The link between curiosity and success

“I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.”- Albert Einstein

The curious mind is an outstanding tool for professionals and business. The strong desire to learn and understand unfolds the intellect for innovation and resourcefulness. Curious individuals make more rational decisions, more creative solutions and tend to form stronger interpersonal relationships.

How curiosity can excel your career or business or just your zest :

Improve business practices. The more knowledge you obtain about your business or industry, the higher your insight will be on methods to increase your revenue and improve customer and employee satisfaction.

Better Decisions. Curiosity guides versatile thinking. Understanding the entire picture before putting a plan to action leads to improved decision making.

It makes you more likeable. When you seek to increase your knowledge and understanding about a topic you are more confident and intelligent. When you show curiosity towards other people you will become more likable and relatable to them.

Relationships with stakeholders. Showing a genuine interest in customers, employees and other stakeholders is the foundation to a strong, satisfied, and loyal relationships.

Resolve customer difficulties. When a customer has a problem, the curious employee listens, considers why this problem has occurred and develop an innovative solution to help the customer and prevent future complications.

Learning from sales mistakes. If you aren’t making sales or your customers are not coming back and you haven’t being curious to discover why, you will never learn from the errors that have been made.

Negotiation. Curiosity for what both stakeholders want or need, helps negotiations that result in two satisfied parties. The curious mind will be interested in all perspectives.

Reduced Conflict. As above, considering the perspective of other parties and encouraging others to do the same supports collaboration and improved group achievements.

Developing products or services. The curious mind considers how things work, how they can be improved and what people want or need. This is essential to develop high demand products or services.

Encouraging Curiosity in the workplace:

Research indicates that leaders who encourage curiosity create a more wholesome work environment where employees have higher job satisfaction and performance.

Open Mind. When a suggestion is made or a question is asked, regardless of what it is… keep an open mind, branch off the idea and see if it can take you to new heights.  Choose how you respond – think about your response!

Try new things. Sometimes the reason we don’t change is because we don’t feel there is a need, but when we change, wonderful things can happen. Once a month, try something new. Go to a different restaurant, try a new sport, watch a movie from a different genre than your preferred. When you try new things you trigger curiosity within your mind.

Hire Curious Individuals. Consider the way you advertise roles. Consider the questions you ask during an interview. Listen to the question’s candidates ask. Provoke their curiosity during this process and select some naturally curious individuals for your company.

Demonstrate Curiosity. Express curiosity in the interests and opinions of your employees. Ask individuals about improvements they would make. Use their responses to develop a new way of operating. Employees will respect a leader that values and listens to them.

Ask your employees. Questions about what they would do differently or what could be improved. They will respect a leader that asks and listens. Use these responses to redevelop a new way of doing. Solutions to your problems could be sitting in the mind of your colleague.

Focus on learning not performance. To increase confidence, skills and motivation it is more effective to set and work towards learning goals than performance goals.

Encourage employees to expand their skills and knowledge. Support employees to complete further study, expand their network or experiment with new ideas or ways of doing. Leaders and companies will benefit from their knowledge and increased performance.

Arrange innovation days. Organise regular meetings with employees to brainstorm ideas for change. Ask questions such as why… what if… and how do we…? Don’t just accept things as good enough, or because it is how things have always been done. Focus on the experiences people wish to have and the why.   

An individuals curiosity tends to decrease the longer they stay in a job due to being progressive tied up in the daily workload. Try to set some time aside each day to open your mind, listen to someone else or try something new.

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence.”- Albert Einstein

Ferne Eliz King

Love Life  Love YOUR Life