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Question Everything

Sep 13, 2011

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Fire Away

For the good of your profession, your work, your clients, and most of all, your users:

Ask why. Ask for an explanation. A justification. Ask this over and over and over until there are no answers left to uncover.
Ask for evidence.
Ask if there’s a better way.

Question the people who get up on conference stages. Ask them to justify what they say—to demonstrate that their ideas are good. Don’t do this because you want them to fail. Do this because you want to succeed.

At work, question your designs. Question the decisions that were made before. Question the decisions being made now. When something is considered standard, ask if it’s really the best solution. Ask if there’s a better way. Not all designs become standard by being better. Many become standard by being most noticeable. When clients say they need to add features, don’t ask how—ask why. The next time someone tells you the best way to do your job, ask if there’s an even better way.

Question the status quo. Question the standards. The people you work with. The experts. Your own designs. Your client’s motivations. Decisions. Rules. Processes. Ask the questions, then question the answers. Question everything.

It is always a good time to look into the eye of a sacred cow and ask it what it’s doing there. Find your sacred cows, and tip them over.

Stop being good enough. Start being great.

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