By Dr. Roz Cohen
I started a new role last year as Chief People Officer for a finance and advisory firm, and I was still finding my footing when a colleague at a work dinner caught me off guard. I’d been doing what I usually do at these things: surviving the small talk. I can handle it, but let’s be honest, it’s not where I thrive. Somewhere between the appetizers and the main course, she turned to me and asked, “How are you feeling about being here for almost a year?”
That stopped me. The question itself wasn’t complicated, yet it landed completely differently than the usual “how’s it going?” tossed across the table with half a glance. She looked me in the eye, she leaned in, and there was a warmth behind it that told me she wanted to actually know. I found myself answering honestly, sharing more than I normally would. One small shift in a question changed the entire conversation.
That’s what curiosity does. And for leaders, it may be the most underrated discipline we have.
From Assumption to Inquiry
We tend to think of curiosity as something people either have or don’t, but in my work helping organizations design and foster cultures of belonging, I’ve come to see it as something far more deliberate. A behavioral practice that requires intention, repetition, and sometimes discomfort.
Every day, I catch myself and the leaders I coach making assumptions about what people are thinking, and those assumptions send us responding before we’ve actually listened. When I pause long enough to ask “help me understand” or “can you give me more on that,” I give myself the chance to hear what’s actually being said. That shift from assuming to asking directly impacts how teams collaborate, how conflict gets resolved, and whether people feel they belong in the room.
And when curiosity disappears, the organizational consequences add up fast. We stifle voices, shut down the diversity of perspectives that leads to better solutions, and signal to people that their experience doesn’t matter because we’ve already decided what they think. Scott E. Page, who studies cognitive diversity, makes this case well: when many voices contribute to a conversation, the outcomes improve. But when a leader walks into a room having already decided what everyone is going to say, they’ve closed the door before the meeting even started, and over time, people stop showing up with anything to offer.
The Question Behind the Question
I had a conversation recently with a manager struggling with a colleague who was showing up in meetings as overly authoritarian, dismissive toward junior staff, making comments like “I’m the lead here, step back.” The manager wanted to address it but also preserve the relationship, and wasn’t sure how to walk that line.
My advice: lead with curiosity rather than correction. Instead of telling this person what they’re doing wrong, try “I’m hearing that some things are happening in meetings. Help me understand what’s going on for you.” Go to the question behind the question. What’s driving this behavior? Why now? That approach shifts the conversation from judgment to collaboration, creates space for reflection rather than defense, and almost always surfaces information the leader would have missed entirely by issuing a directive.
Curious leaders treat every answer as a doorway, not a destination. They push a little further, wanting to understand what’s underneath. Their questions give them away, because they’re already mid-thought, asking “why does it work this way?” rather than simply “what is this?” And that kind of questioning invites everyone in the room to think more deeply, too.
And it requires vulnerability, which is the part most leadership conversations gloss over. When I don’t pretend to have the answer and instead keep asking questions, I’m admitting I don’t know everything, and that can feel deeply uncomfortable for leaders who’ve been rewarded their entire careers for having the right answer at the right time. But that willingness to sit in the not-knowing is exactly what creates connection, because if I show you that I’m willing to struggle alongside you in finding the answer, a wall comes down between us. Leadership has never been about being the person with all the solutions; it’s about creating the conditions where solutions emerge from the people around you.
The data backs this up. Deloitte’s 2024 Uncovering Culture report found that only 50% of workers say their team leaders create enough psychological safety for them to show up as themselves.¹ That means half the workforce is holding back, and when people hold back, organizations lose access to the very perspectives that drive innovation and belonging.
Under Pressure
The test comes when you’re overwhelmed, when there’s a pile of decisions to make and you just want everyone to execute. I know this feeling intimately. I’ve been in meetings where I’m managing too many things at once and all I want is for someone to just do the thing already.
In those moments, the discipline is the pause. Literally take a breath. I’ve learned to say out loud, “I need a moment, I feel like I’m pushing too hard and we’re not accomplishing anything.” That honesty is itself an act of curiosity turned inward. And beyond the pause, there’s another move worth practicing: hand the problem to your team, let them build the solution and bring it back. The people closest to the work often have a better vantage point than the leader pushing everyone forward from three levels up.
The Follow-Up Question
If I could distill all of this into one practical takeaway, it would be this: ask the follow-up question. Go past the perfunctory “tell me more” and pick up on something specific the other person said. “You mentioned you’ve been struggling with the new role. What part feels hardest?” “You said the project stalled. What do you think got in the way?”
Those questions carry weight because they signal to someone that you see them, that you’re present, and that what they have to say matters. You can’t manufacture that energy. People feel it when your curiosity comes from an honest place, and they feel it just as clearly when it doesn’t.
Deloitte’s 2024 Global Human Capital Trends survey across 95 countries reinforced what many of us already sense: as work becomes more complex, uniquely human capabilities like curiosity and empathy only become more critical.² As the world increasingly feels equal parts fast-moving and fractured and isolating, curiosity might be the most powerful connective tissue we have. It counters judgment, interrupts bias, and opens doors that assumptions keep shut. It doesn’t require a personality overhaul, just the willingness to pause, to ask, and to care about the answer.
_____________________________________________
Author Bio: Dr. Roz Cohen, Ph.D., is the founder of Socius Strategies, an inclusion advisory and strategy practice based in San Francisco. Dr. Roz helps organizations build inclusive, radically connected cultures of belonging that benefit individuals and drive business growth.
_____________________________________________
Sources:
¹ Deloitte DEI Institute & NYU School of Law Meltzer Center for Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging, Uncovering Culture: A Call to Action for Leaders, 2024.
² Deloitte, 2024 Global Human Capital Trends, February 2024.
