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LPC Project Coaches share their views on creating lean design and construction projects and lean enterprises.

Dec 23
2009

Who's asking the right questions anyway?

Posted by: Matthew Horvat on Dec 23, 2009

Matthew Horvat

I have not been doing lean consulting long enough to have a career's depth of war stories. When faced with some regular questions, I have to pull from the underlying philosophy rather than a real world example. Even in the Lean Construction history, there is not a lot of examples. Peter Block defends this approach in his 2003 book, The Answer to How Is Yes: Acting on What Matters. 

He says that the typical How questions are a defense against action and change. When we ask how much time is it going to take, we avoid asking about our level of commitment. When we ask how much it is going to cost we avoid asking what the price is we are willing to pay. 

The book is about the meaningful questions that we should be analyzing. Questions about our desire to create a future together. Questions about personal risk, freedom and responsibility. As I see it, progress won't happen if you study how others did it. Get your philosophy straight first and act on that.

 


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