The Power of Curiosity: How to Have Real Conversations that create Collaboration, Innovation and Understanding - Tapa dura

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Kathy Taberner is a former occupational therapist with a MA in Leadership and a Professional Certified Coach through the International Coach Federation, Kathy has been a facilitator/trainer and coach in leadership development for the past ten years. After recognizing how crucial curiosity was to understanding others and building relationships, she and her daughter Kirsten Taberner Siggins co-founded the Institute of Curiosity, a coaching and training organization that helps individuals learn and apply the skills of curiosity to their personal and professional relationships. Kathy lives in the Okanagan Valley and Vancouver with her husband.

Kirsten Siggins is a certified executive coach and a member of the International Coaching Federation, with experience in the entertainment industry (Warner Music London, American Idol, AOL RED, and producing events, photo shoots, and commercials) and the business world. Regardless of industry or context, Kirsten believes curiosity is essential to personal success, growth, innovation, health, and happiness, and co-founded the Institute of Curiosity with her mother Kathy Taberner in 2014. Kirsten lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two children.

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As kids, we are all curious. Kids are constantly asking questions, wanting to solve problems, looking for new possibilities. All because they are curious, wanting to learn more. Curiosity is a childhood survival skill; it’s how they learn, test their assumptions, become open to new perspectives, push the boundaries of what they are capable of, make mistakes, and do things they (and often we) never thought were possible. As kids, time is a limitless commodity, and the present is the only place to be.

But somewhere along the way, as we grow into adulthood, we lose our sense of curiosity. Is it when our parents become frustrated with our millions of questions--as they’re thinking about other things in their lives and are not present in the moment--and tell us to stop asking them or make us feel bad for asking them? Is it when our teachers, who don’t have the time or means to answer the myriad of questions thrown at them, dismiss these questions or make us feel we aren’t smart enough because we don’t already know the answer?

Sadly, however it happens, curiosity in adulthood is hard to find. We live in a time-pressured world, always anticipating what is coming next with little time to be curious about what is happening now.

A recent Globe and Mail (BC) interview with Brigid Schulte, author of Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play: When No One Has the Time, pointed out that North Americans feel they are time constrained, which impacts their ability to be curious. Our offices are now our homes; our homes are now our offices. Technology tracks our every move, “connecting” us with friends on social media. Expectations of people are high, and people are trying to do everything at once. As a consequence, our communication is brief and our instructions shallow, leaving little room for listening, inquiry, and understanding.

But curiosity shouldn’t be something we grow out of. In fact, curiosity has been recognized as one of the most important skills needed by a leader today. In 2011, Forbes recognized curiosity as “the one trait all innovative leaders share,” using the success of Steve Jobs as an example: “Jobs wasn’t curious because he wanted to be successful. He became successful because he was so curious.”