The 7 Practices of Curious Leaders
Lack of curiosity is deadly in changing times. Vision, courage, and energy, without curiosity, turn to exhaustion and irrelevance.
Curiosity indicates potential.
Leaders who ask questions go further than those who don’t.
The 7 practices of curious leaders:
- Fearlessly step into the fog. Don’t let the need for clarity be the reason you turn like an ostrich from uncertainty.
- Clarity is the point of performance.
- Confusion is the point of opportunity.
- “Not knowing,” is the door of innovation.
- Freely embrace ignorance. (Or live in it.)
- Encourage others to know more than you.
- Release the need to be right.
- Question the obvious. “Tell me again ….”
- Persistently poke assumptions. You don’t know what you think you know.
- What do you mean when you say…?
- What if I’m wrong?
- What are we missing?
- Confidently invite new perspectives.
- Bring customers to team meetings.
- Create cross-functional teams.
- Listen to voices from other industries or sectors.
- Boldly believe things can be better, including yourself.
- Questions end when you arrive.
- Stop defending past performance.
- Compare yourself with those who are “better” than you.
- Tenaciously ask second questions.
- Voraciously read broadly.
Reality check:
You can’t run an organization and be curious about everything all the time. Every moment isn’t a learning moment.
Ship it and move on.
If there’s always room for improvement there’s never room to stabilize processes and celebrate progress. Sometimes, at least for the time being, good enough is good enough.
What blocks curiosity?
How might leaders develop curiosity?
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I so agree with the closing reality check statement: “Sometimes, good enough is good enough”. There is a point we need to move forward and try the ideas with the knowledge they are not perfect. It requires courage to do this..
Thanks Liz. Yes it requires courage. It might help to think of it as a learning experience as well. But in either case, it takes courage.
So true, I’m a curious leader – a creator. It’s so easy to get lost in the fog or forest. I’ve found it takes discipline, sometimes, to stop and actually do something. I love the reality check after such good ideas. It matters.
You are absolutely right Dan. I think that a sign of confidence is being confident enough to say “I don’t know, I’ll have to find out.” instead of trying to make something up. It’s enjoyable to wonder about things and find out new information.
Thanks Andy. “It’s more enjoyable to wonder….” love that. And A I find it’s true.
From your post:”Freely embrace ignorance. Encourage others to know more than you. Release the need to be right. Question the obvious. ‘Tell me again ….’ ”. Love the notion of ’embracing’… Goes nicely with my suggestion to anyone who will listen: EMBRACE AMBIGUITY! I go on to say that it’s not enough to acknowledge it or deal with it; you must see it as an opportunity to accomplish something meaningful – same as embracing ignorance.
Thanks John. Love the term ambiguity!!!
Clarity, confusion and ignorance, the great leaders work on these three elements of life, they are very much clear about their thought process, they find path in the state of confusion they remove the cloud of ignorance. They are fearless, ready to jump and take decision, they create the opportunities, they steam the heat of performance and show the way by leading from the front and live the image by self declared examples
Thanks Rajesh. You listed three powerful terms. I hadn’t thought of them in this context.
I find it curious that at times leaders shy away from being… curious. In an attempt to be a “strong leader” with all the answers, leaders can easily lose sight of the vital role curiosity has in any organization.
Walt Disney pointed out that “…curiosity leads us down new paths.” It provides a catalyst to explore, question, and grow. In the late 80’s Hewlett-Packard had an ad campaign that showed members of an IT team problem solving by using a simple question…”What if?” Curiosity begs us to ask questions, to find solutions, to move forward. It’s a natural human instinct that we’re all born with, which Google has capitalized and made a fortune, for without curiosity what need would we have for a search engine?
How do you facilitate curiosity in your organization? Do you model curiosity or do you always have all the answers? Just asking, as some of the greatest minds would suggest the only way to get right answers and to move forward is to constantly ask…What if…
Albert Einstein once said, “I have no special talent, I am only passionately curious.” Isn’t that a curious statement?
Thanks for adding your insight, Ron. I love a well turned phrase and that first sentence is awesome!
And I would add “when you are wrong say you are wrong.”
Thanks Julie. Good add!
Dan, please help me understand one of your sentences. Under Reality Check, you say “Ship it and move on.” If you mean “Skip it” I think I understand. If you do mean “Ship it . .” please clarify. Just haven’t heard that phrase and am CURIOUS!
Hi Alan. Thanks for asking about “ship it.” … The idea is you have manufactured something. It’s time to send it to shipping. Don’t keep improving something. Determine if it’s good enough. If it is, ship it. The image comes from the manufacturing sector. Cheers
Knowing when to “ship it” can definitely be a challenge, but certainly agree. You can’t make everything perfect. software devs know this… iterate when necessary.