Why we need to make room to wonder

Most teams are great at getting things done. We answer the email, hit the deadline, push the project across the finish line. That kind of drive feels productive, and it is. But somewhere in all that motion, something quieter gets squeezed out: the time to simply think.

At AOE, we call that time "wonder." And we have come to believe it might be the most undervalued part of our work.

Our thinking here is shaped by the Working Genius model, a leadership framework created by Patrick Lencioni and his team. You can explore it at workinggenius.com. In short, it breaks the work of any team into six types of genius: Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement and Tenacity. Each one matters. Wonder asks the big questions and notices what could be better. Invention dreams up new solutions. Discernment evaluates and refines those ideas. Tenacity pushes everything through to completion.

The model helped us see something about ourselves. We are very good at Discernment and Tenacity. We judge ideas quickly, and we finish what we start. Those are real strengths. The problem is that we often live almost entirely in those two phases. We get so busy reacting and executing that we skip right past Wonder and Invention. When you never pause to wonder, your work gets narrower. You solve the problems in front of you, but you stop asking whether they are the right problems. You refine and ship, refine and ship, and the output becomes less strategic, less original and a little more predictable every time.

The cost of skipping wonder

We noticed this in our own team conversations. People kept saying some version of the same thing: "I want to do a better job of thinking and strategizing, but I can't find the space for it." The intention was there. The room for it was not. The biggest culprit is almost embarrassingly simple. Our inboxes stay open all day. The emails keep coming, each one a small tug on our attention. It is nearly impossible to do deep, original thinking when a new message lands every few minutes. Wonder needs quiet, and most of our days have none.

I have felt this personally. Wonder does not come easily to me, especially in the middle of a busy week when everything feels urgent. Last Friday, I decided to try something different. I intentionally made wonder a priority. I let the team know I was stepping away, grabbed a cup of coffee, a notebook and left my phone and computer behind. What surprised me was how quickly I was able to settle into that Wonder phase. Without notifications or a screen in front of me, my thinking opened up in a way it usually does not. I found myself connecting dots I had not seen before and sketching out a few new ideas I was genuinely excited about. I came back to my desk energized, ready to share and brainstorm with the team. It was a simple shift, but it reminded me how powerful and necessary that space can be.

The good news is that wonder is a habit, not a personality trait. You can build it back in with a few small, intentional changes. Start by treating thinking like any other important meeting. Block it on your calendar, give it a name and protect it. If it is not scheduled, it will not happen. Even 90 minutes a week is enough to shift how you approach your biggest challenges. During that time, set your email and messaging apps to do not disturb. Close the tab. Silence the notifications. The world will keep spinning, and the messages will still be there when you return. What you gain is an unbroken stretch of attention, which is exactly what wonder requires.

Sometimes the best thinking happens away from the screen entirely. Take a walk. Sit with a notebook. Move to a different room. Physical distance from your inbox creates mental distance from the constant pull of reactive work. And wonder is easier when the whole team supports it. Agree on a few light rules together. Maybe no internal emails during a set "focus block," or a shared understanding that slow replies during thinking time are okay. When protecting strategic thinking becomes a team value, no one has to feel guilty for stepping away.

Make wonder part of how you work

Wonder is not a luxury reserved for slow weeks that never seem to come. It is the foundation for the kind of strategic, original work we all want to produce. Discernment and Tenacity will always demand our attention, and they should. But they do their best work when wonder has gone first.

So close the inbox for a while. Give yourself permission to think. The most valuable thing you do this week might be the time you spend not doing, just wondering what could be better. And be sure to reach out to AOE if you want to learn more about how to work in your genius!