Each month, “Anschuetz on Leadership” episodes look at unique ways for businesses to approach leadership. Christian Anschuetz is an adventurer, entrepreneur, and United States Marine Corps Captain (not on active duty). He’s been a CIO, CDO, and founded a nonprofit to help connect military veterans with business leaders for mutually beneficial outcomes. Today, Christian and Bob discuss the importance of embracing curiosity, overcoming fear, and fostering courage in navigating personal and professional growth amid the digital revolution.
Episode 21 | Thriving in Change
The Big Themes:
- The power of curiosity: Follow your curiosity. It may not be readily apparent how one activity will connect to another, but you might find unexpected synergy. Christian had no idea that his interest in high-tech lavender farming would actually help his consulting business, but it has deepened his knowledge of ag-tech.
- Fear has multiple aspects: Fear is ever-present, but can be overcome. Fear may obviate curiosity and keep you on the known path. One aspect of fear is being worried about what other people will think, but this shouldn’t dictate your behavior.
- The courage to say no: To say yes to something, you have to say no to something else. Companies dislike saying no, but it’s essential to have the courage to say no to what’s not working.
The Big Quote: “We should embrace our curiosity, we should satisfy our curiosity, we should feel free to explore, to experience, to learn, and to understand. And that is about people. That is about ideas, that is about practices, that is about processes, that it’s about businesses, it’s about relationships, it’s about love . . . we should embrace our curiosity and never ever, ever, you know, be ashamed of it, or to try and squelch it.
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