Technique 6: Idea Generating Questions

Click here to view a video that explains how to get out of the box and generate ideas.

Asking questions to stimulate curiosity and creativity has proven helpful for all kinds of endeavours, whether problem-solving, product development, inventing or communication. A written list of mind-stimulating questions is useful because it reminds us of approaches and possibilities that we otherwise would not have in mind. Yes, it is sometimes possible to be creative in a thorough and even orderly way.

W and H Questions

These are the six key questions that can be used for creative thinking, these questions stimulate thinking about the idea in question and allow approaches to it from various angles.

Who? (Actor or Agent) Who is involved? What are the people aspects of the problem? Who did it, will do it? Who uses it, wants it? Who will benefit, will be injured, will be included and will be excluded?

What? (Act) What should happen? What is it? What was done, ought to be done and was not done? What will be done if X happens? What went or could go wrong? What resulted in success?

When? (Time or Timing) When will/did/should this occur or be performed? Can it be hurried or delayed? Is a sooner or later time be preferable? When should the time be if X happens?

Where? (Scene or Source) Where did/will/should this occur or be performed? Where else is a possibility? Where else did the same thing happen, should the same thing happen? Are other places affected, endangered, protected, and aided by this location? Effect of this location on actors, actions?

Why? (Purpose) Why was/is this done, avoided, permitted? Why should it be done, avoided, permitted? Why did or should actor do it? Different for another actor, act, time, place? Why that particular action, rule, idea, solution, problem, disaster and not another? Why that actor, time, location, and not another?

How? (Agency or Method) How was it, could it be, should it be done, prevented, destroyed, made, improved, altered? How can it be described, understood? How did beginning lead to conclusion?

These questions are especially useful for generating ideas for improving something (the evolutionary approach), but they also help to break thinking out of the evolutionary mode and put it into the revolutionary mode by returning the thinker to the origin and purpose of the idea or solution. By returning to the roots of the problem, a new vision can be created.

What Questions to Ask When

Questions about a physical object:

• What are its physical characteristics?
• What sort of structure does it have?
• What other object is it similar to?
• How does it differ from things that resemble it?
• Who or what produced it?
• Who uses it? For what?

Questions about events:

• Exactly what happened (who, what, when, where, why, how)?
• What were its causes?
• What were its consequences?
• How is this event like or unlike similar events?
• To what other events was it connected?
• How might the event have been altered or avoided?

Questions about abstract concepts:

• How has the concept or term been defined by others?
• How do you define the term?
• What other concepts have been associated with it?
• In what ways has this concept affected the lives of people?
• How might the concept be changed to work better?

Questions about propositions:

• What must be established before readers will believe the proposition?
• What are the meanings of the key words in the proposition?
• By what kinds of evidence can the proposition be proved or disproved?
• What counter-arguments must be confronted and refuted?
• What are the practical consequences of the proposition?

Note: Any complex topic will require you to begin with one kind of questioning and then move to another.