Blazing A Trail: Cultivating Curiosity Through An MBA

Decades have passed, but I still have striking memories of walking home from preschool. Like most New Zealand streets, ours was tree-lined and luscious green. One of my hands would be clutching my mum’s, while the other would be outstretched into the foliage – making sure to feel every leaf that we passed. Some were smooth and sharp while others had furry undersides or were shot through with colourful ridges.

Each one was a new tactile experience. While I’d often come home with little scratches along my hand, I would still do the same thing the next day – who knew what I might find?

So many of my childhood memories are formed from a sense of curiosity: How I interacted with the exciting world around me and the things I learned doing it. Maybe some of your early memories are too?

I’m often asked about traits that have carried me through my MBA experience. The easy answer would be something like ‘resilience’ or ‘adaptability’. These are, no doubt, important attributes, and they’ll help you get through the program.

However, in my experience, if you want a truly enriching MBA, bringing a sense of near child-like curiosity is key. It’s harder than it sounds.

DO OUR ADULT LIVES MAKE US LESS CURIOUS?

While our professional lives will likely help in developing a more structured, logical mindset – I would argue that they do the opposite for our sense of curiosity.

At work, we often settle into our job descriptions and rigid office hierarchies. Our performance is measured by predefined metrics or established five-step frameworks. Our commutes follow the same route, day-in-and-day-out. Efficiency trumps all. How much of your day-to-day is truly new, different, or innovative?

Even in our personal lives, curiosity plays less of a role. Our social networks lie very much in our comfort zones – often with friends we’ve known for decades from college and high school. Our ability to travel or volunteer is often curtailed by work commitments or PTO balances. Even our social media options keep us hooked by showing us more of what we’ve already engaged with before.

Modern-day, adult life is simply not cut out to emphasise the benefits of curiosity and I think we’re poorer for it. Our worldview shrinks, our opinions become more entrenched, and we lose the benefits of unbridled learning that we all enjoyed in our childhoods. It’s why I feel so strongly about a project like Sapia. Sapia is a media platform I’m working on that shows you who you are, what you know, and what you don’t know – feeding you content that expands your view of the world. For the first time we’ll have a media browsing option that encourages curiosity rather than stifles it.

After years of being out of practice, it can be hard to rekindle that sense of curiosity during an MBA. In my time at London Business School, I’ve found that making that effort to embed curiosity in your day-to-day is rewarding beyond measure.

WHAT DOES CURIOSITY ADD TO AN MBA?

The London Business School MBA has been a unique experience over the course of my lifetime. At no other point have I been thrust into an environment full of excellent people from varied cultural and professional backgrounds. Cultivating a sense of openness and making choices borne out of curiosity has allowed me to make the most of this diversity.

Our cohort is made up of over 70 different nationalities and includes everyone from Olympic athletes to medical doctors, to theatre producers (alongside the consultants and bankers). Being truly curious about the experiences that have shaped their views has helped me forge friendships and learn things far beyond the curriculum. One of my stream mates is from Ukraine. Through conversations with him, I’ve learnt more about how people are contending with the conflict in his home country than any news bulletin will ever teach me.

The benefits of curiosity don’t just stop at your cohort, however. I’ve had the chance to try my hand at new hobbies and explore careers I’d never considered.  Running a podcast had never occurred to me before, but co-hosting LightbuLBS, (the LBS Entrepreneurship Club podcast) was only possible through openness to such a new experience. It has given me a platform to ask interesting people even more questions I’m curious about! On our episode with Alex Rico-Lloyd (Co-founder of Bike Club), we spoke about what a successful start-up exit really looks like and the effect it has on a founder personally – a topic seldom discussed in many entrepreneurial forums.

HOW DO YOU CULTIVATE CURIOUSTY ON THE MBA

The London Business School MBA experience provides a host of amazing personal and professional opportunities. Without cultivating a habit of being curious, asking questions, or trying out new things, I would be leaving a lot of those opportunities on the table. This week, I’m going to a Jamaican dancehall class. I’ve never listened to dancehall music before and I’m certain I have two left feet – but when else would I really get the opportunity?

How would you cultivate curiosity during your own MBA? Strike up an incidental conversation with a stranger on campus, take a subject who sits far beyond your comfort zone or even attend a cultural event you’ve never been to before! Sometimes all it takes is the effort of finding out what new, interesting events are happening on the bustling campus around you and the bravery to give them a go!

My MBA experience has taught me the importance of curiosity wherever I am in my life. I hope this column has convinced you to do the same and to make your world as vivid, new and colourful as you remember it. Stick your hand out! Who knows what you will find?

Bio:

Sharvan is a former strategy consultant and LBS scholarship recipient from Auckland, New Zealand. He spent four years working on important problems across a variety of industries, including helping to establish New Zealand’s national COVID-19 contact tracing service.

Sharvan comes to London Business School with an interest in ventures and technology. During his time at LBS, he’ll be busy validating his own entrepreneurial idea in the media space. In his spare time, Sharvan enjoys hiking, writing and comedy – hobbies he’ll continue to cultivate during his MBA experience.

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