Learn to Fly Because You Can’t Outrun the Bear

This is part 3 of a series of 5 articles all going back 25 years ago to my first year as a consultant and the experiences and lessons that stay with me to this day.

You never know when your early life experiences will come back and reverberate as powerful lessons learned later in your career.

They say there’s no such thing as a dumb question. There’s a parable I love that goes like this: Question: How do you put an elephant into a refrigerator? Nine of of Ten people will reflexively start telling you their theory. The correct answer is yet another question: “WHY do you WANT to put an elephant into a refrigerator?” Some people might consider that a dumb question, while others will consider it an enlightened question. That parable rings constantly in my ears decades later.

As a teen in the late 70‘s I started my career in aerospace manufacturing as a machinist and quality control manager. I learned how to run a shop floor, and with a newfound skill and interest in computer software, eventually wrote some shop floor control programs.

In 1994, I took a leap of faith and started on a journey to a career in technology.

What Just Happened?!?

I had been there many times before. A small company that manufactured grocery store checkout stands. It was in a pastoral setting several miles north of Seattle. It was a laid-back place. Whenever they had to take the system down for maintenance, they got on the company PA intercom and yelled “everybody log out of the system NOW”. Ah, the good old days of IT!

One day I got a panicked call asking if I could come there IMMEDIATELY to help with something. I asked what the problem was, and they only said “please get here as soon as you can!!!” Sensing this was way out of the ordinary, my imagination ran wild. I had visions of the server melting in a ball of fire, or in pieces all over the floor.

I rushed over there and was met at the door and escorted into the place like a paramedic that was there to save someone’s life.

I was shown the door to the conference room. Behind the door I could hear a bunch of people yelling at each other. I opened the door. There were over a dozen people sitting around the table, with just one open seat at the head of the table, the hot seat, ostensibly reserved for me. The room fell silent and all eyes were on me for a moment. Then they started yelling at each other again.

The bear is charging at me again. My heart is pounding, I feel dizzy, my palms dripping with sweat.

I sat down and tried to follow the conversation, if you can actually call a dozen people all yelling at each other at the same time a conversation. After a few minutes, the room went silent again, and EVERYBODY looked at ME. Someone asked, “what do YOU think?!?!” I felt the blood rushing out of my head, and thought I was going to faint. I was sweating profusely. Gripped with fear, I had the overwhelming urge to get up and run out of the room.

My mind was racing. I had absolutely no idea what they were talking about. I heard a few words that I DID understand, enough to have a tiny clue. All I could come up with was a question. I don’t recall the specifics, but it was a simple question just asking them to clarify the one tidbit I heard.

The silence was deafening. It was an awkward and uncomfortable several moments with everybody glaring at me. Without answering my question, somebody broke the silence and said something like “YEAH!!! what DOES that mean?!?!” They went back to yelling at each other again. I was completely overwhelmed and not sure what just happened.

What happened was a lesson learned.

This cycle repeated itself a few more times over the eternity that was the next 30 minutes or so. Each time, I struggled to understand what they were yelling about. Each time they stopped, glared at me, and asked, “what do YOU think!?!?” Each time I felt woefully inadequate, with my stomach doing flip-flops and my palms dripping with sweat. Each time I asked a DUMB question. Each time someone else would echo the question and reiterate, “YEAH, what DOES that mean?!?!”

I could feel the bear getting closer, and its hot breath on my back. I figured it was a matter of minutes before they would all conclude I was some kind of idiot.

What happened next astounds me to this day.

Everyone suddenly stopped yelling and stood up. I could feel the weight of the bear on top of me. I began to imagine what I would look like being tarred and feathered.

Then they ALL started THANKING me for helping them resolve the problem! Ironically, I STILL had no idea what the problem was! They all filed out of the room shaking my hand on the way out. I felt like I was going to throw up.

The tennis shoes earned their money that day.

This is where I started to understand what Jack Welch, the late CEO of General Electric, meant when he said “When you are a leader you have to have all the questions. You have to be incredibly comfortable looking like the dumbest person in the room. Every conversation you have about a decision, a proposal, or piece of market information has to be filled with you saying, What If? And Why Not? And How Come?”

Lesson Learned

The lesson here is you CAN leverage your ignorance AND look smart at the same time. Communication is essential to effectively solve problems. Don’t assume everyone knows everything in a discussion. There is a very good chance that some of the people in the room don’t know, or have different perceptions of, the facts.

You need to be the one that asks the “dumb question” that some people won’t know the answer to, or worse yet, more likely are afraid to ask – because they don’t want to look stupid. This is where you act as the lighting rod. YOU “looking” stupid automatically makes everyone else look smarter, and this can dramatically change the dynamics of the discussion. In these situations, I like to say, “yep, you got me right where I wanted you.”