Questions.

So many have been asked since September 11. Why? How? What of the future?

The irony is that one reason the attack on America was able to happen is that the right questions weren't asked. Apart from the whole, so many of the individual components which made up the attack were unthinkable. Hijack within America, synchronised hijacks, hijackers who were fully trained pilots, hijackers determined to take their own lives. None of these had happened before individually, let alone together.

The threats to New York and Washington were not anticipated because doing so would have required putting together a jigsaw made up of invisible pieces. Asking the 'unaskable'.

Whether we want to predict the future or identify opportunities for improvement, success depends much more on asking the right questions than knowing all the answers.

Questions open the door to opportunities. Opportunities to see the future. Opportunities to improve. Opportunities to simplify.

Questions come in many forms. The simplest ones ('why?', 'how?', etc.) don't need to be sought out, we just need to take time out to ask them.

As a production manager a few years ago, I was surprised to learn at one point that many of my factory floor operators were actually qualified in areas including marketing, accounting and science. Having finally asked the question, I was able to look out for opportunities for these people to put some of their skills to good use. What hidden skills do your people have?

Much of my work involves mapping and understanding basic business processes like order processing and planning - mundane processes repeated numerous times every day by those involved. The results are always a revelation: participants in the process are amazed that a simple process can involve over 100 steps from end to end, most of which are not actually needed. Opportunities to improve abound, but have remained invisible because the question 'why?' has not been asked.

Sometimes more sophisticated questions rely on the 'asker' having a vision, no matter how vague, of what the answer might be.

In coaching people to become more efficient, I am frequently appalled at the time wasted by many who are unfamiliar with the computer software they use every day. I recently helped a team virtually half their workload - and vastly reduce paperwork - by working with them to get more out of the spreadsheet program they were already using. The exercise opened their eyes and, with new answers in sight, the questions flowed!

The tragedy in America has forced U.S. intelligence to ask a whole new set of questions, some they never dreamed of asking. The challenge for the rest of us is to do the same - without it being forced on us. Ask away!