How and Why to Apply Gut Feelings to Business

Posted on November 9, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-11-08 at 9.46.41 PMI know we promised you an decoding of your intuitive compass, and with our greatest apologies, it will come next week.

In the meantime…

Because our instinct is responsible for our survival, it actually makes complete sense for it to be heavily involved in sophisticated decisions. It has been doing that job for thousands of years. So it follows that, in important matters that will affect our lives, our instinct should be the first and foremost judge of whether or not a decision is good. A study conducted by neuroscientists at Princeton University confirms this fact. The aim of the study was to demonstrate how a gut feeling may rise before a person becomes conscious of what the brain has registered. In the study, students were directed to pick out figures—people or cars—in a series of photos that flashed by on a computer screen. The pictures flashed by four at a time, and the participants were told to scan only two of them, either those above and below the center point, or those to the left and right. Eye tracking confirmed that they did just that. But brain scans showed that the students’ brains registered the presence of people or cars even when the figures appeared in photos that they were not paying attention to. The brain tallies cues, big and small, consciously and not, it may send out an alarm before a person fully understands why.

A gut feeling is often the result of some part of our brain taking in and processing information that we are not conscious of having taken in and processed. This study demonstrates how we sometimes are not consciously aware of all of the information that we in fact have already registered at some level—in this case visually.

When a gut feeling arises before a person becomes conscious of it, it can enrich their ability to make a decision. Not only that, but sometimes logical problem solving is simply not the best option. Sometimes the best way to come up with an appropriate answer to a logical problem is to base it on a gut feeling. Dr. Gerd Gigerenzer, a psychologist who has studied the limits of rational thinking in decision making explains that, contrary to popular wisdom, sometimes there is no optimal strategy attainable to solve a problem. He gives the example of a presidential candidate who has to plan a fifty-city tour. The candidate would like to start and end in the same city and obviously cover the shortest distance. The candidate would like to start and end in the same city and obviously cover the shortest distance. There are so many possible itineraries that not even the fastest computer can optimize the candidate’s choice in a lifetime, a century, or even a millennium.

When optimization is out of reach we must rely on our gut feelings instead of logical deduction. And this applies to any situation in which rules are not completely explicit, uncertainty is prevalent, or rule breaking is an option. This obviously pertains to winning a negotiation, leading an organization, marketing a new product, investing in the stock market, or training executives. Of course, for every one of these endeavors good enough strategies exist, but for us to find and choose these valid strategies we need to resort to what Gigerenzer calls a “rule of thumb,” which he defines as the product of a mental process that tries to identify the most important information and ignore the rest, taking advantage of an evolved capacity of the brain to do so. For Gigerenzer, expert of the intelligence of the unconscious, “it would be erroneous to assume to intelligence is necessarily conscious and deliberate.” He adds, “We know more than we can tell.”

Excerpted from Francis Cholle’s The Intuitive Compass, Jossey-Bass

HOW YOU MAKE DECISIONS Questionnaire

Posted on November 2, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-11-01 at 10.35.29 PMWhere do you fall on the Intuitive Compass®? A great way to start understanding the Intuitive Compass® is to actually use it. Take a few minutes to answer the following questionnaire; your answers will give you a snapshot of how you make decisions. Each person’s Intuitive Compass® is unique, revealing something about the person’s approach to a specific topic (in this case, decision making) at a specific moment in time (today!)

For more information about the Intuitive Compass® please check out our July 6, 2015 blog post or our book.

For each question, rate yourself from 1 to 5 (1 is least, 5 is most) as it relates to how you approach decision making. When you are finished we will explain how to chart your answers on a diagram of the Intuitive Compass. We hope you will gain insights on how to optimize your decision-making process in the future.

