The Two Most Important Questions For Human Development

"There is power in the question" as the longstanding refrain goes. More specifically, the power is in two questions. Two questions that have more to do with unlocking human development and human potential than any other. I believe they are the two most important questions in the world. And there is a pile of research miles high that supports my statement.

Is there someone who encourages my development?

And

Do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?

Ask yourself these two questions. Ask anyone you care about these questions. Ask every young person and student in the world these two questions. How they answer determines more of their trajectory in life and work than their answers to any other question. The goal, the dream would be that everyone strongly agrees to these two questions. Short of that, simply knowing how important these two questions are can become a guidepost for all we do in schools and the workplace to unleash human potential.

This advice was the basis of the one commencement address I have given - back in 2015 at Augustana College. Heading into the address, someone gave me some great advice that I chose to ignore at the time. And I now regret it. They had given several commencement addresses and said "whatever you do, don't go any longer than 7 minutes." My address went just 14 minutes - which doesn't sound very long in the grand scheme of things. But it was indeed WAY too long. When you want someone to remember what you have said, SHORTER is ALWAYS better. It could have been a 2-minute address.

I spent a lot of time explaining why these two questions were the most important in the world. They stem from Gallup's 'greatest hits' if you will - from decades and tens of thousands of questions asked of millions of people across the globe. You could spend hours unpacking it to do it full justice. Or you could just simplify it and say "here are that greatest insights from a century of work at the greatest research firm in the world."

I attempted this in a blog form here, for those of you interested in more of the underpinnings. But what I want readers to focus on is a third question - a question about these two questions: "What if we designed every school and workplace around these two questions?" Imagine what schools and workplaces would look like - or better yet feel like - in a culture of supportive mentoring, talent spotting and strengths development.

To do it well, we'd have to aim for far more experiential learning, work-integrated learning (in school) and learning-integrated work (at our places of employment). After all, how else would a student or person ever discover what they are best at without actually doing it or trying it on for size?

Is there someone who encourages my development?

And

Do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?

If it was up to me, I'd throw out the entire status quo operating system of schools and workplaces today and replace it with one aimed at these two questions.