Your Latent Leadership Skill….Curiosity!
The idea of being genuinely curious was the gift that coach training gave me in 2011. Prior to that, and with twenty years in leadership positions, I was under the impression that “knowing stuff” was the currency of leadership, rather than being curious about people, ideas or solutions. I spent so many years stressing over the need to have the answers for my staff, stakeholders and executives, and I avoided opportunities for advancement because I didn’t feel “ready” with all of the answers that I felt would be needed to succeed.
Fast forward to today, and in the context of a pandemic, knowing all of the answers is literally impossible. We are in uncharted territory. For the leaders who lean on providing definitive answers, this is an extremely challenging paradigm to navigate. When we don’t have the answers that we are used to having, we stay stuck, stressed and ineffective for ourselves and everyone around us.
The mindset and skill we need to cultivate right now is genuine curiosity. Getting curious about what’s possible, what you’re learning, what others are experiencing and co-creating the first step will keep you moving forward. When I cultivate a curious mindset it keeps me out of judgment (of myself and others). Curiosity allows me to minimize my pattern of making assumptions about what is going on for people, and alleviates anxiety about what lies ahead.
We are seeing innovation all around us right now; curiosity is the birthplace of creative and innovative ideation. On the flip side, maintaining the status quo is quickly leading to irrelevance in businesses and non-profit organizations who are resisting innovation in this time of rapid change.
Whether your team is thriving or struggling right now, we can all agree, this is not business as usual. The conditions of the pandemic present an unprecedented opportunity to think creatively about how we deliver on our missions and engage our people.
Modeling curiosity is the best way to cultivate it in your team. This can be challenging for leaders who feel that they need to bring answers and directives to provide a framework for their team. While there is a place for your ideas in your team conversations, challenge yourself to ask a few questions from a curious place first, before providing the answers that you think your team is looking for.
Here are some simple questions you can use to stimulate some curiosity in your next virtual planning meeting:
If we didn’t have to get it perfect, what is one new idea we could implement?
If you had all the resources you needed, what would you change?
What might our customers need from us that we haven’t provided yet?
What will we stop doing? What will we start doing? What will we continue?
If we were building our services from scratch, what would we do differently?
Go ahead and experiment with curiosity and questions to design your meeting agendas. You may have a single question that guides your entire meeting and keeps you focused on the problem you are trying to solve.
Our curiosity, the untapped resource within us, is waiting to emerge. In response to all of the challenges presented by this pandemic, how might you leverage this uncertainty to create space for curiosity and lasting change?
Your Meditation: Evoking Curiosity
Support yourself through this learning of curiosity with mindfulness and meditation. Nicole McLellan, IRG Associate Coach and Facilitator has created a meditation for Evoking Curiosity.