I have been thinking about why it has taken us so long to unite good design practise with good business practise and pondering the contemporary interest in so-called “design thinking”. Before 2008, it was a relatively unsearched term in Google but the search has since grown enormously. I am not sure I have any theories on this yet so I will keep on reading. But the reading is leading me into interesting terrain, despite not providing a neat answer to a complex question. Today’s education was mostly about the attributes of “design thinkers”.
Curiosity is, of course, a key attribute of any good designer. I happen to believe it is also an attribute we all need to re-discover in order to navigate our way in the rapidly changing technological environments in which we will soon be working. That is, if we hope to keep our incomes coming in. In an early-ish article on design thinking from a 2008 HBR article (coincidental timing with search trends?) written by the founder of the international design consultancy Ideo (Tim Brown), some other attributes of a design thinker are listed in a sidebar. A few, like empathy and optimism, surprised me:
- Empathy
- Integrative thinking
- Optimism
- Experimentalism
- Collaboration
In my experience, not many of these attributes are especially required in an average job description nor expected of the average corporate worker, as they go about their tasks. Which is a shame, considering the interest many corporations have in increasing innovation. And that it’s exactly these kinds of attributes that are uniquely human and not under threat by robots or AI just yet. To have these attributes is to have personal competitive advantage in the Second Machine Age and by kindling them, our eyes and minds become open to new possibilities. In time, these can become profitable ideas for our companies. Win-win. So why aren’t we all working on these, I wonder?
And here’s a list of the 8 habits of curious people, from Fortune magazine. I did a quick mental mapping these against past behaviours I have demonstrated and/or been on the receiving end of in the workplace, and came up short of ideal (my emphasis):
- They listen without judgement
- They ask a lot of questions
- They seek surprise
- They are fully present
- They are willing to be wrong
- They make time for curiosity (when last did you?)
- They aren’t afraid to say ‘I don’t know’
- They don’t let past hurts affect their future
And, finally, from Hal Gregersen, Executive Director of the MIT Leadership Center, and co-author of The Innovator’s DNA, a statement that captures precisely why I think a lot of the behaviours above, the very behaviours that are necessary for creative and innovative personal and business results, are curiously absent in corporate life:
it’s clear we live in a society that rewards the right answers instead of the right questions
Asking better questions is a good skill on the way to developing comprehensive and constant curiosity. Asking any questions is a good start. At least, that’s what Mr Gregersen believes, and believes in so much that he has started the 4-24 project, to encourage this practice. The website states “Questions aren’t just means to an end; they’re a journey. Start your questioning quest by reviewing the (resources on the site) – and go back to a time where there was no right or wrong answer, just possibilities.”
It’s a simple way to start the personal journey back to the curiosity we all had as children and worth doing, if only to remember the simple pleasure of whining “But why?” to everything your parents said.