????有一次參加電話會議之前，我問會議組織者是否安排了硬性休會的安排。他說，沒有，不過他希望會議能在45分鐘內結束。

????會議開始70分鐘以后，我中斷了通話，因為我清楚，我可以經常假裝Skype斷線。對此沒有人會有意見。因為，似乎并不是只有我一個人對這種會議感到失望。

????我失望的原因不僅僅是會議耗時過長，也不是因為在這70分鐘的時間里沒有實現任何有價值的結果。我也并不是因為時間被浪費而感到惱怒。經過仔細考慮，我更加確信，電話會議之所以很少能令人滿意，原因在于，我們參會是希望能實現有意義的協作。可事實上，這種環境讓我們內心更傾向于防止損失和顧全面子。我們之所以發言，是因為不發言就會降低自己在這個群體中的地位。我們之所以不停說話，是因為我們擔心還沒有證明自己的價值。所有人都只在乎如何讓自己聽起來聰明絕頂，卻往往忘記了要給予其他人我們自己同樣渴望的那種認可。

????沃倫?貝格爾在自己即將出版的新書《更好的問題：詢問的力量》（ A More Beautiful Question: The Power of Inquiry to Spark Breakthrough Ideas）中提到，類似這樣的經歷充分證明了“提問文化”的必要性。

????貝格爾寫道，許多公司并不鼓勵真正的交流——說白了，就是不給你機會去質疑規劃、創意乃至其他同事。他認為，鼓勵集體提問的辦公室文化能夠形成巨大的優勢。谷歌（Google）每周一次的TGIF討論會有時候非常混亂，所有員工在討論會上都可以向拉里?佩奇和謝爾蓋?布林提問。貝格爾對這種做法非常贊賞。此外，麻省理工學院媒體實驗室(MIT's Media Lab)的做法也獲得了貝格爾的認可。這個實驗室的工程師們不斷地進行廣泛的實驗，雖然一再失敗，但每一次失敗都是向成功邁近了一步。

????在這種環境中，不懂不會受到懲罰。設計公司IDEO的保羅?本奈特告訴貝格爾：“我一直都把自己看成一個傻瓜。”他相信，這種愿意提出“令人難以置信的天真問題”的態度卻幫助他的公司實現了茁壯成長。

????本奈特所謂的“令人難以置信的天真問題”是指那些非常基本的問題，以致于有些人會認為他是一個遲鈍的人。有一次，他受邀在冰島議會就該國的金融危機發表演說，他問道：“錢都到哪兒去了？”后來他解釋說，提這個問題并不是出于無禮，而是因為這種“首要之事優先提問”的方式可以激發聽眾，用簡單的語言解釋問題，而問題的根源也會隨之變得清清楚楚。

????令人難以置信的天真問題之所以“有效”是因為，它們會降低聽眾的防衛心理。此外，它們會迫使我們放棄那些死板的答案。貝格爾認為，這種方式雖然會放緩對話的節奏——但卻大有裨益。

????“在大多數會議以及大多數商業場合，我們往往會努力推動事情的發展，只考慮‘把事情做好’。這是一種天生的沖動。把事情做好和保持進度當然很重要。可問題在于，它會讓我們無暇質疑其他設想。比如：我們為什么要做這件事？我們是不是真的考慮周詳了？是否考慮過其他的可能性？”

????貝格爾建議，暫停下來，給自己一個提問的機會，對團隊基本的操作假設提出質疑。（我想提的一個問題是：“我們希望在70分鐘的時間里實現哪些無法用45分鐘實現的結果？”）

????這種暫停的設計沒有理想的準則。但隨著時間的推移，團隊會培養出對這種暫停的寬容。“雖然它看起來拖累了進度，但實際上，它可以保證你們不會被事先設定的‘進度’引向錯誤的方向。”

????我認為，只要有明智的CEO鼎力支持，用確鑿的實例證明，令人難以置信的天真問題并不一定代表軟弱、愚蠢，也不代表缺乏團隊精神，建立這種提問的文化就不會很難。但如果你的上司是一位沒有安全感的中層管理者，他并不喜歡這種觀點，也不喜歡人們提出的問題，又該怎么辦？

????對此，貝格爾并不擔心。

????“領導者必須讓拒不合作的人知道，公司希望他們能提出問題，同時也歡迎其他人提出的問題。此外，要鼓勵人們提出有雄心的、積極的、經過深思熟慮的和具有可行性的問題。”（而不是那些關于休假政策的問題。）

