Skip to content

Posts from the ‘Kathleen’ Category

Feb 26

Clearing the Brain’s Inbox

Neuroscientists have created a large body of evidence over the years for the importance of sleep. Now researchers have added new understanding to why sleep matters. When we sleep, information that is stored in our short-term memory (located in the hippocampus) moves to longer-term memory storage (located in the cortex). We process new information, create new neural pathways, and open space for new data and experience. This process happens during stage 2 REM sleep.

Of note is that it is equally advantageous to sleep before learning as well as after learning. Researchers say that sleeping before learning allows the brain to become like a dry sponge that is able to then absorb liquid. Enter the midday nap: data showed those who napped were able to integrate information more readily than those who did not. It allows the brain to take a “mental time out”. Even if you don’t sleep, a midday rest can produce similar results.

A good night’s sleep has not lost its importance. Most people know that stage 4 REM sleep is necessary for doing complex thinking and creative remapping of experiences and information.

In Brain Rules, Medina summarizes the importance of sleep by looking at its reverse, “Loss of sleep hurts attention, executive function (decision-making), working memory, mood, quantitative skills, logical reasons, and even motor dexterity.”

Some organizations have set up nap-pods. In day-long kindergartens and in some first grade classes an afternoon nap time still happens. How can our organizations and learning centers integrate the benefits of rest? Let the midday naps begin!

Feb 25

2 Comments

Teaching Old Dogs New Tricks

The old adage, “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks,” is being turned upside-down. It used to be believed that the brain not only didn’t change, but deteriorated with age. But new research is proving that humans continue to form new brain cells and build new neural connections throughout their lives. The brain is elastic, “You can teach an old dog new tricks.” So what does the new science of neuroplasticity have to do with managing an organization?

In the past, the workplace was viewed as transactional: employees did work in exchange for pay. Managers made decisions and gave direction. But the research demonstrates that the human brain sees the workplace first as a social system. Like the human players in the game, people can experience anger and rejection at work. This happens when they are given negative feedback, not invited to participate in a team, assigned a task for which they’re overqualified, see unfairness, or asked to take a cut in benefits or pay. To the brain, these experiences are like being punched in the mouth or going hungry and are reflected in the activation of threat and pain related neural circuits.

The response changes the brain. The response uses up oxygen and glucose as blood is diverted from parts of the brain where working memory resides. It impairs the person’s ability to think effectively, to solve problems, and to be creative. Most employees learn to hide their reactions or shrug their shoulders and get on with it. But these same employees will begin to limit their commitment to the workplace and may give their best energy and ideas somewhere else.

This research has broad implications for how organizations are structured, communication happens, information is exchanged, and reward and benefits are structured. What are a few ideas that managers can use to avoid activating a threat response and activate a reward response? I propose the following as a short list for managers:

  • Choose your body language and words carefully. Observe how different patterns deliver different results. As a manager and leader, you’re always on stage.
  • Clearly communicate not only expectations, but priorities. Do this as often as necessary to maintain clarity in the organization.
  • Be flexible, whenever possible, letting employees make their own decisions.
  • Support employees’ ideas for building good workplace relationships.
  • Act with fairness, which can be increased by greater transparency, clear ground rules, and well explained objectives.

What is being learned in neuroscience about how we behave and relate to each other, creates a great advantage: there is now data backing the ideas that have been put forth in the past two decades about social and emotional intelligence. As managers and employees we have the opportunity to put that knowledge to use in successfully developing our organizations. We can all learn new tricks.

Read more about the research in my article: Managing in 2010: Teaching Old Dogs New Tricks

Feb 19

2 Comments

Procrastination vs. Incubation

As someone who often sees herself as a procrastinator, this article offers a new perspective. I have often defined my operating mode as procrastination. And, it can look this way from the outside perspective. You’ll often find me setting aside 3 or 4 hours each day to read and reflect, go on a walk, or drink a cup of tea or coffee while having a conversation with tribe members and friends. And yes, from the outside, it looks as though nothing is happening. But when the project deadline arrives, it is delivered on time and within budget.

Robert Biswas-Diener suggests that the opposite side of the procrastination coin is incubation. He defines incubation as “a clear sense of deadlines, confidence that the work would be complete on time, certainty that the work would be of superior quality, and the ability to subconsciously process important ideas while doing other — often recreational — activities.” Acknowledging incubating as a strength was a breath of fresh air. In sharing this insight with a friend, yes – in a conversation over coffee, she added that incubation can be a big part of creativity and innovation.

As I reflect further, this idea fits in with the reading that I’ve been dong on interpersonal neurobiology and how our brains most effectively process and manage information. Our brains need a balance of sleep, exercise, good nutrition along with time for stimulation and relaxation in order to function at peak levels. And whatever one calls it, setting aside time for incubation, curiosity, thought experiments, reflection, or exploration, will allow us all to function at our best.

