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3 Questions Your Should Be Asking Before Starting A Project

Summary

In this episode of Developer Tea, host Jonathan Cottrell presents three crucial questions developers should ask themselves before starting any project. He emphasizes that these questions are designed to clarify perception and expand how we approach projects, moving beyond common questions like target audience to more fundamental considerations about personal value and focus.

Cottrell begins by discussing the importance of mental preparation through mindfulness practices like meditation, mentioning Headspace as a sponsor and tool he personally uses. He explains that clearing your mind before brainstorming helps improve mental clarity, focus, and creativity—essential for approaching projects with the right mindset.

The first question is “What is this project worth to me?” This isn’t about monetary compensation but about understanding the project’s net effect on your life, including energy levels, relationships, and overall impact. The second question is “If this could only do one thing, what would that one thing be?” This helps identify the most valuable core function and guides prioritization toward minimum viable products. The third question is “What am I assuming?” This involves identifying both explicit and implicit assumptions that might be shortcuts leading projects in unintended directions.

Cottrell explains that these questions are meant to be revisited and refined throughout the project planning process, as answering one may change your perspective on others. He emphasizes that taking perception for granted is a common mistake, and these questions help developers avoid that pitfall by systematically examining their approach from multiple angles.

Throughout the episode, Cottrell provides practical examples of how these questions apply to different project scales, from small daily tasks to large applications like Instagram. He encourages listeners to develop their own clarifying questions and join the Spec community to continue the conversation about effective project planning and perception management.

Recommendations

Communities

  • Spec Slack community — An online community where developers can discuss questions about project perception and planning. Cottrell invites listeners to join to share their own clarifying questions and continue the conversation.

Tools

  • Headspace — A meditation app that helps build a meditation practice with guided meditations on topics like stress, sleep, and balance. Cottrell mentions using it for over a year and recommends it for improving mental clarity, focus, and creativity.

Topic Timeline

  • 00:00:00 — Introduction to three essential project questions — Jonathan Cottrell introduces the episode’s focus on three questions to ask before every project. He explains these questions are designed to expand how we perceive projects at the beginning stages, moving beyond common questions like target audience. The host emphasizes that we often trust our perception too much and need tools to clarify it.
  • 00:01:45 — Importance of mental preparation and mindfulness — Cottrell discusses the value of clearing your mind before brainstorming or starting a project. He introduces Headspace as a meditation app sponsor and shares his personal practice of mental relaxation before planning Developer Tea episodes. The host explains that mindfulness practices are medically researched and accessible regardless of belief systems.
  • 00:05:10 — Question 1: What is this project worth to me? — The first question focuses on personal value rather than monetary compensation or company benefit. Cottrell explains this question helps with prioritization by considering the project’s net effect on your life—including energy levels, relationships with family and coworkers, and overall impact. He notes this question may need revision after considering other questions.
  • 00:07:42 — Question 2: If this could only do one thing, what would it be? — The second question identifies the most important core function of a project. Cottrell provides examples like collecting email addresses for a web app or posting photos for Instagram. He explains this question helps developers recognize the most valuable pieces and work toward minimum viable products by asking it repeatedly for each additional feature.
  • 00:10:34 — Question 3: What am I assuming? — The third question involves identifying both explicit and implicit assumptions. Cottrell explains that assumptions are mental shortcuts that help focus, but sometimes lead down wrong paths. Examples include assuming users will be on mobile devices or that a web app is the best solution. Identifying assumptions helps refine answers to the first two questions.
  • 00:12:25 — Conclusion and practical application — Cottrell concludes by emphasizing that answering these three questions will likely change initial project plans because we take perception for granted. He encourages listeners to spend time refining their answers and to develop their own clarifying questions. The host invites listeners to join the Spec Slack community to continue the discussion about perception and project planning.

Episode Info

  • Podcast: Developer Tea
  • Author: Jonathan Cutrell
  • Category: Technology Business Careers Society & Culture
  • Published: 2017-01-20T10:00:00Z
  • Duration: 00:13:44

References

Podcast Info

Transcript

[00:00:00] Hey everyone, and welcome to Developer Tea.

[00:00:05] My name is Jonathan Cottrell, and in today’s episode, I’m giving you three questions that

[00:00:10] you need to ask before every single project you ever do.

[00:00:17] I’m trying something a little bit new for today’s episode.

[00:00:21] I’ve done it a little bit before in the past, but I’m going to try to do it again today.

