Fostering Curiosity & How to Avoid Groupthink

THINKING YELLOW

Yellow is creative from a mental aspect, the colour of new ideas, helps us to find new ways of doing things. It is the practical thinker, not the dreamer. It is the best colour to create enthusiasm for life and can awaken greater confidence and optimism.

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"In life there isn’t a single person that knows everything and there is no person that knows nothing. It’s not too late to learn because you just need to develop that interest, talk to people, share with them what you have and learn from them. There is no breakthrough in this world if you are isolated, you can only make a breakthrough by talking to people." Marie-Christine Gasingirwa, Director at the Ministry of Education in Rwanda?

Just like Ted Lasso said, be curious not judgemental.

The power of open-ended questions lies in their ability to withhold judgment and invite curiosity. Open-ended questions allow responders to take the conversation in one of many directions and allow them to choose the direction that is most meaningful to them.

We need to question our questions—ask what you can do to make your questions more powerful. Powerful questions come from a place of curiosity, not judgment. And when leaders lead with curiosity, remarkable things happen.

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THE STONECUTTERS BLOCK

When nothing seems to help, I go and look at stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the 100 & First blow, it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.” Jacob Riis

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“While leaders are broadly aware of the importance of creating a psychologically safe culture to encourage candour, they are less cognizant of how subtle leadership behaviours can get in the way of people speaking up.” Dina Denham Smith, Founder and CEO of?Cognitas

The higher leaders go, the more likely they are to find themselves in an echo chamber, surrounded by people who think like them and agree with them. This occurs partly because of the?affinity bias, which leads us to favor, associate with, and hire the people to whom we feel most similar. This dearth of diverse perspectives is further compounded by a couple of issues: problem-solving methods that lead to?groupthink?and the difficulty of establishing?psychological safety. Collectively, these forces can result in leaders getting stuck in an echo chamber

Taking these actions will help you step outside the bubble of agreement where many leaders unwittingly exist:

1. Ask for feedback - We all have blind spots, use language such as "I need your help to see mine" and "want you to question and disagree with me if you think I am off base."
2. Be curious & listen well - Adopt an attitude of curiosity and ask questions to understand their perspective better. For example, you might ask: “What led you to that conclusion?” or say, “Tell me more.”
3. Practice Yes and? - Acknowledging someone’s ideas, you help them feel listened to, considered, and encouraged to share ideas in the future.
4. Speak last - Speaking last doesn’t mean being entirely quiet. Instead, it means that you focus your initial comments on gathering and clarifying information through questions such as: “Why do you think that’s the right direction?”
5. Seed different perspectives - Invite people from other parts of the company to team meetings to share alternate perspectives and views on a situation.
6. Walk the talk - By modeling the behaviors you’re asking your team to display, such as sharing feedback and ideas with your superiors, you build trust in your message and encourage others to behave similarly.

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QUESTION TIME

Questioning techniques are important because they can stimulate learning, develop the potential to think, drive to clear ideas, stir the imagination, and incentive to act.

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1. What is an area you'd like to improve over the next decade?
2. How are you working toward that outcome today?