I will continue to plan and set deadlines. I will set realistic expectations for myself. I will communicate with clients and co-workers. But I stop judging myself for taking time to incubate ideas and projects.

Feb 9

2 Comments

The dragon next door

I’ve been hearing from readers and friends about the turmoil in their organizations. They attribute the turmoil to varied external causes: economic instability, a shift in leadership, internal politics, or organizational jerks.

Whatever the cause, as JRR Tolkien said in The Hobbit, “It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him.” I do believe that how we choose to live with the dragon next door is more important than the turmoil, anxiety, and suffering. I do not believe in being naively optimistic; my life has had its share of pain.

Is it possible to find hope in the midst of turmoil? I will use the analogy of a film. If you look carefully at a strip of film you will see a series of small, individual, framed images aligned in a row. When the film is projected on a screen, you will see a moving picture – a movie. A film is both individual photos and a movie. It depends on your experience, your point of view, your focus.

For me, hope comes from focusing on the big picture of organization and personal values, which for Friesen Group include trust, creativity, and abundance.  Hope comes when I manage the individual frames with my best efforts. Sometimes my best effort requires simply recognizing and accepting difficulties and unfairness which come as a part of any life. At other times it means being willing to walk away from a bad situation and let it go. But hope always comes back to the core values of love and compassion for others and for myself.

In the West, our stories of dragons are about battling dragons that represent darkness, fury, danger, and death. But in the East, dragons are gentle and friendly, symbols of change and promise. It depends on your point of reference. The paradox that is life continues. We live with certainty and uncertainty, hope and turmoil. We live with the dragon next door.

Feb 6

Strong opinions, weakly held

This is a cross-post from the Friesen Group Kansas EMS Transition project blog. It is a topic of interest to everyone who engages in organizations.

As dialogue, debate, and discussion continue around various EMS Transition questions, I was thinking about a post on Bob Sutton’s blog where he talks about the need for strong opinions, weakly held. The argument originated with persons from the Institute for the Future.

It starts by stating that we each need to have strong opinions. When we care passionately about something, we are willing to put our energy and time into learning about it, understanding it, and defending it. But the argument doesn’t stop there. The rest of the argument is that we need to hold our strong opinions loosely. If we’re too attached to our opinions, we lose the ability to hear and see other evidence and alternative ideas.

I close this post with a quote from Sutton, “Wisdom is the courage to act on your knowledge and the humility to doubt what you know.”

Feb 5

1 Comment

passion AND indifference

In the interest of looking at all perspectives, I have been reflecting on the need for balance between passion and indifference. In organizations, managers spend time and energy seeking to motivate people to passion for their work. But, with too much passion managers can roll over people and miss important cues indicating risk or simply other options – including better ones. With too much indifference managers can become lethargic and stagnate.

There is balance in the world: a time for reflection and stepping back to see more clearly, and a time for passionate engagement.

If you’re interested in thinking further about this dichotomy, check out Bob Sutton’s post on 10 things he believes about the workplace or David Maister’s post on Passion, People, and Principles.

Feb 4

3 Comments

Thinking by design

This quote from by Diego Rodriguez from IDEO stimulated my thinking today:

Whether or not you call yourself a designer, when you work to relate people’s needs to broader webs of individual, social, and economic factors, and pour your energy into creating better outcomes via an evidence-driven process, you’re using design thinking to increase your odds of success in the world. (From Business Week)

How do we begin relating needs to webs of factors to create better outcomes? Design thinking and critical thinking pull together two worlds that can bring out the best in organizations by using both our left-brain and right-brain to brainstorm, problem solve, and crack cognitive eggs. In Business by Design, Roger Martin writes that organizations of the future “will balance analytical mastery and intuitive originality in a dynamic interplay.” He predicts an “. . . unwavering focus on the creative design of systems, will eventually extend to the wider world. From these firms will emerge the breakthroughs that move the world forward.”

Careful observation is a method of relating needs to webs of factors. When I perform a routine process or engage in conversation, I can ask myself questions to promote observation and reflection, “Why did I do/say that? What was I thinking about when I did/said that? How did it make me feel? What do I believe is important here?” I want to emphasize that it can be just as revealing to ask these questions about routine tasks like using a cell phone or having a weekly team meeting as asking them about more strategic issues.

Another method is integrative thinking. Integrative thinking looks at situations from different perspectives. It does not shrink from contradictions, complex dilemmas, or wicked problems.  It asks questions like: “How does this impact each person in the organization? What would it be like to experience this from their desk? What experiments could be tried to test our ideas? What are ways we could quickly prototype this idea?”