Questionnaire
1. How willing are you to review your creative options with an open mind while you are in the process of making a decision?
2. How willing are you to systematically gather facts and data surrounding your decisions?
3. How willing are you to evaluate the potential outcome of your decisions before you make them?
4. How organized are you in making the best use of the time you have to make decisions?
5. How willing are you to approach making a decision with a playful attitude—that is, not focusing on expected tangible results?
6. How committed are you to making proactive decisions even when the decision-making process is challenging and it would be easier to avoid making a decision altogether?
7. How ready are you to question your own ideas and beliefs while making a decision?
8. How willing are you to be present to your emotions, regardless of whether they are pleasant or unpleasant, while you are in the process of making a decision?
9. How willing are you to organize your environment and resources to optimize your decision making?
10. How willing are you to openly explore new concepts and new perspectives while making a decision?
11. How committed are you to making the best decision possible?
12. How accepting are you of being confused while you are in the process of making a decision?

To calculate how you score in each quadrant:
For the northeast quadrant, add questions # 2, 4, 9 and divide total by 3.
Northeast Quadrant Score

For the southeast quadrant, add questions # 3, 6, 11 and divide total by 3.
Southeast Quadrant Score

For the northwest quadrant, add questions # 1, 7, 10 and divide total by 3.
Northwest Quadrant Score

For the southwest quadrant, add questions # 5, 8, 12 and divide total by 3.
Southwest Quadrant Score

Your Intuitive Compass®

Please print the image that goes with this post and follow the instructions below.

Mark a dot in each quadrant at the point on the line that is closest to your score for that quadrant and then draw lines to connect the dots in all quadrants. Use the following sample compass to plot your own score and connect the dots.

Next week we will talk about how to decode your compass.

Copyright © 2012 Francis Cholle (text and images)
thehumancompany.com

Thriving in the New Normal: Change

Posted on October 26, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

 

Screen Shot 2015-10-26 at 12.20.17 PMIt is a truism that the one thing that doesn’t change in life is change; we are constantly dealing with the unknown.  A decade immersed in the performing art and cultural studies gave me a new perspective on the how modern world deals with change.  When directing or acting, I had to accept that great art is not about control.  It is about having discipline in the preparation and surrendering during the performance.  Management, at least the way I had experienced it, is about controlling the environment to ensure flawless execution and reach the expected results. Management is a powerful means to reach one’s ends, but my artistic journey made me realize that in the modern world, our fear of change and our inability to deal creatively with the unpredictability of change lead us to seek control over the process of life.  This means that although management should be about stabilizing our environment to facilitate the natural creative process belying any human activity, we attempt to control the process to secure the results we want; we do everything we can to eliminate the unknown, but in doing so we work against the creative nature of life.

In recent years, neuroscience research has revealed three key facts that may change forever the way we think about and approach creativity:

–       Instinct plays a leading role in complex decision making.

–       Eighty percent of our grey matter is dedicated to nonconscious thought.

–       Imaginative play is one of the most direct means of activating our creativity and problem-solving abilities.

These three discoveries open up unprecedented opportunities for progress, creativity, and efficiency, if we only embrace the instinctual and unconscious aspects of the mind and the randomness and chaos of life.

The uncomfortable part of this is that we are not used to relying on instinct and the unconscious, and we are certainly not used to accepting randomness or chaos.  We are used to seeing life and reality as linear and logical when they aren’t.  Success in modern times mean making a leap from seeing the world as we think it operates to seeing how it really operates.  In reality both life and the whole of the human mind operate in a way that is closer to chaos than to linear order.

In my seminars at L’Oréal, SAP, and other companies, I often recount Edgar Allan Poe’s “A Descent into the Maelstrom,” a story that beautifully illustrates this aspect of chaos theory.  It describes how three brothers go out on their fishing boat only to be caught in “the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens.”  The storm drives their boat into a powerful whirlpool, the maelstrom of the title.  One brother is thrown overboard into the whirlpool and quickly carried under.  Another brother goes mad with terror. But the third brother is suddenly struck by the awesome beauty of the maelstrom.  With an inner calm he notices that some objects are being spun around at the top of the whirlpool rather than sucked into it.  Unable to convey this to his mad brother, he submits himself to the sea, cling onto a barrel, and rides the maelstrom until it subsides and he is rescued.  In the meantime the mad brother, because he fights the chaos rather than submitting to it, drowns when their boat spirals down to the depths. Although the experience turns the surviving brother’s hair white and makes him look older that his age, it give him a deep insight into the working of nature, and an enduring serenity.

