In my last article, I suggested that curiosity hasn’t disappeared. We’ve simply stopped making enough time for it.
The response generated some interesting conversations. Most people agreed curiosity matters and recognised the symptoms when it begins to fade: narrower conversations, fewer questions, faster conclusions and less exploration. But another question quickly emerged. If curiosity is such an important driver of growth, where exactly should we direct it, or perhaps direct more of it?
The more I’ve thought about this, the more convinced I’ve become that one of the biggest mistakes we make is treating curiosity as though it’s a single capability. It isn’t. Different growth challenges require different forms of curiosity because curiosity isn’t simply about asking more questions. It’s about knowing where to point them and where to keep looking when everyone thinks they already “know” the answer.
Over the years, working with agencies and clients, I’ve noticed four areas where curiosity consistently uncovers opportunity, strengthens relationships and creates value. Together they form what I’m (snappily) calling The AAR Growth Curiosity Model.
Not because it’s complicated. Quite the opposite. Sometimes the simplest frameworks help us what has been sitting under our noses all along.
A thought on tenure
One of my recurring curious questions is why new agencies can appear more insightful than incumbent ones. It’s rarely because they’re smarter or know more about the business, the category or the customers.
What they bring, rather wonderfully, is fresh curiosity. They ask questions that everyone else stopped asking years ago, challenge assumptions that have quietly become accepted truths and become fascinated by things that familiar teams may no longer notice. Perhaps what we describe as “new and shiny” is often simply the effect of “new and shiny” questions.
The strongest long-term relationships combine both: deep knowledge AND a willingness to keep looking. They retain the confidence and context that come with tenure, whilst continuing to ask some of the questions a new agency or new joiner might ask in month one. Why? Because familiarity should deepen curiosity, not replace it.
Why these four?
Having assessed client-agency relationships for nearly two decades, across all sorts of shapes, sizes, disciplines and geographies, I’ve realised that most growth conversations and relationship challenges tend to cluster around four areas – Strategic, Commercial, Stakeholder and Organisational Curiosity.
- Strategic Curiosity: What problem are we really solving?
Strategic curiosity helps us lift our heads above the immediate challenge and pay attention to what’s changing around it. Whilst the brief inevitably demands focus, strategically curious teams stay interested in what sits beyond it: shifting customer behaviour, emerging pressures and changes that may not have reached the agenda yet, but almost certainly will.
For example, what’s changing in the category? How are customer expectations evolving? What might we be missing because we’re simply too close to the problem?
When I look back at some of the strongest client-agency relationships I’ve assessed, one thing consistently stands out: the conversations weren’t confined to the brief. They wandered into customer behaviour, category shifts, future opportunities and challenges nobody was yet paying the agency to solve. Curiosity seemed to ooze beyond the immediate remit.
That’s often the difference between responding brilliantly to a brief and helping shape a better one, and it prevents teams from becoming brilliantly equipped to solve yesterday’s problems.
- Commercial Curiosity: Where Is growth being created, protected or lost?
Some of the most valuable conversations I’ve witnessed between agencies and clients have had very little to do with comms, media or creative output. They’ve been conversations about growth ambitions, margins, investment decisions and commercial pressures.
Yet this is often the area agencies explore least deeply. Perhaps because it feels slightly out of bounds, or absent from the brief. Perhaps because we’re worried about stepping into someone else’s territory. Or perhaps because commercial conversations simply don’t feel as comfortable as marketing conversations.
Commercial curiosity might explore where growth is being created or lost, what keeps the CFO awake at night and what success genuinely looks like to the business. It doesn’t mean becoming a finance director. It means understanding enough about the commercial context to recognise where your expertise could make the greatest difference.
I regularly hear senior clients say they would love their agencies to understand their business as well as they understand their brand. That’s a subtle but incredibly important difference.
- Stakeholder Curiosity: What is really driving the decision?
One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learnt over the years, both client-side and as a consultant, is that organisations don’t make decisions. People do.
It sounds almost too obvious to say, yet we often spend considerably more time understanding the brief than understanding the people behind it. Stakeholder curiosity looks beneath job titles and organisation charts to explore who genuinely influences decisions, what people are trying to achieve and which concerns, pressures or ambitions may be shaping their choices.
And let’s face it, in today’s organisations the challenge is rarely one stakeholder or one powerful voice. More often it’s ten, fifteen or even twenty people across different functions, often well beyond marketing, all carrying different priorities, pressures and definitions of success. The question isn’t simply, “Who is the decision-maker?” It’s how all those voices combine, compete and eventually reach a decision.
Through AAR’s work, I’m continually reminded that the stated challenge and the real challenge are not always the same thing. Sometimes a marketing problem is actually a stakeholder problem. One client captured it brilliantly – “We’re not struggling with the work. We’re struggling with getting everybody aligned around the work.” That’s a very different challenge, and a very different set of questions.
- Organisational Curiosity: What’s getting in the way of progress?
This is perhaps the form of curiosity I see overlooked most often. Sometimes the issue isn’t the strategy, the capability or even the work. Sometimes perfectly capable people are operating within systems, structures and processes that make progress unnecessarily difficult.
Organisational curiosity explores where decision-making gets stuck, what has become far harder than it should be and what is quietly frustrating progress. It looks at the way work is briefed, shared, challenged, approved and delivered, rather than assuming another new process, strategy or agency will magically fix everything.
Some of the biggest breakthroughs I’ve seen haven’t come from a new strategy, a new agency or even a dazzling new idea. They’ve come from fixing a briefing process, clarifying decision-making or removing a bottleneck that everyone had simply learnt to live with. The work wasn’t failing. The operating system around it was.
Where does your curiosity naturally gravitate?
Most teams don’t lack curiosity. What they often lack is intent. Over time, we naturally gravitate towards the areas we understand best, enjoy most and feel most confident exploring. Before long, our curiosity begins to follow familiar paths, whilst other parts of the business, relationship or challenge receive far less attention.
So, if you asked your team where most of its curiosity sits today, what would the answer be? Strategic. Commercial. Stakeholder. Organisational.
Would that answer change depending on the client, category, discipline, remit, payment model or length of the relationship? More importantly, would your clients agree with you?
Perhaps the most revealing question of all is this: Which of the four areas are you consistently brilliant at, and which have you become least curious about?
Because being intentional with curiosity doesn’t mean asking questions randomly or endlessly, too late in the project or only when the senior person gets involved. It means recognising where curiosity could create the greatest value, then choosing to look there with purpose.
So keep the knowledge that comes with experience and the confidence that grows through familiarity, but hold on tight to the fascination too. The strongest long-term relationships aren’t simply the ones that know the most. They’re the ones that never stop being interested.
And perhaps that’s the real challenge. Not whether we’re curious, but whether we’re directing that curiosity towards the places where the next opportunity might be quietly waiting to be discovered. Because curiosity is at its most powerful when it isn’t left to chance.
And, of course, all of this raises another wonderfully pesky question: what happens when curiosity stops relying on one interested individual and begins to spread across an entire team?
That’s where I’m “curious” to explore next…
