What's your guiding question?

I know mine's changing again, and just for once, I'm aware of it happening.

Maybe (almost certainly) it's been put better elsewhere, but I made this up all by my own self. Your guiding question is the one you always ask. The one you measure everything you do against. The first question. The last question.

I'll try to explain.

My official job title is 'network and systems manager'. In practice, I'm a significant chunk of a team who make all the technical calls, and do all the fixing. We're generalists, who specialise in whatever's the problem right now. Not an unusual situation.

The pertinent part is where we 'make all the technical calls'. And technical decisions aren't always simple. Interesting technical decisions always aren't simple. Security versus ease of use. Customisability versus maintainability. Everything versus budgets. And the technical decisions I make and influence are affected, I hope strongly, by my guiding question.

The guiding question, for me, has evolved.

1. What do I need to do to make this machine work?
2. What do I need to do to make this service work?
3. What do I need to do to make this service work well for my users?
4. What do I need to do to make this set of services work together well for my users?
5. How should these services work together to best support what my users are doing?

And today, it's

• What service infrastructure should I be providing and supporting to equip my users to do what they do, but better?

What's your guiding question?