“Hey, why not have fun with our company branding and logo?” a senior executive wondered aloud in a meeting one day.

Had this otherwise forbidden question been asked in a conventional branding meeting, it probably would have garnered eye rolls and a wave of silent judgment against the credibility of the wondering executive. Tee up the next snowball for the office gossip machine!

As you probably guessed, the sabotaged credibility didn’t happen to the executive in this example because the question was posed by Google’s founders. Today, the brand’s famous changing logo is a distinct and much talked-about/blogged about element of the Google brand identity. Google’s logo, however, is merely the outcome of one simple thing the company seems to do naturally and unapologetically. And, any brand, business or individual can be more like Google – today – by doing that one thing:

Dare to be curious.

It may sound simple, but giving ourselves and others permission to be curious is not always easy. It may even go against our early conditioning.

Growing up, I was always that kid in the classroom with my hand in the air. Insatiably curious and genuinely interested in understanding and learning, I asked questions. Most kids do, but I somehow became the go-to girl for asking what everybody else wanted to know. This quality and designated role weren’t necessarily appreciated, however, as evidenced by my third grade teacher who routinely issued exasperated reprimands to my queries (“Don’t contradict me, Katy!”)

In retrospect, my teacher probably interpreted my questions as personal challenges to her authority or knowledge.  Her irritated responses were confusing, though, to my 9-year-old brain. More importantly, my teacher’s (mis)behavior had an important impact on me:

It shamed me for being curious.

Without necessarily intending to, my teacher established the cultural tone of her classroom, stifling the air of curiosity just as it began to breathe. While other kids laughed and made fun of me, they also avoided asking questions. They didn’t want to be the recipient of our teacher’s wagging finger wrath and the subsequent group ridicule of the class. And that is the real shame in the story.

 “Live the questions”, Rilke encourages, yet doing so means an inherent “not knowing” that can feel risky. Should we know the answers already? Are we the only one who doesn't know or cares about knowing? And expressing our curiosity can feel even riskier because it exposes us to being judged in a meeting ("We tried that last year"), at a party ("You haven't heard of...?!"), in a relationship ("You're over-thinking things."). So we often go along and don’t express what we're curious about, playing it safe and stifling more curiosity. We also miss the fruit that is born from a curious mind.

I recently attended an industry conference, iCitizen, where Wired Magazine’s Kevin Kelly sagely suggested  that “we’ve got to get better at believing the impossible” because it is our belief in the impossible that makes it possible. And, I believe, it is our curiosity that seeds this belief in the impossible. In other words, courageously asking “what if…?” can be the first step to creating the impossible. Just ask Steve Jobs. Or Einstein. Or Bono. Or Oprah.You get the gist.

I believe curiosity is imperative to being an innovative organization, relevant brand and growing human being. I never did buy the notion that “curiosity killed the cat.” On the contrary, without curiosity, we die a little bit inside – as companies, teams and human beings. So what if we hold curiosity differently and build relationships and team cultures around “living the questions”? What if curiosity is an elixir for possibility and innovation?

Ask yourself a few a quick questions:

Your responses are not  for you to brag or fret about. They are simply to raise your awareness about how things are right now. Because when we know where we are, we can see more clearly where we need to go.

So get curious. Allow yourself to be curious. Live in it, swim in it. Make room for it. Enjoy it, encourage it. Reward it. Google does.

Shine on, curious cats. I dare you.