Whoever first said “there is no such thing as a stupid question” certainly proved that there is such a thing as a stupid statement.
There are many myths that exist in our modern workplace, and a lot of them teach us to behave in a way that is counterproductive to the goals we have for our careers. The statement above is one of the worst offenders.
I am a firm believer that people looking to move up in the corporate world should be relentless questioners; aside from active work experience, it is the single best way to educate yourself about your profession. But let’s face it, folks. There is a huge difference between a great question and a stupid one.
The statement should be changed to: "The only stupid questions are ones you could answer on your own."
Just because you have a question about how something works or how you should proceed does not mean that it is a question you should ask someone else.
Over the years, telling people that there are no stupid questions has become an excuse for people to ask all sorts of things that they shouldn’t need help in answering. These questions aren’t asked out of true interest, or the inability to answer them independently, these questions are asked out of laziness. If you tell me that there are no stupid questions, what’s to stop me from asking you what I should do at every turn of my daily activity? Asking a lot of these questions is just an excuse to not learn, or at the very least to have someone else do your work for you.
As a manager, if I answered every one of the questions that an employee asked me, I would be crushing their ability to become independent. My goal as a manager should be to make my employees so good at what they do that they need me less and less each day. The day I’m completely obsolete is that day that I’ve really done my job.
With every question you encounter, your first goal should always be to get the question answered on your own. The world today is full of amazing user-accessible research tools, from books to blogs, and going through the process of discovery is a vital part of educating yourself.
Sure, it can be frustrating to try to answer your questions without assistance, but it can also be amazingly interesting. Even the process of researching your questions will guarantee that you will end up with much more information than if someone else just gave you a shortcut to the solution. Trust me when I say that the employee who asks only difficult questions and even then has clearly thought about and experimented with potential answers is always the one on the fast track.
Every one of us has been in a meeting where someone embarrassed themselves by asking something idiotic and it doesn’t take a fortune teller to predict how those instances affect people’s careers.
So the next time you get the urge to ask something in a meeting ask yourself: "Is this something I could answer on my own, is this an opportunity to learn and expand my knowledge base?" If the answer is yes, you probably just saved yourself from asking a stupid question!
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