Looking Outside curiosity: Sarah DaVanzo, Chief Data Officer Pierre Fabre

May 10, 2022

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Welcome to the second season of Looking Outside. To broaden our perspective, in Episode 11 we bring the Curiosity mountain to us direct from the source, with the original Chief Curiosity Officer, former VP of Consumer & Market Insights and Foresight at L'Oréal Groupe, and now Chief Data Officer at Pierre Fabre, Sarah DaVanzo.

Sarah shares her vast experience in “strategic curiosity science”; unpacking what curiosity is beyond intellectualism, stressing the worrying results in quantifying and tracking curiosity over time, and highlighting the importance of immersion when applying curious behavior.

Sarah also teaches practical lessons in strengthening your curiosity muscles (doing curiosity not just being curious) and using curiosity like a magnet to amplify it with those around you.

Both advocates of curious thinking, Sarah and Jo also discuss the importance of recognizing the consequences of not being curious, when a lack of diversity or bias sets in, and the need for humbleness and humility - particularly for those us who are passionate about the topic of curiosity.

To look beyond the familiar, Sarah seeks out diversity of perspectives beyond her algorithm bubble, actively pushing herself towards both human diversity and data diversity. She suggests a way to do this is doing creative projects, going to meet ups to get to know people outside your normal group, or by pushing yourself into random events through platforms like clubfreetime.com.

On the show Sarah speaks to practicing curiosity by seeing, thinking, feeling and doing, and she reminds herself to 'feel' curiosity. What's your underleveraged curiosity muscle?

Sarah DaVanzo is innovating the future of data, analytics, insights, and foresight. She spent two decades working internationally in 22 countries, in F500 companies, consultancies, agencies, and start-ups. Today, Sarah is the Chief Data Officer (Curiosity, Analytics, Intelligence, Insights, Foresight, Futures) for Pierre Fabre, responsible for APPLIED CURIOSITY; driving curiosity to collect & analyze data to amplify intelligence & insights while fueling foresight & futures. Previously she led Consumer & Market Insight & Foresight (including Cultural Intelligence & Futures) for the L'Oreal Groupe driving corporate and product innovation.

She is a quantitative data-driven futurist with >70% accuracy (a.k.a. "superforecaster") who has helped over one hundred businesses future-proof. Her futurized insights have been published in Time, The New York Times, Forbes, Fast Co., Wired, The Guardian and featured on TV, podcasts, radio, and cited in books and research papers all over the world.

Ever inventive, she holds several patents and is continuously building and creating. Sarah has dedicated over a decade of research, including a Master's Degree, to studying ways to cultivate curiosity. Today, she is focused on "Applied Curiosity" – the measurable application of curiosity arts and sciences for business growth. She is a 2x TEDx speaker on using curiosity strategically in business and in life. Sarah's "curiouser & curiouser" secret is to actively #LiveCuriously. She believes a new class of people, defined by their curiosity, not socio-economics, is rising. Sarah leads by example when it comes to #LiveCuriously helping people to see, feel, think and do everything more curiously.

Curious? Check out Sarah's latest curiosity experiment called Insight Alchemy as well as her non-profit called CURIOUS FUTURES.

You can find Sarah on LinkedIn.

Looking Outside is new podcast dedicated to exploring fresh perspectives of familiar business topics. The show is hosted by its creator, Joanna Lepore, innovator and futurist at Mars Wrigley.

Find out more about Jo & Looking Outside at www.looking-outside.com.

Connect with Jo and join the Looking Outside community on LinkedIn.

Check out Jo’s foresight podcast Future Imagined (produced for Mars Wrigley).

Looking Outside is created by Joanna Lepore. All views are that of the host and guests and don’t necessarily reflect those of their employers.

OBOY and Craig Allen Fravel music features in Episode 11.