, and explore practices that help us ask better questions.
Curiosity: shape the work with questions
Ask: Why does this situation exist? Is there a problem or opportunity here?
Our questions shape our creative work by defining how we think about problems and how we approach solving them. Questions are seeds from which our creations unfold. The finished work reflects the original question, its form shaped by attempts to answer it and follow-up questions asked along the way.
Questions create the frameworks that our work takes shape around. Because of this, it’s important to define the question you’re trying to answer clearly, on as many levels of detail as you can. Problems and inconsistencies arise when the questions aren’t clearly defined or communicated.
If you’re a creative contributor to a project, find your place in the work by asking questions of your leaders and collaborators.
- What are their visions?
- How do they see the problems you’re trying to solve together?
- What do they understand about the situation, problem and opportunity?
Ideation: create a broad canvas of possibilities
Ask: What are all the possible questions? What is the most promising question to pursue?
To end up with the best work, it’s important to start with a long list of questions. Being curious about what we observe leads naturally to a flow of ideas and discoveries. The more we ask, the more possibilities we can consider, and the more likely we are to find a successful solution.
After you have a long list of questions, prioritize according to the importance, the ease of answering and the potential impact.
When contributing to a business, ask questions about both the customers and the company.
- By asking about both, we are more likely to find a solution that creates communication and connection around their mutual needs.
Work in progress: steer the creative process
Ask: How can we answer the question we’ve chosen? What tools do we need? What direction should we go to start looking for the answer? Once we’ve started, how do we know whether we’re on the right track?
Surround all parts of the process and solution with questions to ensure the best result.
Many modern teams have questions already built into their processes:
- What is research? A process of asking questions about the materials, the requirements, or the audience.
- What is development? Asking and answering questions about the best way to construct a product.
- What is a retrospective? An organized process of asking questions about the working process in order to improve it.
Collaboration: align and improve
Ask: How do we align on a shared vision? How do we help one another improve?
Questions are a powerful tool for connecting with others. They help collaborators align on a shared vision. They help collaborators grow together and encourage people to own their learnings.
When people answer questions, they take ownership of both the problem and the solution. They have opportunities to contribute their creativity and energy to the project.
How can we ask better questions?
Create a daily practice of asking and answering questions. Every day, I start my work by brainstorming a few of the most important questions that pertain to the projects I’m working on that day. Then I spend 15 minutes freewriting answers, follow-up questions and related thoughts.
These sessions help me focus on the tasks I’ll be facing during the day. They train me to see unresolved questions more easily and identify the most important ones more quickly. And they often generate the most creative ideas of my day.
My practice is inspired by Julia Cameron’s Morning Pages and Josh Waitzkin’s Most Important Questions.
- Julia Cameron suggests freewriting for three pages each morning to get your thoughts flowing and prepare for creative work. The writing can be serious or silly, meaningful or nonsense. Anything goes, as long as you’re producing a flow of words.
- Josh Waitzkin has a practice of writing the most important question he’s thinking about before he leaves his desk at the end of the day. This gives him a starting point for his work the next day, and allows for diffuse, subconscious thinking about the topic. In the morning, he begins his work with a short session of freewriting on the topic.
Questions and answers: a cycle of growth
A question is alive. An answer can be a dead-end if it doesn’t lead to more questions. A question creates new space and new possibilities. It opens new pathways. It enables formation and motion.
Questions are openings, dynamic invitations. Answers are closings, and hold the risk of becoming static and rigid. These energies need to be balanced. One cannot exist without the other. When balanced, they feed one another and enable growth.
What questions will you ask?
When we approach our work with curiosity and questions, it becomes clear how to start and how to proceed. What questions are you working on? Do you have a practice for asking better questions? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Join the discussion with a comment or a question of your own.
