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It is rather common these days to say that there are no such things as stupid questions, but (and apologies if this sounds stupid) does anyone actually believe that?
Interestingly, we tend to praise those who ask smart questions but rarely condemn the reverse. Yet, unsurprisingly, smart questions are far less common than dumb, and especially average ones. Let us start with those …
Harmless
Average or typical questions are those that will invite no reaction, because they are expected, adhere to a norm or etiquette, and may even be useful or at least “hygiene” questions in the sense of attempting to highlight some basic coordinates of group collaboration or team effectiveness. For example:
1. “Are we all aligned on the objective?”
2. “What does success look like?”
3. “What does the data tell us?”
4. “Who else needs to be involved?”
5. “What are the next steps?”
In fact, you may (as many people do) use these at liberty irrespective of whether you paid attention to what was said in a meeting, and may even gain some undeserved brownie points for apparently paying attention and perhaps even showcasing a level of professionalism or competence that may impress an amateur audience.
Expertise, intelligence, and good judgment
Moving on to smart or clever questions, these must, by definition, stand out, not only for being unusual but also for being indicative of deep expertise, intelligence, and good judgment, not to mention emotional intelligence (EQ) or the ability to decipher some hidden aspect of organizational politics, subliminal messages, or the capacity to spot some logical flaws or reasoning errors where others don’t – AND, the ability to expose this with a simple question, at times by throwing a skilled, unexpected curveball. Here are some examples:
1. “What would have to be true for this to work?”
Forces people to surface hidden assumptions rather than continue debating conclusions.
2. “What are we not seeing because we are looking at the problem this way?”
Questions the frame rather than the answer, inviting people to consider whether their perspective itself is limiting what they can see.
3. “Which problem are we actually trying to solve, and is it the one that matters most?”
Exposes the surprisingly common tendency for teams to become very good at solving the wrong problem.
4. “What is the strongest argument against what we are proposing?”
Forces the group to challenge its own reasoning rather than simply accumulate evidence in favor of what it already wants to do.
5. “What would change our minds?”
Perhaps the smartest of the five, because if the answer is “nothing,” you are probably not having a discussion at all. You are witnessing a conclusion looking for supporting evidence.
To be fair, the above questions may be easily dismissed if the person asking them lacks a reputatipon for being intelligent. Indeed, extensive research has shown that we perceive thoughts and ideas as extraordinarily smart or plainly irrelevant based on who provides them, which explains why so many popular internet quotes tend to be attributed to Socrates, Confucious, or Lincoln rather than Michael Scott or Dilbert.
Needless to say, in an age in which too many people crowdsource smart questions from generative AI (as, you won’t be surprised, I have done), it is increasingly common – and necessary – to be skeptical about seemingly smart sounding questions, especially if people are discretely gazing at their screens when they produce unusually erudite or intellectual ideas and words, including “narrative,” “nuance,” “framing,” “first principles,” “second-order effects,” and, for those really determined to sound intelligent, “epistemic” (okay this last one may be too much). Also, when AI commoditizes our ability to produce complex, intelligent-sounding words, turning thought into the intellectual equivalent of a microwaved ready meal, such language inevitably loses its power to signal intelligence and instead becomes just another square on the board of management cliché bingo.
Not so smart
But what about dumb questions? Perhaps the list is so long that a standalone article would be required. Also, because it is easy to accidentally offend people when criticizing in good spirit, it may be pertinent to reference some of the science on what people typically perceive as a dumb question, especially if we are to provide readers with a simple yet practical taxonomy and guideline to avoiding these questions.
1. A question that isn’t a question
Whenever the ostensible purpose is to ask, but the actual purpose is to perform, show off, advertise expertise, or hear yourself speak, it is pertinent to classify that as a dumb question. Fittingly, there is a large organizational literature on impression management and self-promotion, showing that people strategically manage how competent others perceive them to be, mostly by asking questions that are aimed at impressing the audience rather than chasing an answer.