I always remind participants that Poe’s story shows that the way each one of us chooses to handle confusion and chaos may have a huge impact on the final outcome for everybody.  Each brother acted his own way and by doing so chose his own final outcome.  In Poe’s story, when the third brother decides, in spite of his fear, to give up the fight with the maelstrom, he actually facilitates the organizing principle creates all the marvels that have evolved in nature. In our minds, it brings reason, feeling, and instinct into balance, if only we have the wisdom to trust it and stop trying to override it.

 

Navigating the Shift to Play

Posted on October 19, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-10-19 at 2.06.21 PMExcerpted from Francis Cholle’s The Intuitive Compass, Jossey-Bass

If innovation is key to corporate success, and if play is the door to innovation, then the next logical question (logic does have it place!) is how to create a corporate atmosphere be part of every CEO’s mandate, and companies should be rated according to the level of playfulness of their culture in the same way as they are rated as a great place to work or as a socially responsible organization.

A number of practical steps can be followed to navigate this cultural shift toward play, which then can become easier than it seems.

Think about what play look like.  It is personal, engaging, and interactive.  It is often exuberant and messy.  It is filled with light, color, and sound.  When you think about play, you may instinctively think about a children’s playground or children’s toys.  Now, think about corporate offices, or, more specifically, corporate boardrooms.  There are lots of straight lines in boardrooms, (or perhaps, artistically, an elegantly curved accent wall); there is typically an imposing table made from fine polished wood or sleek metal.  That table likely suggests a hierarchical seating arrangement that people intuitively understand: the boss will sit at the head of the table and the chief advisor will sit next to the boss or perhaps will anchor the other end.  The rest of the employees will fill in the sides of the table.  So, before the meeting even starts, everyone knows his or her relative importance.  And everyone knows that polite behavior is expected: sit up straight, papers stacked neatly in front of you, a pen at the ready, smartphone close by in case of an emergency.

These rigid boardrooms are where major strategic decisions are being made about innovation and the future of our organizations.  They represent a very logical environment geared toward conscious conversations that will unfold in a very linear and efficient way.  They appeal to the 20 percent of our intelligence that lives in our conscious mind with its wealth of creative ideas, and the intelligence that we can reach through play.

Dr. Marian Cleeves Diamond, one of the world’s foremost neuro-anatomists advocates the establishment of “playful environments.” I too believe that we need to create offices, boardrooms, and activities that engage our playful nature—a corporate sandbox or playground.  We are playful by nature and efficient by necessity.   So let’s embrace our nature, and less effort will be needed for the same, or better, results.  When we do this we can break through the mental barriers that are keeping us stuck. Certain corporations are already doing this. Some of the things that they do to create a play-friendly atmosphere include:

–    Allocating significant time in which employees are explicitly encouraged to play

–       Creating, or giving employees access to, physical spaces that are conducive to play

–       Giving employees implicit and explicit permission to “fail” or be “unproductive” in their pursuit of innovation.