[00:00:26] I’m basically going way off script.

[00:00:29] I don’t have notes in front of me, and this is just a couple of questions that I really

[00:00:34] believe are so, so important to ask, and they’re not necessarily intuitive, especially one

[00:00:42] of these questions that I’m going to ask.

[00:00:43] It’s not really necessarily something that, you know, we aren’t talking about, you know,

[00:00:49] the common, what is my target audience?

[00:00:51] That’s not the type of questions that we’re asking today.

[00:00:54] The types of questions we are asking today are intended to expand the way

[00:00:59] we approach a project.

[00:01:01] When I say approach, I don’t mean, you know, what methods we use.

[00:01:05] I mean, quite literally, the way we perceive the project as we’re kind of ramping into

[00:01:10] the project, right?

[00:01:12] At the very beginning stages, there’s a lot of things that we take for granted about our

[00:01:16] own perception.

[00:01:18] We assume that we’re starting a project that we see very clearly.

[00:01:23] It’s a bad assumption.

[00:01:24] We trust ourselves too much.

[00:01:26] So these questions are intended.

[00:01:29] They’re intended to clarify how your perception changes what you are building or how your

[00:01:35] perception changes the things you plan for a project.

[00:01:40] Before we jump into those questions, I want to talk about something else that’s very important

[00:01:45] to do at the beginning of a project and when you’re brainstorming.

[00:01:49] And if you’ve never done this, then it may feel a little bit weird.

[00:01:53] It may feel a little bit strange to you at first, or at least it may sound a little bit

[00:01:57] strange.

[00:01:58] And that is.

[00:01:59] To basically clear your mind, to really empty your mind out.

[00:02:04] And I’m not an expert on this, but there are some people who are an expert.

[00:02:08] And in fact, I’ve lined up this episode explicitly to talk about them.

[00:02:13] Today’s episode is actually sponsored by Headspace.

[00:02:16] And as a developer, investing in your mental health is one of the most important things

[00:02:20] you can do.

[00:02:21] And meditation is a fantastic way to improve mental clarity, focus, and creativity.

[00:02:26] Headspace is actually, it’s an iPhone app.

[00:02:28] I’ve used.

[00:02:29] This for over a year now.

[00:02:31] Headspace is an app that helps you build a meditation practice with clear instruction

[00:02:35] and guided meditations on topics such as stress, sleep, and balance.

[00:02:40] And the company is also growing super fast.

[00:02:42] They have over 10 million downloads worldwide.

[00:02:46] They’re building a team right now.

[00:02:47] They have offices in San Francisco and LA.

[00:02:50] If you’re interested in joining a company that’s working to improve the health and happiness

[00:02:54] of the world, then go and apply to Headspace.

[00:02:57] Go and check it out.

[00:02:58] It’s spec.fm slash Headspace.

[00:03:00] Thank you to Headspace for sponsoring today’s episode.

[00:03:03] Now, I do feel it’s important to note that Headspace doesn’t subscribe to any particular

[00:03:07] ideology beyond meditation and mindfulness.

[00:03:12] This is something that is medically researched.

[00:03:15] There are tons of people who have found benefits across belief systems.

[00:03:20] So if you are subscribed to a particular religion, or if you are not subscribed to religion at

[00:03:26] all, pretty much anyone can do it.

[00:03:28] You can use Headspace without it conflicting with those belief systems.

[00:03:31] So it is very accessible, and it also doesn’t make you feel super bad if you miss a day.

[00:03:38] Just a really great application in my experience using it.

[00:03:42] But I have found that taking this time to dedicate to some kind of mindfulness practice.

[00:03:49] In fact, I do this for every episode of Developer Tea.

[00:03:52] I have kind of a ritual of clearing my mind, and I do it after I exercise and when I’m in the shower.

[00:03:58] I start thinking about ideas for Developer Tea.

[00:04:01] But before I do that, I relax my mind.

[00:04:04] I empty my mind.

[00:04:05] And it’s a concept that is so much more proven than you may expect.

[00:04:11] I challenge you to go and do some research on it.

[00:04:13] It will definitely, certainly help your mental health, especially people who deal with things

[00:04:18] like anxiety and that kind of stuff.

[00:04:20] Okay, so once you’ve aligned your mind, once you’ve calmed down, and once you’ve taken some

[00:04:25] time to prepare yourself.

