Managers often spend countless hours looking for the best ways to perform tasks, administer functions, and run departments. This often works well for a short period of time. However, to create an enduring business, managers should be curious and encourage curiosity.
Cultivating curiosity in business creates enduring businesses that are less likely to falter. In this article I cover three areas where curiosity can improve the performance of managers, sales teams, and production teams.
The People
“The best people don’t need to be managed. Guided, taught, led—yes. But not tightly managed.” -Jim Collins
Curious companies start with managers being curious about people—those they are selling to, the people they are currently building the company with, and those they are considering hiring. For managers, there is not a physical work product that they produce. They no longer have a great installation, victory in signing the job, or other physical goal. They do have a responsibility to make sure their team produces a quality work product and runs well through the production of others.
The Customers
Sales and marketing provide the first opportunity for a manager to be curious about business. According to LinkedIn there are, on average, 11,000 new business books published each year, with many of these being in the sales and marketing arena. It doesn’t matter if it’s a team of sales professionals being managed, or an operationally minded group with a “kitchen table” sales presentation; a manager and their team have a responsibility to be mindful of what the customer needs and wants.
A manager who is curious could look like: asking questions to understand what is most important to the individual or group; asking how they have experienced your type of service in the past; or finding out who will be affected by the work you are doing and then striving to create buy-in. Ask questions of your clients and find the keys to making sure they are happy with the work your company provides before you start a job.
You and Your Team
The second opportunity for a curious company is within its own walls, with the people who work there and, most importantly, with you. Being curious about yourself, how you work, what you expect from others, and when you demand more is a critically important component of interacting with or managing those around you. For managers, the people in your work group are constantly watching you, looking for value and assistance. For the most part, they’re looking for you to help them grow.
Being curious about yourself as a manager could look like: defining your leadership style, deciding how you want to build others up, working on strategies to create followers of your leadership, or finding ways to praise those around you. Consider how you would answer questions like: How do others view me? What are the results of my actions from today? How can I serve my employees better? This exploration of self leads to better outcomes for your team and can be used as a building block to model the coaching of employees. By being curious, managers can know who they are and develop a plan to coach others.
Every person working under a manager’s direction has a different set of thoughts, beliefs, and patterns that they follow in their life. A trivial example of this is to ask yourself a question about where you store your ketchup. If you thought of the refrigerator, you likely grew up in a standard American household. If you thought the pantry, you likely grew up anywhere else in the world. Simply, ketchup is shelf-stable and does not need refrigeration.
This example highlights a difference that may exist between two people, how they move through a space, and what they expect to see as they work. Being curious about how a person works, what decisions they make, and why they make them creates an open and inclusive environment where the best ideas win.
As a manager, being curious about the people who work with you is part of a process that begins by holding regularly scheduled one-on-one meetings with the 3-6 key employees you coach directly. For a younger company, these may be weekly 20-minute meetings with technicians or an office administrator.
As a business grows, you’re teaching managers how to develop other employee relationships by modeling care and curiosity about the work they are doing during your regular meetings with them. In contrast to a technician meeting, a manager meeting may last a full hour but cover more in-depth topics. In practice, the request for updates on tasks should be kept to a minimum in these meetings. Recognize that this is a meeting for them and not a meeting for you to give them tasks, and as this meeting develops, the employee will begin to bring relevant content or problems to discuss.
Your Future Team
A resume should be the very best representation of a person that they could possibly give. The first interview is the second-best representation, with stories candidates tell that include often-rehearsed answers intended to impress a hiring manager. Instead of becoming excited about this paper person, be curious by asking yourself questions about how their experience translates to the position you are hiring for. Think about how they will react to the current manager of that position and what level of autonomy you believe they can work with.
In being curious, you may learn that coaching a new candidate will take more training time than you originally thought, that they are not comfortable with an after hours schedule, or that they don’t do well with uncertainty. Any of these scenarios could result in a poor hire due to a lack of training, a mismatch of expectations or experience, or a general dissatisfaction with the job. The potential results are poor performance, a voluntary quit of the job, or dismissal—expensive mistakes that may have been avoided by being curious.
On the other hand, you may recognize that the company is not ready for an employee as skilled as the candidate you are interviewing. Instead of losing them to a company that is ready, present the challenge of working in your company and the work you are asking them to do. To do this, managers and candidates must be candid about the job.
Many potential employees are looking for an opportunity to build something with a business. This could be an exciting possibility and might be the job that your candidate dreams of having. Certainly, you want to sell the positive aspects, but also be aware that overselling the position could result in the same loss of performance or voluntary quit as described above.
Five Ideas to Lead a Meeting with Curiosity
As a manager, practicing curiosity in business starts with creating a structure for how you interact with the people you work with and manage. Consider the following five ideas to begin your curiosity practice.
- Create an agenda so others know what you intend to discuss.
- Create space to talk about new ideas and consider writing exercises or short-answer questions to support participation from everyone in the group.
- Ask the people you hear from the least to give their opinions first.
- Stay with the messy middle of problems, ask questions, and resist moving toward a resolution too quickly.
- Recognize victories and let others know when their ideas will be utilized.
You may find that curiosity results in more sales, higher-level employees, and decisions being made at the appropriate level in the company. By teaching others to be curious, you will be more aware of market changes, what your customers are saying, and how employees are all working together to build the business.
Chris McQueen
Chris McQueen is a Business Development Advisor for Violand Management Associates (VMA), a highly respected consulting company in the restoration and cleaning industries. Chris is a veteran of the restoration industry, having worked as an independent claims adjuster, estimate reviewer, and district manager for the world’s largest independent claims management company. Through Violand, Chris works with companies to develop their people and their profits. To reach him, visit Violand.com or call (330) 966-0700
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