In today’s dynamic professional environment, the importance of fostering healthy relationships within teams, across organisations, and beyond cannot be overstated. Career success is dependent on the support of other people, as is success for individuals and businesses when it comes to meeting key objectives.
The people you work with have the ability to boost your success through providing ideas, insights, support, introductions and by advocating and influencing on your behalf. Alternatively, they can prove to be huge obstacles to your success, challenging your ideas, obstructing access to key people or withholding important information.
We all have a vested interest in building positive and constructive relationships with the people with whom we work. To do so, we need to develop trust and engagement, ensuring that they actively want to support us, rather than simply ensuring that they go along with our plans.
To develop this engagement, it helps to recognise the relationship between curiosity, listening, authenticity, and vulnerability. These elements form a continuous cycle that is critical for developing robust professional relationships. By understanding this cycle, we can better navigate interpersonal dynamics and promote a thriving organisational culture.
Curiosity: The Catalyst for Engagement
Curiosity acts as the initial spark in this cyclical relationship. It encourages individuals to seek understanding beyond superficial knowledge. The temptation can be to enter conversations with a clear idea of where we want the conversation to end and to act as if that conclusion is preordained. But, when we are genuinely curious, we are more likely to explore different perspectives, ask probing questions, and discover underlying motivations. This openness lays the groundwork for meaningful interactions and potentially different, and more impactful, outcomes.
Curiosity not only fosters a thirst for deeper learning but also leads to greater connection. Participants in a study conducted by Todd Kashan and John Roberts at George Mason University were more attracted and felt closer to curious conversation partners, primed by the study authors, than they were to those who showed less interest in them.
Kashdan said of the study, “Being interested is more important in cultivating a relationship and maintaining a relationship than being interesting. It’s the secret juice of relationships.”
Listening: The Foundation of Understanding
Curiosity naturally leads to active listening. Effective listening involves more than just hearing words; it’s about fully comprehending and acknowledging others’ viewpoints. When colleagues and clients feel genuinely heard, it validates their contributions and reinforces the value they bring to the table.
By demonstrating that you value what others have to say, you cultivate an environment where people are encouraged to open up and express their thoughts and ideas. This authentic exchange bolsters mutual respect and understanding.
Authenticity: Establishing Genuine Connections
Once you put aside your own agenda and bring curiosity and active listening into your professional conversations, you open up space for authentic engagement. Authentic engagement moves you away from a transactional focus on what you can get out of each individual conversation and towards finding meaningful and positive outcomes collectively.
Greater understanding of and investment in the needs and desired outcomes of others can lead to a greater commitment to finding solutions for all. Such authenticity builds loyalty and commitment, as people understand that you are not just there for yourself and, as a result, feel more driven to support you.
Vulnerability: Bringing Down Barriers
As you set aside your transactional agenda and enjoy more curious, engaged, and open conversations, the barriers come down. Interactions become deeper and more meaningful. Your openness encourages the same in others, which then creates a much stronger connection.
People often equate vulnerability with a loss of face and worry that others will lose respect for them if they admit that they have made mistakes or don’t know all of the answers. However, research from a team of researchers at Harvard University demonstrated that a message can actually be more resonant if accompanied by humility and stories of struggles along the way. Meaningful relationships are easier to forge when people see themselves in you, not when you put yourself on a pedestal.
Vulnerability, the understanding that you don’t have all the answers, will also fuel your own curiosity. And so, the cycle begins turning again.
Trust and Engagement: The Cornerstones of Collaboration
Trust and engagement bind the entire cycle together. When curiosity leads to active listening, and those interactions are grounded in authenticity and vulnerability, trust and engagement are organically cultivated. Trust is critical for effective collaboration as it reduces friction, enhances communication, and enables a free flow of ideas.
The Impact Across Teams and Organizations
- Individual Relationships: This cycle enhances mutual respect and understanding on a one-on-one basis, laying a solid foundation for collaboration.
- Team Dynamics: Within teams, this cycle promotes a culture of openness and psychological safety, encouraging team members to share ideas and take risks. Teams that operate within this cycle effectively solve complex problems and innovate.
- Organizational Culture: At an organisational level, embedding this cycle into the core values can transform company culture. It paves the way for a resilient and adaptable organisation where employees feel valued, trusted, and aligned with the organisational mission.
Kashdan, Todd B. and Roberts, John E., Trait and State Curiosity in the Genesis of Intimacy: Differentiation From Related Constructs. (2005). Journal of Social & Clinical Psychology.
Wood Brooks, Alison et al, Mitigating Malicious Envy: Why Successful Individuals Should Reveal Their Failures (2019) Journal of Experimental Psychology, American Psychological Association.