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We are all born into what I would call a “world of why”. Children aged 3-6 can ask this question reportedly up 400 times a day. If you’ve got them close by, listen to them.

“Why?” is a great question! It may be the most important question in life. It enables one to plumb the depths, open new horizons, look at old realities with new eyes, to really understand and reach a higher level. But it appears that there are two sides to every coin. In the case of “Why?”, the new horizons disturb old “truths”. If we all started to ask questions (the way small children do), no stone would be left unturned. For example why do we still have MANDATORY school attendance in 2010? Or why do we still have summer holidays, which we may have had justification for in our agrarian past, but today they only cause havoc on roads and at resorts? Why do we work from Monday to Friday? Why are the heads of companies and high political offices, in principle, only men? Why does the media bombard us with so much negative news? Why do we so often study things we don’t like, just so we can get a piece of paper? Why do we try to build a career instead of finding a calling? We would come to the realization that many of the things we’re used to no longer have a basis and that some things not only don’t make sense, but even possibly do a lot of harm.

If we followed the example of small children and we all began to ask “why?”, it would cause a revolution. Life would be changed beyond recognition.

If we followed the example of small children and we all began to ask “why?”, it would cause a revolution. Life would be changed beyond recognition.
I would say that we know this very well somewhere deep in our subconscious, but probably the fear of losing the old stability forces us into permanent opposition and defense. It’s like playing volleyball with children. Whenever the ball flies over from them (= the question “why?”), we jump up to block it. With a single objective. Don’t let even one ball reach our side. Win the game. Don’t allow debate. Here are a few examples of some of our most successful well-known notorious blockers that Czech/Slovak parents love to use against the whys:

“Just because!”

“Enough of these silly questions!”

“There’s no time for silly questions!”

“This is not a discussion!”

“What? You don’t know?!”

“Because I said so!”

“Are you going to do it, or am I going to have to make you do it?”

“Curiosity killed the cat!”

“You’ll regret asking that question!”

“No one here is interested in talking about that!”

“No one here is interested in you!”

“One more question and I will give you a reason to ask why!”

“I do not like curious kids!” (miss Cassandra in The Adventures of Maya  the Bee)

When we are around five or six years old, we begin unconsciously leaving the world of “Why?”. Who would enjoy hitting the ball into the hands of their opponents and constantly losing, right!? And then one morning we wake up in the world of “How?” Everything seems to be clear to us. We no longer ask why… Even if somewhere inside us we’re interested, we don’t ask. We heard it a thousand times during our childhood that we shouldn’t be interested. Moreover, we learned the art of blocking from our parents, just as they learned it years ago from their parents. We no longer try to serve the ball over the net. Instead we sit on the sidelines, or sometimes we become a blocker.

It’s like playing volleyball with children. Whenever the ball flies over from them (= the question “why?”), we jump up to block it. With a single objective. Don’t let even one ball reach our side. Win the game. Don’t allow debate.

In this state, with this mind set, we sit in schools that have been mandatory for quite a long time, in which most of the time one person speaks and the rest write it down, and where you spend time trying to remember something in which we’re not the least bit interested and we’re never going to need. Most of the time it never even occurs to us to ask ourselves why we HAVE TO go to school, why do I have to take this particular course, why learn in this specific way, why with this teacher? And then others simply explain to us that that’s the way we do things around here… We give up. We decide to serve out our prison sentence until we’re adults, and then we hope to set free. Then we will finally be able to make decisions about our own lives. Then the adults will no longer tell us what we have to do and how to do it. A damned seventeen to twenty years of our lives! (Most of the time we don’t see it this way, or at least I didn’t see it that way.) 

But whoa. We leave the schoolroom and if we don’t choose to be freelancers, start up our own business, or choose a life of a homeless person, we most likely get an employment. Suddenly, it’s as if we’ve gone all the way back to the beginning – like when we were seven years old and in our first year of elementary school. Only in pale blue fashion. Moreover, in school it was clear who the boss was. We didn’t pretend to be anything. The teacher was respected. When we behaved in a way the teacher didn’t like, she wrote a note that we had to take to our parents, and that was it. However, at work it’s not clear at all. “When they try to catch a bird, they call to it nicely”, and so often we hear about all the opportunities we can expect in the new company, and about the plans the company has for us. But once the cage is closed, weird things begin to happen. The boss or an HR person tell us how to behave properly within the company. What to wear, when to go to staff meetings, how to fill out forms… Loads of directives, regulations, procedures, plans, and budgets. The main thing is to understand the system – how not to get lost in it. Welcome back to the world of “How?”!

Increasing number of companies start asking “Why?”. The basic question at this kind of company is: “Why are you doing what you are doing? “. They begin to leave “how” to its people.

Luckily there are also “Why Companies” that leave the how question up to employees and rather focus on the “why?”.  Not surprisingly, the motivation and results of their employees seem like from another world. Do you still wonder why 80% of new eager recruits begin ignoring the company within six months, or even hate it (according to Gallup)? Not me. 

Jean-Francois Zobrist, former-CEO of the French automotive components manufacturer FAVI nicely gave it a name. He says that there are two types of companies – “Pourquoi?” and “Comment?” – “Why?” and “How?” companies. (source: Freedom Inc.) “How Companies” are those most of us know: those that make the decisions for their employees. “Why Companies” are those that not only don’t ban the question “why?”, they even ask for it. The basic question at this kind of company is: “Why are you doing what you are doing? “.

To a large extent they leave the decisions over how things will be done to their people. They focus on results. And everybody in the company comes to the primary agreement what the results should look like. And if the employees manage to get those results from their own living room, and while in their pajamas, that’s up to them (with some slight exaggeration). Different companies, of course, differ in the extent of freedom they allow their employees. From companies where the employees themselves decide how much they will take, whether they will go to work or who will be their boss, to companies that require working hours or the aid of directives determining the proper attire (dress code). I, personally, am glad that elements of freedom are appearing at most of the conventionally directed international firms. And that is also why I think the future looks bright.