[00:04:28] To ask these questions, then you’re going to jump in with the three questions I’m about

[00:04:33] to give you right now.

[00:04:35] And all of these questions, let me go ahead and preface this.

[00:04:37] All of these questions, you may end up needing to go back and revise them multiple times.

[00:04:44] Because the process of discovery and the process of perception clarification, when you answer

[00:04:50] question number two, it may change your answer for question number one.

[00:04:54] So don’t feel like this is a brittle thing.

[00:04:56] It’s not intended to be.

[00:04:58] You know, rules that you set for yourself.

[00:05:00] But rather, it’s intended to open up your mind, get you to think a little bit differently

[00:05:04] about the way you perceive a project.

[00:05:06] So question number one is, what is this worth to me?

[00:05:10] What is this project worth to me?

[00:05:14] Now, notice I didn’t say, how much money am I going to be paid for this project?

[00:05:19] Notice that I didn’t say, what is this project worth to the company that I work for?

[00:05:24] I said, what is this project worth to me?

[00:05:27] And because we are talking about a personal perception, right?

[00:05:32] We’re talking about understanding how you are going to feel about this project, but

[00:05:37] also how this project tangibly will affect your life.

[00:05:42] And this question functions for multiple different reasons, multiple different areas that this

[00:05:47] question functions in.

[00:05:49] One of those obvious areas is prioritization.

[00:05:52] If you look at a project and maybe it’s something that one of your friends has been doing for

[00:05:56] and they aren’t really invested in it and you’re not really invested in it, but it’s just something

[00:06:02] that’s on your plate, right?

[00:06:04] Well, it may be that you decide that you have other projects that come way before this project.

[00:06:11] It may be that your perception was unclear on how important or unimportant that particular

[00:06:17] project was.

[00:06:19] I also want to take a moment to say that when we talk about projects in today’s episode,

[00:06:23] I’m talking about more than just large scale projects.

[00:06:26] This same questioning, the same line of questioning can be used for most projects of any size.

[00:06:35] You may not ask this kind of question for a one hour or these kinds of questions for

[00:06:39] a one hour project, but certainly for a project that will take the whole day, for example.

[00:06:45] So asking the question, what is this worth for me?

[00:06:47] You’re certainly going to look at things like monetary benefit, but you may also look at

[00:06:51] things like how does this affect my energy levels?

[00:06:55] How does this affect my relationships?

[00:06:57] How does this affect my relationship with my family?

[00:07:01] Or how does this affect my relationship with my employer, with my coworkers?

[00:07:05] What is this worth to me is not just what are the benefits that I’m going to get out

[00:07:10] of this, but what is the net effect that this project will have on me?

[00:07:16] So that’s question number one.

[00:07:17] And as we go through the other two questions, you will certainly end up going back and looking

[00:07:21] at question number one and maybe adjusting it.

[00:07:23] As I said before, don’t view this as a set of rules.

[00:07:26] Don’t view this as a set of rules.

[00:07:26] Don’t view this as a set in stone, but instead view this as a way of clarifying your perception.

[00:07:32] And it’s totally updatable.

[00:07:34] You know, write this in pencil.

[00:07:36] It’s totally fine to mark it out or erase it and start back over.

[00:07:40] Question number two.

[00:07:42] If this could only do one thing, what would that one thing be?

[00:07:49] Let me say that again.

[00:07:50] If this project, whatever it is that I’m trying to accomplish, if I could only do one tiny

[00:07:56] thing, what would that one thing be?

[00:07:56] If this was an insignificantly small thing, what would that one thing be?

[00:08:01] Now, this question works on multiple different levels.

[00:08:04] You can go way down to a very granular approach.

[00:08:07] For example, if you’re building a site, a web app where people log in, then perhaps

[00:08:14] the most important thing that you can do is get people’s emails, right?

[00:08:19] So that could be the one thing.

[00:08:22] If this could only do one thing, what would it be?

[00:08:24] It would collect email addresses.

[00:08:26] You could also do this on a larger scale.

[00:08:29] Let’s take Instagram, for example.

[00:08:31] If Instagram could only do one thing, what would it do?

[00:08:34] It would allow me to post a photo, right?

[00:08:38] It would allow me to post a photo to a public location.

[00:08:42] Now, what does this do?

[00:08:43] What does this do for us as developers?

[00:08:47] Well, what we do is we take this question and we recognize the most important pieces

[00:08:53] of whatever this project is, right?

