We Talk Constantly. But Are We Curious?

Communication is fundamental to the human experience. It is how we exchange ideas, make sense of one another, navigate difference and build relationships. At work, we do it constantly: through meetings, emails, instant messages, presentations, one-on-ones and increasingly sophisticated digital platforms, our working lives are built around communication. Yet the volume of communication within an organisation tells us remarkably little about the quality of the relationships within it.

We can communicate constantly without learning very much about one another.

It raises a more interesting question: we talk constantly, but how often are we actually curious about the person we are talking to?

Much of workplace communication is necessarily transactional. Information needs to move, decisions need to be made, problems need to be solved and work needs to progress. The problem emerges when transaction becomes our default way of relating to one another and efficiency masquerades as connection. We enter conversations knowing the information we need to extract, listen for the part relevant to us and, often without realising it, begin constructing our response while the other person is still speaking.

None of this necessarily makes us poor communicators. By conventional organisational standards, we may be highly effective ones. Information was exchanged, the meeting stayed on time and the required outcome was achieved. What is less certain is whether anything happened within the interaction that strengthened the relationship between the people involved.

That distinction between transmitting information and creating genuine dialogue has occupied leadership researchers for some time. Harvard Business School professor Boris Groysberg and communications expert Michael Slind proposed the concept of organisational conversation, arguing that effective communication should share many of the qualities we associate with interpersonal conversation: intimacy, interactivity, inclusion and intentionality. At its core is a shift away from employees simply talking at one another towards people talking with each other.

It is a compelling way to think about communication at an organisational level, but it also raises another question. If stronger organisational relationships depend on genuine conversation, what makes a conversation feel genuine in the first place?

The art of talking

This is where the work of Professor Alison Wood Brooks adds another dimension. While Groysberg and Slind examine conversation as a model for organisational communication, Brooks brings the lens closer to the interaction itself. Her research explores the behavioural science of conversation: how we choose what to talk about, how we respond to what another person says, and why seemingly small conversational choices can influence whether people leave an interaction feeling connected or disconnected.

Brooks brings much of this research together through the TALK framework: Topics, Asking, Levity and Kindness. Rather than treating good conversation as something that depends on charisma or natural social ability, TALK draws attention to the choices being made throughout an interaction: what we choose to explore, the questions we ask, the warmth we bring and whether we are genuinely considering the person across from us.

Taken together, the two perspectives offer an interesting progression. Creating more opportunities for dialogue may change the way communication moves through an organisation, but dialogue alone does not guarantee connection. The quality of the relationship is shaped by what happens once people are actually in conversation with one another.

One of Brooks' findings makes this particularly visible. In studies examining conversations between people who did not previously know one another, Brooks and her colleagues found that people who asked more questions tended to be better liked by their conversation partners, with follow-up questions proving particularly important.

The distinction matters because not all questions communicate the same level of interest. A question can begin a conversation without necessarily demonstrating much curiosity about the answer. A follow-up question, however, depends on what another person has just said. It requires enough attention to notice something worth exploring and enough curiosity to remain with it rather than moving immediately to the next topic.

In effect, it communicates something quite simple: I heard what you said, and there is something there I want to understand more.

The human side of conversation

TALK also makes room for something often underestimated in professional communication: levity. Humour, warmth and playfulness can make conversations more enjoyable and create moments of connection, yet professionalism is sometimes interpreted as requiring their absence. Levity does not mean turning every interaction into a joke, nor is humour appropriate in every circumstance. Rather, it recognises that conversation is not purely an exchange of information; it is also a human experience, and how people feel within an interaction can shape the relationship that emerges from it.

That experience is influenced just as much by how we respond to one another. A moment of humour can create warmth, just as a thoughtful follow-up question can communicate genuine interest. Both move conversation beyond the mechanics of speaking and listening towards something more relational: an awareness of the person on the other side of the exchange. This is reflected in Kindness, the final element of Brooks' framework, which considers not only what we want from a conversation but also the experience and needs of the person we are having it with.

Seen this way, listening becomes less about demonstrating the behaviours of a good communicator and more about what our response communicates to another person.

Giving someone space to speak matters, but a relevant follow-up question shows that what they have said has not merely been received; it has influenced where the conversation goes next. We pay attention not simply because listening is an important communication skill, but because another person's perspective is worth understanding.

This is perhaps where organisational communication becomes most interesting.

Organisations can create the infrastructure for communication through meetings, surveys, consultation processes, one-on-ones and leadership communication strategies, but those structures cannot determine the quality of the conversation that occurs within them. That is shaped in smaller moments: whether someone asks another question, stays with an unexpected answer, brings warmth into an interaction or remains genuinely interested in a perspective different from their own.

Groysberg and Slind's work challenges us to move beyond one-way transmission towards genuine dialogue, while Brooks' research brings the lens closer to what happens inside those conversations. Perhaps this is why curiosity deserves more attention in conversations about communication. It shifts our focus from simply exchanging information towards understanding the person we are exchanging it with, creating the conditions through which stronger relationships can develop.