No, this debate had been ongoing throughout Nicholas II's reign, and in particular after the failed 1905 revolution.

The 1905 Revolution failed for two key reasons - the military sided with the Tsar and there was no real, developed way to organize the masses towards revolution. For a very brief period in 1905 there was a Workers' Soviet council in the Ivanovsky district of Moscow which organized trade union workers toward demonstrations and revolutionary activities, but it shut down after the revolution failed.

In 1917 there were actually two separate revolutions, something that gets glossed over by many but is actually key to understanding the rise of the USSR.

In February (technically March but that's because Russia we still using the Julian calendar) the liberal and parliamentary leftists and social democrats who were already in the Duma removed the Tsar from power and made the Duma the governing body. However the Workers Soviets were instituted as parallel governing institutions partially to placate leftists but also to