Why Curiosity Builds Emotional Intelligence and Improves Engineering Workflows

Engineering and product development teams often move to cloud-native platforms like PTC’s Onshape to remove bottlenecks, break down silos, and collaborate in real-time to build better products faster. The technology connects design data seamlessly across organizations and external partners.

To truly get the most out of these powerful tools, team members need to adapt to a more collaborative environment.

Software is built for agility. And our human interactions can sometimes still get stuck in old habits like serial workflows or siloed thinking. This is where Emotional Intelligence (EQ) becomes a practical engineering tool. It is a learned skill that smooths out the friction points that software alone cannot solve.

We can build this skill by following a simple cycle of Curiosity, Understanding, and Action.

In this blog, learn how to utilize curiosity to understand broader insights, keep the team focused on the main goal, and make efficient decisions.

Don’t Just Fix the Geometry, Find the Insight

With Onshape, teams can leave feedback with more context by using comments to flag errors or provide further instruction. The comment feature in CAD software is fantastic for asynchronous design workflows. However, there is an opportunity to go beyond treating feedback from comments like items on a checklist.

While efficiency is good, understanding the insight behind a comment can provide even more value – especially if the feedback is challenging.

By leaning on curiosity, EQ becomes a superpower that strengthens teams. Instead of just fixing the error, dig deeper to uncover what wasn’t considered at first, what aspect of the design was missed.

For example, the feedback may have addressed a risk that wasn’t considered before designing a certain part.

This small shift turns a transactional fix-it ticket into a genuine conversation. It improves the product and the relationship between team members.

Meet the Deadline and Understand the Goal

Curiosity leads to a deeper understanding of the work needed to get done. It’s easy to get tunnel vision when a release date is looming. Deadlines often cause teams to rush to finish a model, creating workflows that are effectively another list of boxes to check off.

But it’s very important to remember that a deadline is just a date and not the main goal. The goal is the overall business outcome.

Transformational leadership happens when pausing to look at the big picture. For instance, taking the time to ask if the geometry actually solves the customer’s problem or to understand the business impact of a design decision. Zooming out ensures that the team is moving in the right direction.

This understanding also applies to other colleagues. Simply asking a peer in another department about their teams’ biggest priority helps organizations become better aligned.

With Onshape’s sharing options, it’s easy to bring in other departments earlier in the design process. So, instead of trading files and emails back and forth, the whole organization can start building solutions together earlier and more thoroughly.

Solve the Problem and Lead the Way

Once there is clarity and understanding, teams can move to decisive action.

In a fast-paced and agile design environment, waiting for top-down direction slows everyone down. The beauty of modern collaboration is that anyone can influence the direction of a product.

It’s common to think that leadership requires a specific title. But the truth is that real influence comes from how people show up in the work. Whether we are junior designers or senior engineers, anyone can step into leadership by choosing to facilitate clarity rather than just execute a task – shifting from problem solver to a collaborative partner. That’s what helps the whole team move faster.

The Cycle of Continuous Improvement

This approach follows a simple cycle called The EQ SPARK. It starts with Curiosity and moves to Understanding before finishing with decisive Action.

When combining the speed of design tools with the connectivity of Emotional Intelligence, teams don’t just build faster, but smarter as an entire team.

About the Author

Karen Wonders is an engineer, Executive MBA, and Rotman Certified Executive Coach with over 20 years of leadership experience. Wonders is passionate about bringing clarity to leadership challenges and helping technical professionals amplify their unique influence through essential skills like emotional intelligence. This commitment extends to her volunteer work, where she actively mentors young engineers.

Connect through LinkedIn, Instagram, or the Laluz Consulting website.