The case for curiosity in Conscious Leadership
Curiosity is an extremely powerful yet underused tool for conscious leadership. If it's a new concept to you, I promise the impact of curiousity is nothing short of transformational.
This week, I’m sharing seven advantages to make the case for curiosity in conscious leadership.
Advantage 1: helps process feedback
Did you know that receiving unsolicited feedback puts people into a fight or flight state? Fight or flight is a way to protect and defend ourselves, but reacting defensively to constructive feedback is unhelpful. By engaging curiosity, we shift out of defensive mode into learning mode, which helps us take feedback on board and process it.
Advantage 2: helps deal with conflict
Leaders have different views and approaches to conflict, and it’s relatively common for leaders to feel some degree of avoidance toward conflict. Curiosity moves leaders from avoiding conflict to addressing conflict by investigating its root cause. Taking this solution-focused approach helps leaders effectively de-escalate tense situations.
Advantage 3: stronger work relationshjps
Challenging work relationships often stem from misunderstandings and negative assumptions, which then continue to negatively impact the relationship. Curiosity is an excellent starting point from which to build (or rebuild) a relationship, as it moves us away from inaccurate assumptions and toward a more accurate and deeper understanding of other people’s point of view.
Advantage 4: openness to learning
Conscious leaders who engage curiosity are more willing to explore new ideas, challenge existing knowledge, and adapt to changing circumstances. This mindset enhances their own development and sets a positive example for their teams and creates a culture of psychological safety.
Advantage 5: supercharge empathy
Curiosity helps leaders to ask thoughtful questions at a deeper level and actively listen to the reply. Staying curious about diverse perspectives is especially important, and helps leaders mitigate our unconscious bias and build more inclusive relationships within the team.
Advantage 6: increase creativity
When leaders build a culture of curiosity, they inspire their teams to think outside the box. Curiosity promotes creative thinking, which leads to innovative practices, which in turn leads to higher profits.
Advantage 7: develop relationships and improve communication
Curiosity gives leaders a starting point for talking to everyone. Being curious helps leaders connect with their teams on a deeper level, and a ton of research shows us that connection is a vital pillar of physical and mental health and wellbeing. Connections also lead to more successful collaboration at work. By actively listening to people and trying to understand their struggles and motivations, leaders earn the trust and respect of their team.
How you can be more curious at work
If you’d like to access the power of curiosity, the good news is that there are a number of things you can try to develop your curiosity at work:
Ask open ended questions – questions starting with ‘how’ are particularly effective to elicit more information
Focus on active listening, not just listening to respond when it’s your turn to talk
Check your understanding by reframing people’s responses to your questions: “This is my understanding of what you shared… is that accurate?”
Be open to challenging your beliefs, knowledge and assumptions
If you have an event or conference coming up and you're curious about how conscious leadership can transform your team's dynamics and performance, book a call with Sarah to find out how she can add value.
