It killed the cat. It went to Mars.

I’ve recently realised how important curiosity is to me. It encourages me to learn, helps me to have enjoyable conversations and makes life interesting. I don’t have a cat, so I should be fine.

I also recently read this article about how to talk about climate change using curiosity rather than lecturing.

It struck me that, as well as a great blueprint for a discussion on climate change, with a few tweaks, this is a great blueprint for most knowledge-related conversations. Perhaps a good toolkit for conversations with leavers to prevent knowledge loss?

7 step plan for a curious conversation

1. Beforehand, consider the motivation for this conversation. What do you need to learn? Why are you doing this? Why might they engage with you?
2. Make sure it’s the right time to talk for both of you.
3. Lead with curiosity, make space for the discussion, don’t jump in, listen a lot. Asking “Why?” with curiosity releases knowledge. Asking “Why?” with judgment releases defensiveness.
4. What do they know (what’s a concrete fact)? What do they think (what have they deduced)? How do they feel (listen with empathy and dig deeper to unearth more)? What stories do they have to illustrate these facts, deductions and feelings?
5. What shall you both do now? What is the best way for the new knowledge you’ve unearthed together to be shared for the organisation’s benefit? Explore together the possibilities.
6. Arrange to follow up and talk again. And do it.
7. Build your conversational skills: use reflective learning to get better each time.

Interested? What can you do now?

• You could read one of these: Strategies for preventing a knowledge loss crisis from MIT Sloan; The Impact of Knowledge Loss from Knowledge Cats
• If you are interested in knowledge loss in particular, join my webinar with MBL on 12 June 2019.
• If you are interested in conversation and can get to London, come along to my workshop on Deep Knowledge.
• And follow the blog or sign up to the newsletter for more like this.

Lastly …

Remember to be more like this guy!

#Knowledge #KM #LawFirm #KnowledgeManagement #Tacit #Curiosity #conversation