What assumptions do you need to question in your industry?

3 How to question assumptions?

The next step to question your industry assumptions is to challenge them. To do this, you need to examine their evidence, validity, and relevance. You can use various tools and techniques to question your assumptions, such as the Ladder of Inference, SWOT Analysis, and Six Thinking Hats. The Ladder of Inference helps you to check your reasoning, assumptions, and biases at each step of the ladder. The SWOT Analysis helps you to identify the internal and external factors that affect your industry and business. The Six Thinking Hats technique enables you to explore different perspectives and viewpoints on a situation by switching between different modes of thinking, such as White Hat (facts/data/evidence), Red Hat (feelings/emotions/intuition), Black Hat (risks/drawbacks/problems), Yellow Hat (benefits/advantages/opportunities), Green Hat (creativity/alternatives/solutions), and Blue Hat (process/structure/overview).

4 How to act on assumptions?

The final step to question your industry assumptions is to act on them. This means to experiment, learn, and adapt based on the results of your questioning. You can use various methods and approaches to act on your assumptions, such as the Lean Startup or Design Thinking. The Lean Startup is a methodology that helps you validate your assumptions and hypotheses through rapid prototyping and testing. It involves defining your value proposition and customer segments, creating a minimum viable product (MVP), testing it with customer segments, collecting data and feedback, analyzing the results, and pivoting or persevering based on the learning. The Design Thinking process helps you solve problems and create solutions through human-centered design. It includes empathizing with users and stakeholders, defining the problem statement and opportunity space for a solution, brainstorming ideas and concepts for the solution, building prototypes of the solution, and testing it with users to collect feedback and insights.

5 How to question assumptions continuously?

Questioning your industry assumptions is not a one-time activity, but a continuous practice that requires regular and systematic questioning. To cultivate a culture of curiosity, openness, and learning in your organization, you should encourage and reward employees for questioning assumptions. Strategies and habits such as asking open-ended and probing questions, seeking diverse and contrary opinions, conducting experiments and tests, reviewing and updating assumptions, and celebrating and learning from failures can help you question your assumptions continuously. Doing so is a powerful way to improve thought leadership and business performance by discovering new insights, opportunities, and solutions that can differentiate you from competitors and delight customers. It can also help to avoid costly mistakes, conflicts, and risks that can damage reputation and results. So, what assumptions do you need to question in your industry?

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?