“It’s a choice to awaken ourselves to what we don’t know.” ~ Jeff Wetzler
The essential question animating Jeff Wetzler’s career, whether in working with children, educators, or executives, has always been: how can we create learning experiences that are deep, powerful, and enduring?
In his new and surprisingly uplifting book ASK: Tap Into the Hidden Wisdom of People Around You for Unexpected Breakthroughs in Leadership and Life, Jeff distills the many lessons he’s learned into a curiosity-centric approach – “The Ask Approach” – that offers a way for all of usto tap into our desire for connection and into the wisdom hiding in plain sight around us.
It begins with choosing curiosity.
Even if we’re curious to learn from someone, that doesn’t mean it’s going to feel comfortable, easy, or appealing for them to share it with us. We may want to know, but that doesn’t mean they’re going to feel free to tell us.
Listen to Choose to Be Curious #230: The Ask Approach, with Jeff Wetzler
Here’s your crib sheet for the three levels to appreciate in a conversation — content, emotion and action — and the five key steps in the wonderfulness that is ASK:
- Choose curiosity, so you are genuinely interested in what others think, feel, and know
- Make it safe, so it’s more comfortable and appealing for others to tell you the truth.
- Pose quality questions, which uncover what’s most important to people
- Listen to learn, so you are truly hearing what matters most to them
- Reflect and reconnect, to translate what you hear into the right insights and actions
Read up on The Ask Approach, order your copy of the book, and take Jeff’s Ask Assessment. Where are your strengths and your opportunities to grow?
Learn more about Jeff’s work at Transcend.
Read more about Action Science, by Chris Argyris, Robert Putnam, and Diana McLain Smith.
Check out David Kantor’s legacy as a systems psychologist.
If you like this conversation, you might enjoy these C2BC Classics Leadership, with Scott Nycum; Facilitation, Leadership & Curiosity, with Andres Marquez-Lara; Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times, with Monicá Guzmán; Curiosity Is Haley Magee’s Love Language; Diagnosing Curiosity, with Stefaan van Hooydonk; Humble Inquiry for Parents, with Kate McCauley.
Theme music by Sean Balick; “Reflectors” by Ray Catcher, via Blue Dot Sessions.
You can subscribe to Choose to Be Curious on Apple Podcasts, Spotifyor wherever you get your podcasts.
Wear your curiosity on your sleeve. Check out the Choose to be Curious shop.
Listening to the Universe 