Start Your Own Curiosity Conversations at the CoreNet Global Summit

We’ve all heard the prescription for how to get ahead in life: go to college, get a good job, network, and move up the ladder.  But what’s missing from that equation, according to Hollywood producer Brian Grazer, it is curiosity.

Grazer is the Emmy-and Academy Award-winning producer of such cinematic blockbusters as Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind and The Da Vinci Code, as well as 2015’s breakout hit television series, Empire. Grazer, who will headline the CoreNet Global Summit North America in Los Angeles in October, says that more than anything else, having an acute sense of curiosity is key to achieving personal and professional success.

He knows this firsthand. Grazer cultivated his own curiosity over a number of years, through what he calls “curiosity conversations”— intimate conversations with people in other professional disciplines (astronauts, filmmakers, business leaders, scientists—even spies!) from which he gleaned knowledge and insight about ideas and world views far different from his own. These conversations, Grazer says, were an integral part of his professional success.

“In the business of storytelling, you’re looking for originality in the subject and in terms of a point of view,” he said in an interview with HBR.org last month. “Being interested in other people and other subjects gives me a deeper richer filter in which to create ideas…I gained an endless amount of confidence by doing these curiosity conversations.”

And, he says, they’ve given him an edge over his competition in Hollywood. “Every person in the entire movie business is trying to work with Tom Hanks, or Russell Crowe, or Denzel Washington, or Eddie Murphy, I think I get the tip on the ball because I have available to me, information on subjects that might not be available to somebody else. I truly believe that when Denzel Washington contemplates ‘Should I try this or should I try that?’, he might find me to be a more interesting person who knows more about a varied group of subjects, and that’s interesting and intriguing to him; it probably shows him that I care about something other than…the dynamics of show business.”

Grazer says anyone can enjoy a fuller, more interesting life. It starts with being curious. Grazer will share tips on how you can begin crafting your own “curiosity conversations,” and he’ll talk about his New York Times bestselling book, A Curious Mind: The Secret to a Bigger Life, during the Closing General Session at the CoreNet Global Summit North America in Los Angeles.

Curious about what he’ll say? Register to attend, at www.corenetglobal.org/LosAngeles2015