About

Purpose

Grounded Curiosity is dedicated to the professional education and development of military personnel across all ranks and experience levels. Anticipating a future characterised by complexity and convergence, we seeks to promote the essential discussions throughout our military that will best prepare personnel for the consequences of that future.

To encourage conversation about our profession of arms, Grounded Curiosity provides a space in which to share ideas and debate concepts pertaining to our current and future fight. The topics strive to engender and reinforce our professional curiosity about how we can enhance our performance and presence in a rapidly-evolving global context. 

Encouraging widespread consideration of military issues by increasing the dissemination of ideas opens us to more robust critical discussion. Such conversations enable us to refine our ideas and our thought processes, achieving the debate both within and outside our military that is a vital aspect of ongoing growth

Execution

Grounded Curiosity’s form provides numerous benefits which facilitate its purpose. 

Digital platforms are easily accessible through readily available technology (i.e. the smartphone in your pocket) and provide an excellent resource for networking with other military personal of similar interests. Thus, Grounded Curiosity facilitates the sharing of ideas and prompting of discussion beyond the limitations of geography. It allows dialogue to escape the confines of the Mess, whilst permitting ideas from outside the military to enter our awareness and factor into our discourse. 

Grounded Curiosity’s digital form also provides time-poor personnel with a convenient and easily-digestible gateway into Defence issues and ideas beyond those within their immediate sphere of experience. We hope this exposure sparks thought that provides the impetus to read beyond the blog—both across other forums and through formalised study. 

Grounded Curiosity is partitioned into four main sections: 

1. Blog. A space for military personnel to share and debate written work with an international audience including Australia, United States, United Kingdom and New Zealand. Grounded Curiosity encourages junior leaders who are writing for the first time as well as established writers.

2. Innovation. Grounded Curiosity hosts DEF Aus â€“ a network of serving personnel who debate future war fighting concepts and progress ideas to tangible action.

3. Opportunities. Provides practical information on opportunities for self-initiated and formalised professional development.

4. Podcasts. Featuring discussions on future warfare with candid scholars, commanders and military professionals.

Target Audience

The Australian military is built on its people. In acknowledgement of this, Grounded Curiosity seeks to start a conversation with junior commanders about our future in warfare to help strengthen our collective intellectual foundations. Junior leaders often discuss both tactical and strategic-level concepts with their mates as they strive for professional mastery and the optimal solution for their specific operating environment. It is this culture of professional curiosity from the ground-up that underpins our adaptive action, mission command, and critical thinking. And it is these conversations that Grounded Curiosity seeks to 

We hope the topics discussed on Grounded Curiosity spark readers’ interest and encourage you to continue the discussion and debate with peers, subordinates, commanders, and mentors in units and messes, both online and offline. Contesting ideas and 

Finally, while our aim is to spark discussion about our profession of arms, a secondary aim is to provide an example of a blog by active service members that remains within the bounds of professionalism, information security, public comment, and common courtesy.