Does asking smart questions make you a radical manager?

Dede Bonner, a.k.a. "the question doctor" 1/ asked me last week:

"Steve, what's the role of asking smart questions in radical management?  Does the very act of asking questions make someone a radical manager?"

The short answer is: not really. Asking questions is necessary but not sufficient.

Radical management does require a spirit of inquiry and curiosity, as well as a certain humility to realize that you may not have the right answer to things, and even to recognize that a proportion of what you firmly believe to be true is actually false.  Asking open-ended questions does reflect that spirit of inquiry and curiosity.  But more is required.

First, goals. The goal of radical management is to delight clients, by creating a continuous stream of innovations that provide additional value.  If instead the manager operates in an environment where the goal is simply to produce goods and services, then the mere asking of questions will degenerate into various forms of cost-cutting exercises, leading to downsizing and outsourcing, thereby undermining the firm’s capacity to thrive and innovate in the medium term.

Second, modalities. Radical management is conducted by self-organizing teams, operating in short cycles and adding value to clients at the end of each cycle. This is quite different from the traditional bureaucracy where individuals report to bosses. In a traditional bureaucracy, a manager who asks questions may do better than one who doesn’t, but by itself, performance will be limited by the stultifying nature of bureaucracy.

Third, transparency. Traditional management operates on a need-to-know-basis, with many issues lying hidden, often for decades, with well-known CYA routines. A manager who asks questions in such a setting will get some answers, but the culture will prevent getting straight answers.

Fourth, continuous improvement. In a traditional bureaucracy, whistleblowers get punished. In the learning organization, whistleblowers get rewarded, but only if they also bring a solution to the problem being identified.   In radical management, whistleblowers are rewarded, even if they don’t have a solution: everything stops so that the root cause of the problem can be identified and solved. In a bureaucracy, a manager who asks questions will be at risk from his or her superiors: it’s much safer to keep one’s head down. In radical management, the spirit of inquiry and curiosity reflected in open-ended questions will be common.

So asking questions is necessary, but not sufficient, to constitute radical management.

To learn more about radical management, go to:

http://www.stevedenning.com/Books/radical-management.aspx

1/Dede Bonner, Ph.D., a.k.a. "the Question Doctor," is on the graduate business faculties of The George Washington University and Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia. She is an internationally acclaimed expert in questioning skills and money-saving "Best Questions" for CEOs and other clients.

Comments

[Jordan 8]

Nice content, I trust this is a nice blog. Wish to see fresh content next time.

[Thaler]

Terrific post, Steve, thanks!

[college board]

Having read this article, I have learned for myself a lot of the new. Thanks

[write your thesis]

I think some organizations have experimented with other methods (such as employee-voting models) of selecting or reviewing managers; but this occurs only very rarely.

[Coach Outlet]

The greatest interest was in a learning event in which participants would acquire techniques and skills