You Already Have All the Resources You Need to Succeed

Posted on October 12, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-10-11 at 10.34.04 PMExcerpted from Francis Cholle’s The Intuitive Compass, Jossey-Bass

Play opens us up to the possibility that we don’t need more of anything—time, money, knowledge, and so on—in order to produce more.  It is a radical idea, especially in business, where we often hear the argument the budgets are limited and therefore the ability to innovate is limited.  How can you get the same result with half of the resources?  How is that possible?  It’s possible because human motivation is not linear; the way one person gets motivated is a complex function of many intertwined factors, which do not follow a linear continuum, but which can be greatly influenced by play.  When we tap into the part of people that responds to play and inspiration, we unleash possibilities and huge potential for new sources of motivation that we could not have predicted or accessed otherwise.  Thus when people are engaged in play, truly and deeply engaged, they lose track of time, they stop thinking about whether their paycheck is bigger today than it was yesterday, they form close and fruitful bonds with their playmates, they withstand discomfort and inconvenience, and more often than you might imagine, they create magic.  Play moves people into an optimistic frame of mind, a place where they are more adaptable to change and more likely to improvise, and where they begin to dance in the groove of life.  In that joyous groove, success and innovation become far more likely outcomes than they ever could be in an atmosphere of grinding unhappiness and perceived lack.

Take, for instance, a story of how dice games were invented, according to the ancient Greek historian Herodotus.  In pre-Roman times, 2,500 year ago, the kingdom of Libya was suffering a famine that left it only able to feed half of its citizens.  The Libyan king invented a game—sheep knuckle dice—and established a policy that every other day, every person in the kingdom, would do nothing but play sheep knuckle dice.  They would not work, they would not just hang out, and they would not run errands for their grandma.  And they would not eat.  Such was the level of immersion the sheep knuckle dice provided that the people managed to survive an eighteen-year famine.

What does this tale reveal to us? It shows that the impact of play reaches far beyond the realm of reason.  It also tells us that the power of play is such that it can provide an effective distraction even from something as elemental as hunger.  Play is a strong catalyst for changing behavior, helping people shift perspective and refocus their energy to overcome hardship or challenging situations without necessarily increasing material resources or the number of team members.

Why Ritual is an Important Part of Leadership

Posted on October 6, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-10-06 at 12.16.49 AMExcerpted from Francis Cholle’s The Intuitive Compass, Jossey-Bass

Ritual is powerful and can be used to engage people in ways that words alone cannot.  Rituals are meant to affect the body through regular repetition and dramatic staging; as a consequence of that drama and repetition, they affect us at an instinctual level and influence the mind in ways much deeper than logic and reason.   From sacred ceremonies including school graduations and the public swearing in of elected officials, they mark the most significant moments of our lives, individually and collectively.  On a more mundane level, they help us navigate through the average day—the morning cup of coffee, a hot shower. They send a signal to our brain that something of note is happening.  In all cases they help us harness energy, stabilize our minds, and have faith in the future.  In doing so they channel our thrust for survival in constructive ways.  By conveying a sense of purpose to important aspects of our lives, they help us find meaning, go past inertia to move through the challenges of life, and creatively reach beyond the bounds of logic.  Rituals powerfully harness the law of survival, the law of reaching beyond boundaries, and the law of inertia.

Rituals can also help in the business world.  BETC, the successful advertising agency in France, provides an example that can easily be adapted to many different businesses and industries.  The founder and chairwoman of the agency, Mercedes Erra, insists that whenever a brief on a new client or project is brought in by an account executive, it is and should be treated as a pivotal moment in the life of the agency.  The brief is the first step in the development of a new campaign.  Its arrival becomes a celebratory moment.  It is the trigger for a professional ritual in which importance and meaning are conveyed.  Food and drinks are brought into a special room, and all of the people who will be working on the campaign gather together to talk about the future of the project.   It is fun and play and serious work all at the same time.  Key elements of the brief are clarified, including the strategic context of the project.  There is discussion about the agency’s or individual team members’ relationship with the client, and any convictions or doubts about the client, their company, the brand, or the communications plan that they want to launch.  But what happens could not be achieved through an exchange of emails or written notes because they would not have the same impact.  Allowing time, staging the meeting in a different way, and having the chairwoman attend the briefing all have a special emotional impact and show the significance of the event.  People can feel its significance, and feeling it is more important than understanding it intellectually when it comes to harnessing creativity and enthusiasm.  Feelings make an impact on our bodies, which in turn influences our ability to solve problems and imagine new solutions.  Such a meeting reaches into people’s psyches, and the meeting’s perceived significance has a long-lasting effect.  Rituals are powerful, as they help us go beyond what’s tangible and conscious.  They reach deep into our unconscious, engage our instinct, and convey meaning.