[00:08:56] We start.

[00:08:56] We start identifying the most, and really with this question, the most important, the

[00:09:02] number one most important thing, right?

[00:09:05] And it could be that you recognize that there’s a series of one things that need to be put

[00:09:12] together to create a minimum viable product, right?

[00:09:17] So ask yourself this question.

[00:09:19] And then if it’s not minimum viable product yet, ask yourself the question again.

[00:09:23] So once you have thing number one built, I’m collecting.

[00:09:26] Then you ask yourself the next round, if this could do one more thing, what would it be?

[00:09:35] Now, the important thing about this to understand is that we always work one task at a time.

[00:09:41] No matter how much we want to multitask, we will always complete one task at a time.

[00:09:47] And if you ask yourself this question, it starts to clarify where the value is in any

[00:09:53] project, right?

[00:09:54] If you could only do one thing, then hopefully you’re going to be able to complete one task

[00:09:56] Your, your perception and hopefully your judgment is going to narrow it down to the

[00:10:01] most valuable thing that you can do.

[00:10:05] So this exercise kind of forces you to weigh the value of the different functions that

[00:10:10] you’ve considered for a given application.

[00:10:13] So once again, question number one, what is this project worth to me?

[00:10:18] Question number two, if this thing could only do one thing, if this project could only

[00:10:24] accomplish one small goal, what would it be?

[00:10:26] what would that goal be? What would that thing be? And question number three, what am I assuming?

[00:10:34] What am I assuming? You know, we have different types of assumption, and sometimes assumption

[00:10:40] is actually characterized as a bad thing. But the reality is that our brains use assumption

[00:10:47] in order to focus, right? Let me say that again. Our brains, the word assumption is effectively

[00:10:54] a shortcut. Our brains are using shortcuts so that they can focus on the things that they can’t

[00:11:00] shortcut on. Now, the problem is sometimes our brains take shortcuts that we didn’t want them

[00:11:07] to take, right? And sometimes our brains lead us down the wrong path because we took the wrong

[00:11:12] shortcut. So if we explicitly identify the things that we are assuming, we assume in multiple ways.

[00:11:21] Sometimes we assume on purpose, right? Sometimes

[00:11:24] we assume on purpose, right? Sometimes we assume on purpose, right? Sometimes we assume on purpose,

[00:11:24] we knowingly and systematically create assumptions for our projects. For example, we may assume

[00:11:30] that a large amount of our audience, if you’re developing a web application, you may assume that

[00:11:37] a large number of your audience is going to be using mobile phones, right? So this may be an

[00:11:42] explicit assumption. But then there may be implicit assumptions or these subconscious assumptions that

[00:11:49] we’re making. Like for example, the best solution to this problem is a web application. These are

[00:11:56] the bigger questions that we have to address early on in this process because the more we can think

[00:12:03] about the larger picture, right? The more we can think about what assumptions are we making, the

[00:12:09] better we can answer questions number one and two. What is this worth to me? And what is the most

[00:12:15] important fundamental thing that this project does?

[00:12:19] I can nearly guarantee you that if you ask these three questions at the beginning of any project

[00:12:25] and you actually spend some time to answer them and refine them, that your initial plan,

[00:12:32] whatever you had planned to do when you started out or when you were getting ready to jump into

[00:12:36] a project headfirst, whatever you had planned to do will almost certainly change because we take

[00:12:43] our perception for granted. Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of

[00:12:49] Beyond waited. If you liked this video, please hit the like button and subscribe to our channel. We’ll see you next time. Bye.

[00:12:49] Developer Tea. I want to encourage you to go and download Headspace. Of course, you can find it in

[00:12:54] major app stores. You can also go and find out more about joining Headspace by going to spec.fm

[00:13:01] slash Headspace. Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of Developer Tea. I hope you

[00:13:06] go forward and you start asking your own questions. You know, there are many more questions that you

[00:13:11] can ask to identify and clarify your perception. These are three of mine. I’d love for you to share

[00:13:17] what questions you are asking to help clarify your perception. You can join me in the spec

[00:13:23] Slack community and we can talk about it. spec.fm slash Slack. Of course, I’m on Twitter

[00:13:27] and at Developer Tea and at Jay Cottrell. That’s my personal Twitter. Thank you so much for

[00:13:33] listening to today’s episode of Developer Tea. And until next time, enjoy your tea.

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