Ten principles
To live with a spirit of inquiry is a way of being. One that helps us move through complexity with greater presence. Its essence is held in ten principles.
Move toward not-knowing
We are all born curious. Yet that early wonder is quickly trained out of us. “If you ask too many questions, you’ll be overlooked,” we’re told, and the inquisitive child is sent to wander elsewhere. Measuring becomes knowing, and knowledge becomes key. Knowledge may offer power, but sensing what we do not know is wisdom and it is this wisdom we need in today’s complexity. To create connection and movement, we must learn to lean on something deeper than what we already understand. It begins with practising how to find the inner stance of not-knowing.
Find the question that is alive
Imagine that a more generative answer to your most complex challenge could arise from asking the one question that truly matters. Where would you begin? Throughout life we collect countless scripts for solving problems. Most of the time we set out to “fix” things without ever touching the root of the issue. To go deeper, we must search for the question that lives within our organisation or the system around us. How to reach that question is something one can learn. It is an essential beginning.
Gather difference
One of the greatest limitations to our collective wisdom is our longing for sameness. We know the pleasure of recognition, the comfort of those who see the world as we do. But the shadow side of that comfort is the impulse to dismiss another’s truth the moment our own certainty is challenged. What if your truth is just one perspective? And what if becoming wiser depends on our willingness to expand it with radically different viewpoints? Gathering difference is a precondition for progress.
Ask forward
“The reluctance to inquire further occurs everywhere and leads nowhere.” Most of our questions are rooted in reactivity, mistrust, or scarcity. They reveal only a narrow slice of reality and ignore the vast territory of possibility. Asking forward is a way of questioning that brings the potential of the future into motion and always in connection with the other. In my podcast elsewhere on this website, you can listen to how this sounds.
Listen others into being
Between what someone says and what we hear lies interpretation. We think we have heard the other, yet without noticing, we listen to our own interpretation of their words. As long as our convictions shape our listening windows, we unconsciously obstruct connection and progress. The practice is to listen in such a way that the other can fully emerge with their own wisdom. This asks for awareness of the different levels of listening, with the deepest one as our aspiration.
Start with the system
Much of our energy is spent working hard, only to discover that a problem we thought we had solved reappears months later in another form. This happens because we often work on a challenge with people who have no direct relationship to the issue. We work for others rather than with those who are part of the system surrounding the question. Learning how to gather a meaningful representation of that system is essential in curious leadership.
Give voice to the whole
In groups and organisations, the prevailing norm shapes how we respond to complex matters. But sustainable answers require us to bring our full humanity into the workspace. Meaning arises in and between people. So does the direction that binds us. Learning to observe and listen to what is happening between us is an essential capacity and the gentle bell that signals the moment when shared meaning begins to appear.
Suspend judgement
“Every judgement is a tragic expression of an unmet need.” Too often, its consequences include harm, subtle or overt. We rarely recognise judgement as a disguised need, nor do we always have the capacity to meet the old longing that still lives within us. Leaders who work from inquiry recognise judgement as a place where something has been left unattended. They explore the underlying need instead. The far-reaching alternative to judgement becomes the request.
Make sensitivity S.M.A.R.T.
Work is human work, and humans carry entire lifetimes within them, joy, fear, everything that befalls us along the way. We often try to set aside what feels personal in order to perform “well.” Yet we forget that most of our communication is non-verbal, and that we cannot hide ourselves, even when we try. By becoming aware of our sensitivity and engaging it with intention and discernment, we can profoundly expand the value of our presence.
Turn reaction into response
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space lies our power to choose.” Viktor Frankl’s words remind us that when we can observe what we previously assumed to be true, new meaning becomes possible. This requires listening inward and outward at the same time. The art of curious life and leadership is to shift from reacting out of the past toward responding to what the present moment is calling for. In doing so, we find our way toward connection and wisdom, living in a continuous state of response-ability.
