Specific questions, even fairly high level ones like “how do you find clients?” immediately cause answers to jump into my head. It’s almost more work not to answer.
Vague questions like “got any tips for research?” do the opposite. I don’t have anything cached for this, the answer space is almost infinite, I have no idea if any particular answer I make up actually helps you. It ends up dumping the work of figuring out the question on me.
FYI a priori I wouldn’t have thought “how do you find clients” would be much more specific than “got any tips for research”. It makes sense that there’s a distinction but I don’t really know how to act on it.
I have a sort of vague question/request and would like someones opinion on it. In cold emails or having recently been introduced I would like to ask something along the lines of “What mindset/philosophy about (insert something vague like work/school or specific if I have it in mind) have you found most useful and why?” I like this because it has changed recently for me and even if I don’t find their specific mindset useful I think it would tell me a lot about them and I am curious how people will answer. How would you suggest improving that question. Also I would like advice on making this sort of thing less awkward.
Some notes on the Dialogue format:
Seems like a less effortful/more social way of writing—like glowfic, but for nonfiction!
Probably better at conveying more implicit knowledge, like interviews do (maybe?)
Just because it’s public doesn’t mean we won’t stop adding pieces to the dialogue; Elizabeth and I still have a lot to say.
FYI a priori I wouldn’t have thought “how do you find clients” would be much more specific than “got any tips for research”. It makes sense that there’s a distinction but I don’t really know how to act on it.
I have a sort of vague question/request and would like someones opinion on it. In cold emails or having recently been introduced I would like to ask something along the lines of “What mindset/philosophy about (insert something vague like work/school or specific if I have it in mind) have you found most useful and why?” I like this because it has changed recently for me and even if I don’t find their specific mindset useful I think it would tell me a lot about them and I am curious how people will answer.
How would you suggest improving that question. Also I would like advice on making this sort of thing less awkward.