In the beginning, before we’re experts, the following are easy questions to ask:
- I wonder if this will work.
- I wonder how this works.
- I wonder who can help me if this doesn’t work.
- I wonder what’ll happen when this works.
Once we become the expert, our expertise means:
- This will work.
- I know how it works.
- I’m the one that people come to when it doesn’t work.
- I’ve seen this work a million times, so I know exactly what’ll happen when it does work.
In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few. –Shunryu Suzuki
Expertise means knowing. Knowing usually repels wonder.
But, powerful things can happen when expertise is mixed with wonder, instead of being separated from it:
- I wonder if there’s a better way to make this work.
- I wonder if I can eliminate this entire step and get the same result another way.
- I wonder who I can help learn more about how this works.
- I wonder how my customer views the way this works.
The expert who keeps their wonder is willing to search for new ways, new answers, and even new questions, in a quest for continuous improvement.
That same expert might even wonder (pun intended) if their expertise can solve an entirely new set of problems.
True innovation is almost always impossible without its main ingredient: wonder.
The more you know, the more you know you don’t know. –Aristotle