Ask "why" more often than "what" and "how"

I see Principal Engineers and Engineering Managers struggle with this, mainly when filling in for the lack of a Product Manager on technical initiatives.

In early development phases, it's hard to let go of "we all know what's needed here, we just need to break it down and talk about hard thing X". It's normal, we take pride in our expertise, and we want to bring our specialization to the table. But if everyone's thinking "how", you run the risk of no one thinking "why".

If you want to build a successful product or technical initiative, you need different thinking modes: Who are we building this for and what are they really struggling with? Is this the best problem to solve right now? How will this add to the company's bottom line? And finally: Is this technically feasible?

Luckily, you can fix that easily by shifting your thinking mode and start wearing a different "hat". In the next workshop, look at the room and ask yourself: Who's having the interest of the user/business/quality/system in mind? Who has explored the problem and challenged the proposed solution already? Spot the gaps and wear that hat.