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| 1 | +# Asking Questions |
| 2 | + |
| 3 | +The way to get useful answers is to ask effective questions. |
| 4 | + |
| 5 | +The act of creating an effective question can often produce the answer without even needing to share the question with others (although it is valuable to still ask for a wider scope of answers). |
| 6 | + |
| 7 | +The act of creating a question allows for a clear analysis of what the problem is, what has been tried already. |
| 8 | + |
| 9 | + |
| 10 | +!!! HINT "No need to apologies for asking" |
| 11 | + People enjoy answering other peoples questions as it provides a sense of satisfaction that they could help. There is never a need to apologies that your are asking a question, especially if you think the answer should be obvious |
| 12 | + |
| 13 | +!!! HINT "There are no silly questions" |
| 14 | + People are not born omnicient, they spend their lifetime learning on a unique path. No two people will understand all the same things in the same way, even when working in the same area. |
| 15 | + |
| 16 | + |
| 17 | + |
| 18 | +## Ask an Engineering question |
| 19 | + |
| 20 | +The more detailed an engineering question is, the more likely that an appropriate answer will be given. |
| 21 | + |
| 22 | +1. Convey the goal of your question (what are you trying to achieve) |
| 23 | +2. Establish the facts as clearly as possible |
| 24 | + - What steps did you try |
| 25 | + - How does someone else reproduce this issue (create the simplest possible example) |
| 26 | +3. Convey assumptions made |
| 27 | +4. Examples, examples, examples |
| 28 | +5. Review and refactor (remove unnecessary words and information, reread and rewrite to ensure the question is easy to understand) |
| 29 | + |
| 30 | +!!! WARNING "Fast questions take more time" |
| 31 | + Asking questions with little or no thought leads to much more time spent explaining the question once its out there. |
| 32 | + |
| 33 | + |
| 34 | +### Example questions |
| 35 | + |
| 36 | +Some example engineering questions (TODO: review questions in slack / stack exchange for useful, not so useful examples) |
| 37 | + |
| 38 | + |
| 39 | + |
| 40 | +## The Art of Asking Questions |
| 41 | + |
| 42 | +1. Demonstrate preparedness for the conversation |
| 43 | +2. Illustrate your expertise without showing off |
| 44 | +3. Invite others to deepen or broaden their thinking and challenge held beliefs |
| 45 | + |
| 46 | +[Article from the Harvard Business School](https://hbr.org/2022/05/the-art-of-asking-great-questions){target=_blank .md-button} |
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