Examples:
“Given the geopolitical uncertainty, rapid technological disruption, and changing nature of stakeholder capitalism, isn’t the real question whether we need to fundamentally rethink our entire operating model?”
At times, there may not even be an attempt to camouflage or disguise this type of interventins as questions, so they may be preceded by confessional statements or disclaimers such as:
“This is more of an observation than a question…”
Or even
“Don’t feel you need to answer this, but I think/feel that…”
2. A question you already know the answer to
These include questions answered (or even asked!) five minutes earlier, questions whose answers were on the previous slide, or questions you could answer yourself with minimal effort, including by reading the pre-read or brief that was circulated ahead of the meeting. Thus, if good questions signal that you have listened or done your homework, bad questions often derive from not bothering to focus or pay attention, which will signal indifference, self-importance, or sloppiness (if not all of the above).
Examples:
“So, when are we launching?”
Ten minutes after discussing the September launch.
“And who’s leading this?”
Asked of the person who has just introduced herself as the project leader.
3. A question based on a false assumption
The question contains its own conclusion, so answering it means accepting a premise that may be wrong. This has particularly strong experimental foundations: classic research by Elizabeth Loftus famously showed that simply embedding false presuppositions in questions can alter people’s subsequent reports and even memories. Inadvertently or not, loaded, presupposition-laden questions, can introduce a lot of noise and bias in discussions and are therefore rather unintelligent contributions to meetings and team debates.
Examples:
“Why are younger employees less loyal?”
“Why aren’t our clients excited about the new strategy?”
“How should we deal with the productivity problems caused by remote work?”
“Why aren’t men adopting AI at the same rate?”
“Why aren’t women interested in being leaders?”
4. A question nobody can answer
These are questions that demand a degree or level of certainty, precision, or knowledge that simply doesn’t exist, but are dressed up as serious strategic inquiry, seeking to masquerade competence with detail, and disregarding accuracy or precision.
Examples:
“What percentage of our jobs will AI replace by 2030?”
“What will our industry look like in ten years?”
“Exactly how much revenue will this transformation generate?”
The problem isn’t asking about the future. That’s what strategy is partly about. The stupidity lies in demanding certainty where only assumptions, scenarios, or probabilities are possible.
5. A question that has nothing to do with the discussion
Finally, what is arguably the most common type of dumb question, namely the irrelevant question. It may even be intelligent in isolation, or a different context, but contributes nothing to the problem being solved. This maps neatly onto Grice’s foundational work on conversation: effective communication depends, among other things, on relevance and providing the appropriate amount of information for the purpose of the exchange.
Examples:
“What are our competitors doing?” When there is no obvious reason competitors should determine what you do. “What does this mean for our culture?” Ah, the Swiss Army knife of corporate questions, applicable from an acquisition to changing the brand of coffee in the kitchen (and then you can allude to it eating strategy for breakfast, especially because Peter Drucker never actually said it). “Should we take a step back and ask what problem we’re actually solving?” Potentially brilliant at minute five; considerably less so after 45 minutes spent defining the problem.
When in doubt, don’t ask
So, before asking a question of others, ask yourself five simple questions: Is it really a question? Do I already have the answer? Am I assuming something that may not be true? Can anybody actually know the answer? And, perhaps most importantly, is it relevant?
And remember: a stupid question is not necessarily one that reveals ignorance. In fact, admitting ignorance can produce some of the smartest questions, not least because it signals self-awareness, intellectual humility, and a genuine desire to learn. “I don’t understand why we are doing this” may be considerably more useful than a two-minute intervention involving first principles, second-order effects, and an emerging narrative.
Ultimately, the purpose of asking questions is not to demonstrate how much you know, but to reduce how much you don’t know, or help the group think better about something it does not yet understand. This is why the smartest people in a meeting are not necessarily those who ask the most sophisticated-sounding questions, but those who know which question will move the conversation forward, and when no question is needed at all. In a world where AI can manufacture an impressive-sounding question in seconds, that judgment may become the real marker of intelligence.
And, if you are still unsure whether your question will improve the meeting, there is always one reliably intelligent alternative: don’t ask it.
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