????它或許意味著要對好的問題給以獎勵。也意味著為了保證質疑討論會的效果，需要確定新的集體責任。“不要懲罰（提問的人）。比如說：‘好，既然你提出了問題，現在就由你（親自）來找出答案吧。’”

????大多數好問題不會有令人滿意的答案。但只有欣然接受這種混亂，以及時不時冒出來的粗魯或傻氣，我們才能摸索出一條通向智慧的路。（財富中文網）

????譯者： 劉進龍/汪皓

????I was about to get on a conference call and asked the call organizer if he had scheduled a hard stop. No, he said, but he hoped the call would be over in 45 minutes.

????The call started, and after 70 minutes I hung up knowing I could always pretend Skype had dropped the call. But no one complained. It seems I wasn't the only one frustrated.

????It wasn't just that the call was long, or that in an hour and 10 minutes nothing noteworthy had been accomplished. Nor was I irritated because time had been wasted. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I was that conference calls rarely satisfy because we join them hoping to enjoy meaningful collaboration when, in fact, the whole set-up trains our minds toward loss-prevention and saving face. We talk because not talking will lower our status in the group. We keep talking because we worry we haven't yet proven our value. And everyone becomes so focused on sounding smart that we often don't give others the recognition we ourselves crave.

????Experiences like these amply demonstrate the need for a "questioning culture," Warren Berger argues in his forthcoming book, A More Beautiful Question: The Power of Inquiry to Spark Breakthrough Ideas.

????Many workplaces, Berger writes, discourage real dialogue -- the kind you get when people feel free to challenge plans, ideas, even one another. He argues that office cultures that encourage group questioning gain an edge. Google's (GOOG) "sometimes chaotic" weekly TGIF sessions, during which all employees are invited to ask Larry Page and Sergey Brin questions, gets a nod from Berger, as does MIT's Media Lab, where engineers experiment widely and fail, fail again, and fail better on the way toward a solution.

????In such settings, not knowing isn't penalized. "I consistently position myself as an idiot," Paul Bennett, of the design firm IDEO, tells Berger. He believes this willingness to ask what he himself calls "incredibly na?ve questions" has helped their firm thrive.

????By incredibly na?ve Bennett means those painfully elementary questions that in some audiences would get him branded a dim bulb. Called to speak to Iceland's parliament in the wake of the country's financial crisis, he asked, "Where's the money?" Not to be disrespectful, he later explained, but because first-things-first questions prompt an audience to explain things simply, and with that simplicity comes clarity.

????Incredibly na?ve questions "work" because they lower defenses. They also force us to put aside stock answers. This can slacken a conversation's pace -- but that's all for the good, Berger argues.

????"In most meetings -- and in most everything we do in business -- we are usually trying to keep things moving forward and just 'get things done.' This is a natural impulse, and of course it's important to get things done and stay on schedule. The problem is, this leaves little time to question assumptions, as in, Why are we doing this particular thing? Have we really thought it through, and considered other possibilities?"

????Berger recommends instituting a pause for questions that challenge the group's basic operating assumptions. (Among my questions would be, "What do we hope to accomplish in 70 minutes that could not be done in 45?")

????There is no ideal formula for how to engineer this pause. But over time, a group develops a tolerance for it. "And while it may seem as if this is slowing progress, what you're actually doing is making sure that your 'progress' isn't taking you down the wrong path."

????Achieving such a questioning culture would be easy, I thought, if enlightened CEOs stood behind it, demonstrating by confident example that incredibly na?ve questions are not necessarily a sign of weakness, stupidity, or lack of team spirit. But what about people who report to insecure middle managers who don't like the idea -- or the questions?

????Berger isn't worried.

????"Leaders must signal to holdouts that this is now part of what's expected of them: to question and welcome questions. And also to encourage a kind of questioning that is ambitious, positive, thoughtful, and potentially actionable." (As opposed to people just asking about vacation policies.)

????This might mean rewards for beautiful questions. It also means a new collective responsibility for the outcomes of questioning sessions. "Don't punish [the asker] by saying, 'Okay, you raised this question, now it's on you [alone] to find the answer.'"

????Most good questions don't have tidy answers. But only in embracing that messiness -- and sometimes rudeness or foolishness -- do we fumble our way toward brilliance.