There Are Stupid Questions, and We Need to Ask Them
Leadership Insights: The Strategic Impact of Asking Obvious Questions in Common Situations
When I worked as an engineer, my manager and product manager scheduled a 2-hour meeting with the team to discuss a new project our team would be undertaking. The project was initially managed by another team but was now transitioning to ours. A new squad within our growing team was taking over the responsibility for this product.
The manager and product manager had good intentions; they aimed to explain to the entire team what we were going to build in this product, discuss its future, and share a roadmap so that we all had a general understanding of what was happening in the team.
My product manager initiated the presentation, and the first slide featured an acronym — let’s call it ABC. Assuming everyone was familiar with it, he delved into discussions about the future. Feeling a bit behind, I swiftly Googled the acronym, thinking I might be the only one unaware of it. Google yielded numerous results, none of which seemed to align with our context. It dawned on me that ABC was specific to our company. The realization left me embarrassed; after being with the company for a year and a half, I should have known this acronym.
