The single most powerful shortcut to accelerating your career:

Learning from people already ahead of you.

But asking “Can I pick your brain?” is how you get:

• Seen as another time-waster

• Forced to learn every lesson the hard way

• Left behind while others fast-track their careers

Instead, ask your mentors these 7 questions:

1. What is something most people think is important that I can skip entirely?

As a beginner, everything looks important.

But as you progress, you realize most things aren't.

So instead of wasting your effort in dozens of directions, ask this to figure out what to avoid.

2. What part of your daily routine do you wish you had started sooner?

People ahead of you got to where they are with simple daily actions compounded over time.

Figure out what they are, build them into your days, & stick to them for years.

3. What channels led to the building of your highest-quality relationships?

It's cliché, but you are the average of the 5 people you surround yourself with.

The problem is finding the right people isn't easy—unless you know where to look.

So use this question to get some directions.

4. What is something you did differently than your peers 5 years ago that led to pushback, but served you in the long run?

If you do what everyone else does, you can expect to achieve what everyone else achieves (mediocrity).

Use this question to identify behaviors to shed.

5. What can I expect to struggle with along the way?

Growth is having problems today you would have begged to have had years ago.

So if you know which struggles are coming, you can prepare for them and continue to grow (which means unlocking new problems).

6. What is something you believed 5 years ago you had to "unlearn" to take the next step?

Progress comes from the constant cycle of identifying a bottleneck and removing it.

Most of the time, that bottleneck is a behavior or belief you have to "unlearn."

7. What's something you didn't pay enough attention to early on, then had to learn the hard way?

Early on, you're flying blind.

You don't even know what you don't know.

So the faster you can uncover these blind spots, the faster you can improve.