As Tim Brown says in Change by Design,

You have to start with observation because it’s the only way to illuminate the subtle nuances about how people actually get things done (or don’t get things done), and it’s these deep insights that lead to powerful new ideas. Intellectual experimentation is equally critical because there’s no way to generate real breakthroughs unless people are willing to explore a lot of options in a divergent way. Finally, rapid and inexpensive prototyping is the most efficient way to move an idea from concept to reality. By ‘building to think’ instead of ‘thinking about what to build,’ an organization can dramatically accelerate its pace of innovation.

The challenge for organizations is to ‘build to think’ and thereby increase the potential for success.

Feb 2

2 Comments

Brain – Mind – Body

I read an interesting article today that summarizes several research studies about how our brain, mind, and body are connected. Cognitive and neuroscience are beginning to provide insights into our brain, mind, and body that will have real world applications. Researchers from the Institute for the Future imagine that a growing understanding of neuroscience and behavior will impact training programs as we learn how to influence students focus, accuracy, and efficiency.

As I imagine what the research data means for organizations. I can imagine tools that will allow organizations to use the research to select the best persons for each team as they configure project teams. I envision tools for educators and trainers to improve transfer of information in classrooms. I can imagine managers using it to create tools to optimize workflow.

We continue to live in a world where there are as many problems with solutions as there are dilemmas without clear solutions. Bringing together disciplines like neurobiology, sociology, psychology, and organization development may help organizations and the individuals in them to live with uncertainty and continue to be successful.

“Yesterday is regrettable, tomorrow still hypothetical. But you can always listen to your body, and seize today with both hands.” – Susan Goldin-Meadow, University of Chicago

Jan 31

3 Comments

Unfinished business

At the end of each day, I contemplate my to-do list. I have never had a day when everything is checked off of the list. And yet, on the next day I’m often starting new tasks and engaging in activities that weren’t even on the list from the day before. From time-to-time, I reflect on the list and delete things for my “stop doing list“. I have books stacked by my chair, always several in progress. I have far away friends and family that I’d like to go and spend a week visiting. I have places I dream of going and others I long to return to for further adventures.

Today I’m reflecting and reminding myself that life is a process, not an accomplishment – a journey, not a destination. Work, chores, and activities are better represented by a tapestry that each of us is weaving. The threads are our work, hobbies, friendships, travels, and families. While checking off tasks – finishing part of the design  – is a good thing, beginning new relationships and activities – discovering new threads – is just as important. Weaving the varied threads together and adding new ones are the stuff of life.

Unfinished business is part of who we are. We each weave, rest, and weave throughout the times and seasons of our lives. None of us will complete our tapestries. When I’m gone, perhaps someone will pick up some of my threads and begin weaving them into their own tapestry. In the meanwhile, I don’t have to get everything done perfectly. I need to keep weaving and discovering threads, flowing through the seasons of life. A life well-lived will leave a lot of hanging threads – a lot of unfinished business.

Jan 24

2 Comments

Staying out of both ditches

Last Sunday, Jon and I went for a drive to Marion Reservoir. We saw three bald eagles in the area of the north cove. And for the first time since I’ve lived in Kansas, I saw the reservoir frozen from shore-to-shore. The pink clouds on the horizon were lingering fog. It was a beautiful afternoon. 

January Afternoon at Marion Reservoir

The Sunday afternoon drive turned adventurous when we decided to take a shortcut to Pilsen to investigate the church steeple we saw peeking over the horizon. We chose one of the many gravelled township roads to travel north. After about a half mile of gravel, we were confronted with an unmaintained road, which in winter – translated for non-Kansans  – means mud over flint rock and limestone. No problem! We have 4-wheel drive. So, onward we charged. The silence in the truck grew tangible as we slid first into the ditch on the passenger side, crossed a small bridge, then slid across into the ditch on the driver side (which was feet from a creek), and back into the ditch on the passenger side as we climbed to the stop sign. When the “mudball” that we were now riding in came to a stop, Jon said, “Let’s not do that again!” 

As I continue, a week later, to process that experience, I think about how much time our organizations spend in ditches. On one side of the road is rapid growth, change, and unpredictability. On the other side of the road is the status quo, rigid thinking, and control. Too much time in the ditch with uncontrolled growth and change will cause the organization to explode as the bubble bursts. Too much time in the ditch with the status quo leads to a slow organizational death from irrelevance and attrition. The challenge is to find ways of being that are neither reactive or rigid. To find ways of creating a road between the ditches. A road that is filled with energy for being flexible and adaptable while being coherent and stable. 

So let the road building begin. Let us find ways of improving organizational roads to support the middle way of “yes” and “and“. Let us find ways to stay out of both ditches and reach the destination.

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »