Reverse the usual format: the newest people ask the questions and a panel of longer-serving colleagues answers them live. New starters have the most useful questions anyone in the building could ask, and a fortnight later they will have stopped asking them.
What it is good for
- OnboardingHelping new people learn names, norms and who to ask about what.
- InclusionDesigning participation so the loudest voice does not set the pace.
- CommunicationPractising clear hand-offs, active listening and saying the hard thing early.
- Trust & safetyLowering the cost of admitting a mistake or asking for help.
What you need
- Questions collected in advance
- A willing panel of three or four
The run sheet
Collect questions anonymously (prep)
Ask new starters for the things they have not wanted to ask out loud. Anonymous collection is what produces the good ones — 'why does everyone talk about that project in that tone?' is not a question anyone signs their name to.
Brief the panel to answer honestly (prep)
Three or four people with real tenure. Tell them in advance: 'I do not know' and 'that is a mess and here is why' are both acceptable answers. A panel that only gives official answers is worse than no session.
Run it as an interview (25 min)
A new starter reads the questions, panel answers, two minutes each. Facilitator keeps it moving and cuts off speeches.
Open floor at the end (10 min)
Anyone may ask anything. The questions here are usually sharper than the submitted ones, because the room has worked out what is allowed.
Write down what nobody could answer (5 min)
Every question the panel could not answer is a gap in onboarding documentation. That list is the session's second deliverable.
Facilitator notes
- Everything hinges on the panel's honesty in the first three answers. Brief them, and if one of them is incapable of a straight answer, leave them off.
- Run it every time you have a cohort of three or more. For a single starter, do it as a conversation rather than a panel.
- The unanswered-question list is often the most useful thing the company learns about itself that month.
Debrief questions
Ask these immediately afterwards, not next week. Fifteen minutes of these is what turns the activity into something the team refers back to — see the debrief guide.
- What did you assume about this place that turned out to be wrong?
- Which question did nobody have a good answer to?
Variations
Written edition
Panel answers in writing in a shared document over a week. Less immediate, more considered, and permanently searchable for the next cohort.
Leadership edition
The panel is the leadership team. Higher stakes, higher value, and only worth doing if they will genuinely answer.
Access and inclusion
Anonymous question submission is the accessibility feature — it removes the need to speak up in a group to participate. Keep it available for the open floor too, via a live form.
Running it remotely
Works well on a call. Use a live question form running alongside so the open floor is not limited to whoever unmutes fastest.