Asking Great Questions

A summary of Episode 2 of “Founder Loveline” with Daniela Santangelo and Allie Kerr.

In episode two of Founder Loveline, Daniela chats with Tony Hansmann, a product expert and founder of Extreme Automation. We’re focused today on asking great product questions to enhance the entrepreneurial journey.

Asking the right questions is paramount to gaining a deep understanding of user needs and preferences. By posing insightful questions, product teams can uncover latent requirements and pain points, allowing for the creation of solutions that genuinely address users' concerns. Effective questioning aids in aligning objectives and ensures that the proposed features or improvements are not only desirable but also feasible within the given context and capabilities. This process prevents investing resources in ideas that might not be practical or well-received. In essence, the art of asking the right questions serves as a strategic compass, guiding product development toward meaningful and successful outcomes.

Keys to Asking Good Questions:

Calibrate Moral Intuition:

• “Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.”- Maya Angelou
• Doing the internal work is important before starting to ask questions.
• Weak questions lead to weak answers. You need to come from a place of courage and deep moral intuition as a foundation.
• Product development is not just about creating technically sound solutions but also about aligning with ethical values and understanding the real-world implications of the products being developed.

Two by Two Model:

• The Two by Two Model is an X and Y axis of Doable vs. Desirable to cluster good ideas and eliminate less feasible ones
• This allows the doable and desirable ideas to cluster in the top right corner and the least doable and desirable far out of the way on the opposite axis
• Utilize sticky notes for idea generation, emphasizing the importance of ideating within context and capability.
• Pass in 3 top ideas of each person to share. Eliminates hierarchies and clusters top ideas in the room for discussion.
• Groups of no larger than 12 are ideal for this model

The Leader-Leader Model

• The Two by Two model accentuates the Leader-Leader Model: encouraging collective leadership, where everyone, regardless of their position, is encouraged to think and contribute actively.
• It harnesses the collective intelligence of the team, leading to more innovative solutions.
• To learn more about this, "Turn the Ship Around" by David Marquet goes into more detail on how this is effective and moves away from a leader-follower model.

Three Cs: Context, Capability, Consequence:

• Context: Who has the knowledge and experience in the specific domain? Context is crucial for evaluating the feasibility of ideas.
• Capability: Assess whether the team possesses the skills and resources to implement the proposed ideas.
• Consequence: Identify who holds the consequences, both positive and negative, for the success or failure of the idea.

Founder Loveline provides actionable insights for founders, emphasizing the importance of well-crafted questions, effective models, and community collaboration in the entrepreneurial journey.

Follow along at Founder Loveline, and join us on November 17th with Vlad Cazacu on  Founder Empowerment during fundraising.

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