There Are No Dumb Questions

But there are stupid questions

Of all my favorite TV shows, I remember growing up watching the late night talk shows most vividly. I was fascinated by the hosts’ ability to talk just about anything, making fun of current events, and expertly interviewing anyone; world leaders, movie stars, everyday people on the streets.

One of the hosts from whom I learned the most was the legendary interviewer Larry King, who recently passed at age 87. Working in the media for half a century, he’s likely done close to 100,000 interviews off and on-air, if not more. The most amazing interviews that stuck with me throughout the years were not when he interviewed the well-spoken, high-profile guests, but rather the ordinary people who were less articulate. It’s more difficult to talk about things you don’t understand or personally care about.

In his book, How to Talk to Anyone, Anytime, Anywhere, Larry King wrote that you cannot get anything out of anyone if they think you aren’t truly interested in what they’re saying and respect them. It’s in how you pay attention to the person in front of you and how you make them feel like you really want to get to know them that makes you a great inquirer.

“I don’t pretend to know it all,” he said in an interview with the Associated Press. With a mixture of ignorance and a bit of skepticism, he deeply believed that no one knows everything, and that anyone can have interesting things to say. It is the job of the interviewer to discover them. He’d approach anyone in a similar fashion, from the US president to supermodels, asking ‘What don’t you like about this job?’ or ‘What’s the biggest mistake you made?’. He often joked about his love for asking questions that seem dumb or obvious which got him the answers that other interviewers never did. By dumb, he meant, “Help me. I don’t understand. Why? Why did you do that?”.

When I work with the founders and entrepreneurs, instead of repeating the mantra of ‘there are no stupid questions’, I start with my dumb questions. In turn, that encourages them to ask more of intentionally dumb questions, so I can better understand the problems more fully and it becomes a process of collaboration. Now, dumb questions are not the same as stupid questions. This is also not the same as playing dumb. Asking dumb questions requires the ability to reduce complex concepts into basic, simple questions. It also takes great humility to ask dumb questions.

“Can you explain it in the same way you would explain it to a kid?” is something I say a lot in my kickoff meetings. It will sound dumb to an expert with years of experience under their belts, but it has become my favorite tool to discover insights. And I mean it when I ask it, I don’t want anyone to assume I actually understand the science they’re talking about (and honestly, I probably don’t). The more difficult the topic, the dumber the questions. The dumber the questions, the greater the answers.

But that doesn’t mean there are no stupid questions. The article Ink Out Loud, defines stupid questions as questions that only waste people’s time. Examples of stupid questions include the questions that have already been answered when the asker wasn’t paying attention, questions that can be answered on your own with complete certainty, or questions with answers that should be painfully obvious to any person with a pulse who has lived on this Earth for more than a decade.

Dumb questions often lead us to new insights and deeper understanding and that’s what makes them special. When was the last time you asked some dumb questions?

A good interview, you know more than you do before you start. You should come away with maybe some of your opinions changed. And when you come away, you feel better, you know more.

Larry King

Prime Movers Lab invests in breakthrough scientific startups founded by Prime Movers, the inventors who transform billions of lives. We invest in companies reinventing energy, transportation, infrastructure, manufacturing, human augmentation, and agriculture.

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