Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Sometimes we don’t know something. There is a magic question that moves us from unknowing to knowing. Three words: when will you?

Person A: How much will this project cost?

Person B: I don’t know.

Person A: When will you (know how much this project will cost)?

Person B: I don’t know.

Person A: When will you (learn how much this project will cost)?

Person B: I don’t know.

Person A: When will you (schedule a learning meeting so that you will learn how much this project will cost)?

Now, Person B knows to

• schedule a learning meeting
• learn at the meeting
• know how much the project will cost
• in that order

We have moved from unknowing to knowing how to know. All from a repeated asking of, “When will you…?”

A problem is that Person A can be quite annoying with all this, “when will you, when will you, when will you?” Sometimes we have to be annoying when the topic is important to us.