Which comes first: The answer or the question?

I have seen some amazing products and services promoted by some of the most enthusiastic people I have come across for some time – in the current depressive state of most of UK business this has been a pleasant change.

If enthusiasm was the only criteria then these products would change our lives in the future – and maybe some of them will.

As I sit and listened to the ‘pitch’ one question keeps floating to the top of my mind: “Is this trying to solve yesterday’s problem or is it answering tomorrow’s question?”

Invariably the answer is that it is solving yesterday’s, or if I am luck today’s problem. Of course this will be the answer as that is all we know about.

The problem with that approach is that we keep wedded to the past and we are never prepared for the future. We spend our lives fire-fighting the problems as they come up, rather than pre-empting the problems before the occur.

So how can we start to even think about problems we know nothing about? How can we envisage what tomorrow’s questions could be?

As we face continued economic problems the focus has moved away from thinking about tomorrow and much of business has become myopic in its approach – worrying about the next 12 weeks rather than think about the next 12 years. This approach is OK but it leads to fire-fighting being a way of life.

There is, however no magic bullet to the question of tomorrow’s questions, there are techniques though that can help and people who can help you with the thinking. I have posted on my private blog (www.howardwright.com) previously about Scenario Planning and the concept of future scaping, both of which will help you envisage different futures. OK, the chances are that the future you envisage today will be based on what you know – but at least you will, hopefully, start to think a little differently and I can almost guarantee that you will find new questions.

So the next time you are sat listening to a presentation or reading something in the press ask yourself the question: “Is this answering yesterdays’ problems?” And if so, ask: “What will tomorrow’s question be?”