I am a serious believer in Quality Questions. The idea of quality questions is nothing new. Socrates was asking quality questions all the way back in ancient Greece. We have the Socratic method for that very reason.
In more modern times Tony Robbins has been banging on about quality questions for years and rightfully so.
In fact, to bastardise one of his quotes I will say this… The Quality of your Business (and for that matter your life) will be in direct proportion to the quality of the questions you ask Yourself! The better the question, often the better the answer. On the flip side of that coin… The worse the questions you ask yourself the worse the answers you will find.
Try asking yourself “Why does this always happen to me?” questions when something goes wrong and sooner or later you will reach the wrong conclusions.
In bad situations the better question you can ask yourself int that moment the quicker you will recover. “What can I learn from this?” is obviously better than “Why me?”
Anyway Peter Thiel in his remarkable book “Zero to One” gives us seven questions we should be asking ourselves.
1. The Engineering Question Can you create breakthrough technology instead of incremental improvements?
2. The Timing Question Is now the right time to start your particular business?
3. The Monopoly Question Are you starting with a big share of a small market?
4. The People Question Do you have the right team?
5. The Distribution Question Do you have a way to not just create but deliver your product?
6. The Durability Question Will your market position be defensible 10 and 20 years into the future?
7. The Secret Question Have you identified a unique opportunity that others don’t see?
Each question is there to give you a method to see the market clearly or give yourself a competitive advantage. I was going to give my commentary on each of the questions and why I think each is so powerful. The thing is I think that would rob you of some of the thinking you should do for yourself. If you ask yourself a Quality Question like “What makes that question so powerful/valuable?” or “How will answering this question gives me a competitive advantage?” then you will have to think through the questions by yourself.
When you come up with good answers, you will not only value the answer more, but you will also value the questions more.
So there you go some food for thought. Oh and if you like the idea of having ways to give yourself a massive advantage over other people who don’t ask themselves the right questions YOU WILL LOVE THIS.