Most small business owners who are hiring right now are focused on three main areas of interest: years of work history, familiar job title and a proven level of competencies. This is reasonable and also makes perfect sense. However, this can lead to many of the most highly qualified candidates being left out of the application pool entirely because they do not meet any of these criteria.
Research indicates that curiosity has been directly associated with a 34% increase in creativity outcomes at work. This is a significant finding! However, unfortunately, hiring practices that exist today are generally designed to measure an applicant relative to their past experiences as opposed to how they think or learn.
As a result, the difference between someone’s past job performance and future job performance can end up costing small business owners time, money, and team energy.
In this blog, we will take a look at some of the most commonly made hiring mistakes by small business owners today, and how to incorporate curiosity into the hiring decision process along with experience.
Section 1: The Hiring Mistake – Prioritising Experience Over Curiosity
What is the issue?
Experience as defined by resume history is a clear and concise indicator of an applicant’s potential. It tells you the person has worked at an employer, typically for a certain duration, and completed specific tasks.
One disadvantage of resumes as a measure of a person’s job readiness is that they provide no evidence of what an individual may do in new ways, or when the traditional process will not work, or when the company needs innovative thoughts on the job. The lack of evidence of what someone might do in a situation at hand is a major barrier to hiring.
To make matters worse, many managers believe in curiosity as a driver of business impact but find it difficult to identify that curiosity in applicants when hiring.
This results in a disconnect between the characteristics to which leaders ascribe value and the criteria they use to vet potential hires. Small companies generate costly mistakes due to this gap in understanding.
Real pain points small businesses face
- A candidate has direct experience and can start doing the job from day one
- The same candidate rarely questions how things are done or looks for better ways
- The resume ticks every box but the person brings no fresh thinking to the team
- Six months later, the business has the same problems it had before the hire
The big insight
Curiosity drives improvement and long-term engagement, to work through problems with no clear answer, and to stay engaged when work gets hard. Experience without curiosity often means doing the same thing, the same way, for a very long time.
Section 2: What Curiosity Looks Like in the Workplace
Defining curiosity (so readers know what to screen for)
Curiosity, in a work context, is the drive to ask questions and explore different ways of doing things. Rather than sticking to what is familiar, curious people actively look for a better way.
It shows up in behaviour, not in personality type or energy levels. Curious people ask why a process exists before following it. They read things they were not asked to read. They come back to a problem a second time when the first solution feels off.
Research highlights
The evidence on this is fairly consistent:
- Managers consistently describe curious employees as stronger performers across different types of roles (Businessnewse, 2023)
- Curiosity connects directly to creative problem solving, especially in complex or unfamiliar situations (Spencer Stuart, 2023)
- Teams with curious thinkers tend to communicate better and get stuck in conflict far less often (Georgia Mountains Works, 2023)
For a small business where one person often does the work of three, these are not soft skills. They are survival skills.
Section 3: Common Hiring Mistakes and How to Screen for Curiosity
Mistake 1: Asking Only Technical Screening Questions
The problem:
Conventional interviews focus on asking participants questions that allow for a “right” answer. For example:
Can you use a tool? Have you previously completed this task? While these questions provide valuable insight, they only indicate what the participant was already aware of (what they learned), and not their thought processes when faced with unfamiliar tasks.
Because all of the inquiry-based questions have an obvious answer, the participants who perform well are skilled at providing responses based on already known information. Candidates who thrive under pressure may struggle with scripted questions based upon their familiarity with any tools or methods.
How can this be accomplished?
- Ask scenario based, open-ended questions where candidates will provide you with their reasoning as opposed to just recalling information. i.e., “Describe a time when you attempted the normal course of action in completing a task and were not successful; how did you proceed from that point forward?”
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- Provide each applicant with a work-related problem with inadequate amount of information to reach an accurate resolution; observe how each applicant responds to the situations created by filing in the blanks.
- Ask candidates what they want to know about the role associated with the role, the team or the organisation; the quality of their questions will provide you with greater insight as to how each applicant thinks than will your ability to evaluate their assigned answers.
Mistake 2: Ignoring Evidence of Lifelong Learning
The problem:
Certifications and courses are easy to spot on a resume. But completing a course and genuinely loving to learn are two very different things. One is a box ticked. The other is a habit of mind.
Candidates who pursue knowledge out of genuine interest, rather than requirement, are usually the ones who keep growing on the job without needing to be pushed.
What to do instead:
- Look beyond formal credentials for signs of self-directed learning, like side projects, skills picked up independently, or unusual career shifts that show someone stepped into unfamiliar territory and worked it out
- Ask directly: what have they taught themselves recently, and why did they bother? The answer, or lack of one, is quite revealing
- Notice how they talk about a role or project they found genuinely interesting. Curious candidates show noticeable enthusiasm when the topic matters to them
Mistake 3: Skipping Behavioural Evaluation
The problem:
Resumes show the highlights and interviews follow a script, so neither gives a real picture of how someone thinks or what actually motivates them. Relying only on these two things means the hiring decision is based on how someone presents, not how they actually work.
What to do instead:
- Watch how candidates ask questions during the interview itself. Curious people ask substantive questions because they genuinely want to understand something
- Consider using assessments that measure openness to new experiences or tolerance for ambiguity, alongside technical tests
- Use structured behavioural questions: ask about a time they changed their mind about something after learning more, or a topic they went unusually deep on simply because it interested them
- Notice how they speak about previous errors. Curious people view failure as a chance to learn, while others may feel that they need to defend themselves against failure.
- Look for sincerity of thought. If someone believes that they have every answer, they often stop asking questions.
In short, there is a need for a new perspective when hiring.
Experience will tell you what a person has accomplished, however, curiosity will inform you of what they will achieve in the future.
For small businesses, the distinction is quite significant.
The purpose of hiring someone is not to merely fill an open position; it is to find an individual who will grow with the business and be able to provide thoughts or ideas that the business currently does not have.
These individuals may not stand out on paper; however, they will demonstrate their curiosity through their thought patterns, questions, and their discussions about learning. By altering a few interview questions, and setting the resume aside for a moment to ask the candidate, “What are you curious about?” you can glean much from their answers.
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