There are many things you don’t know. Things happen and you wonder why. You want to change things, but you don’t know how. People behave in ways that don’t make sense, as do teams and organisations. Or so it seems. But there are reasons. There always are. History, personal interests, laziness, anger—the list can be long.
You won’t know until you investigate: look, talk to people, talk to more people, talk to other people, read literature, think and reflect, alone or together—this is another long list.
When investigating, the key to success is curiosity: wanting to understand, more than wanting to move along in the project, or trying to get some validation for an idea you believe in yourself. In a way, it’s embracing ignorance: putting yourself in a position where you tell yourself “I have no idea, I am clueless, but I want to learn.” And then take it from there, see where it leads you without fear of where that might be.
There’s a difference between wanting to learn and REALLY wanting to learn—so much that it’s like a fire inside you. That is the key. Let’s call it deep curiosity. It goes beyond opportunism or pragmatism, where you’re satisfied as soon as you find something that enables a next step.
Deep curiosity is intense, almost obsessive. It never stops, and it focuses the mind when you look, listen, smell, read or think, like nothing else. It’s not about you, it’s about whatever you’re curious about. For that reason, interesting things can happen. When you interview people, or even casually talk to them, and you are deeply curious, they will sense a lack of ego on your part and it will be much easier to get to the bottom of what you’re trying to find. They will sense it is not about you, but about them, or something bigger, and open up. And let’s be honest, who is not flattered when someone seems to really care about what you think or feel?
Openness breeds openness.
It comes from within, it’s not a posture or a stance. You can be casual and funny, or intense and serious while you’re at it. It doesn’t really matter (just don’t be weird about it either way), as long as you’re sincere.
That means being clear and honest with regard to your words and your intentions. We all know what it is and we recognize it when we experience it. When you’re deeply curious, radical sincerity comes easy, it doesn’t really feel like a choice or an option.
It’s a mentality, a state of mind, a way of being. And you can’t fake it. You have to care about the issues you’re dealing with. If you don’t, your curiosity will be superficial and what you will find will be superficial too. It may be interesting, it may be surprising, but it will not bring you closer to the insights that you need to really make a difference.
The right mentality helps you to do two things that do not automatically go well together: open yourself to new information and insights AND reflect on what the new information means or could mean. This is not a big issue when you can take your time. You can stop reading or pause a video to reflect and this generally pays off nicely. But when you’re in a live situation, interviewing or observing people, there’s no pause button. Being deeply curious helps you to listen and reflect at the same time because your hunger to learn feeds both mental processes. It’s a hunger for meaning that needs both input from outside and integration with what you already know.
Designers are curious by nature, but good designers are deeply curious. They can light a fire from within, and they can get lost in the quest to learn. It’s not always easy. You may not always like what you find. Honesty is a sharp knife you can cut yourself with. Be careful what you wish for…