After reading Glimmer, Warren Berger's 2009 book looking at designers and design thinking, I became a fan of sorts and pre-ordered A More Beautiful Question anticipating something good as a follow-up. I wasn't disappointed. Like Glimmer -- and perhaps design thinking -- Berger takes both a deep dive and a broad stroke over his subject matter. This is tough to do well, but Berger pulls it off.
There is something delightful about looking at something that seems so obvious and simple, but is far from simplistic, in detail. Berger goes through the vast swaths of research and evidence on question formation and innovation and blends it seamlessly with anecdotes, observations and questions...lots and lots of questions. To 'live the title' of the book, the text is organized around questions and, at least with the Kindle, the questions are hyperlinked to explanations at the back about their origin and relevance. This feature was wonderful and frustrating -- but largely due to technology. I read using a Nexus tablet, but my preferred reader is the original Kindle. On that latter device, the linking becomes a frustration in that it is sometimes hard to get back to your place. But that's a small point.
Berger's style of writing is engaging, balancing conciseness with informality, and using enough revisiting of ideas in different places in the text to thread ideas throughout the narrative, but not too much to feel repetitive. I loved this just as I loved Glimmer.
What a reader will take from this is that questions are important, that the best (and most consistent) innovators, leaders and scientists are typically great at asking questions and not just providing answers. Indeed, Berger makes the case that the question and answer are inextricably linked showing dozens of examples of how the habits of questioning lead to exciting outcomes. He also offers a challenge to anyone involved in education -- which, he'd argue is nearly everyone in this age of change and ongoing learning -- to examine how questions are encouraged and discouraged to shun curiosity. This has enormous implications and, as we see, gets replicated in our businesses and other organizations.
If this book does anything for you I hope it gets you to ask better questions and enjoy not always having answers. Taken to heart, the message of paying attention to the questions -- living the questions if you will -- is one that may have profound consequences on your life, work, and learning.
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Top reviews from other countries
arun kumar
Questioning as a way of living life
Reviewed in India on October 27, 2017
Amid Soleimani Yazdi
Great for curious mindset
Reviewed in Australia on August 29, 2020