The Power of a Better Question

This week I learned a simple lesson while working with both people and AI agents. When I want to help someone, I usually ask: How can I make your work better? It's a reasonable question, but I've realized there's a better one: What are the three things that would make your life or work significantly better right now?

The difference is subtle but important. "How can I help?" often leads to vague answers. People don't always know where to start, or they try to be polite and ask for less than they actually need. But asking for the top three things forces prioritization.

Whether you're talking to a colleague, an employee, or even an AI agent, the answers are often surprisingly practical:

• A process that keeps causing frustration
• A tool that's missing
• A decision waiting for approval
• A repetitive task that should have been automated long ago

Once those things become visible, improvement becomes much easier. The interesting part is that this question works equally well for humans and AI. Both tend to produce better outcomes when asked to identify and rank the biggest constraints first.

Sometimes helping isn't about having the right solution.

It's about asking the right question.