Why We All Need Intuitive Intelligence

Posted on September 21, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

We attempt to interact with one another andScreen Shot 2015-09-20 at 10.05.08 PM arrange our institutions in hierarchical pyramids, because we have been taught that the world fundamentally operates according to physical laws that believe that our minds can and should operate in hierarchical way, the reason directing feeling and instinct.  But that thinking doesn’t match up with reality.

The hierarchical view of the world only tells part of the story.  It is a reflection of the classical physics of the atom: a limited, finite, separate, stable entity that is always precisely identifiable in space and time. But in the 1920s physicist like Niels Bohr discovered that we cannot describe the reality of subatomic—or quantum—particles. These entities are not separate and stable, but random and chaotic.  Subatomic particles cannot be precisely identified in space and time except within certain probabilities, and they area entangled in mysterious ways that Albert Einstein called “spooky action at a distance.”

To describe reality fully, we need both classical Newtonian physics and quantum physics.  Likewise, to understand how our unconscious and conscious minds work, we need to account for instinct and feeling as well as reason, for both chaotic thinking and linear thinking.  As the second decade of the twenty-first century starts, even many scientists remain only dimly aware of the implications or quantum physics for the nature of reality, from the makeup of the physical world to the operations of our minds and their creative processes.  That doesn’t leave much hope for the rest of us.

The good new is you don’t need to fully understand the theory to understand how to be successful in our chaotic world.  What you do need is Intuitive Intelligence.

Intuitive Intelligence is a set of skills I designed that uses intuition to get to the instinctual and nonconscious parts of our minds.  It can be learned and developed, but because instinct does not operate in the same way as reason, Intuitive Intelligence requires unusual forms of learning and thinking.  This is why understanding intuition is key.

Intuition doesn’t seek “the truth” or even “sense.” Intuition is completely open to non-sense.  It dives down into the depths of the unconscious where reason and instinct collide in unexpected ways, and it latches onto hidden connections and contradictions.  Then it brings this information—via an unusual sign, a rare sensation, an unexpected feeling, or a seemingly irrelevant fact—to the surface of consciousness to feed the rational mind and enable logic to work with paradox.  Intuition empowers us to operate in the zone of ambiguity and change, the exact place where imagination and genius occur.

Intuitive Intelligence helps us survive in new and changing environments by incorporating intuition and instinct into our thought process and our business endeavors.  The purpose of instinct is survival.  Its’ ultimate mission is to ensure the sustainability of our species.  It understands how to collaborate with and with and adapt to our ecosystems. This is its inherent wisdom.  This is why Intuitive Intelligence is so needed today.

How to Take the Leap to Sustainable Value Creation

Posted on September 13, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Screen Shot 2015-09-13 at 7.59.52 PMMy advice to any executive who has decided to take on an accelerated path to innovation and sustainable growth is to resist the temptation to systematically seek immediate financial results and short-term solutions.  To go beyond business as usual, and to reach truly innovative solutions, you need to shift your focus from financial profitability to sustainable value creation.  The financial logic is exact but not very conducive to imagination.  The concept of sustainable value opens our business reflections and strategies to new horizons.  To make deeper and better decisions, you need imagination, patience, and open mind, and tolerance for ambiguity and confusion.

This calls for a new awareness.  It requires us to balance our faith in logic with the secular wisdom of instinct.  In doing so, we will need to tap into our intuition, an attribute of the feminine part of our psyche.  Intuition opens up new possibilities to feed the masculine part in us, which is ruled and often restricted by the logical mind.  And that is the message of Intuitive Intelligence: anything is possible when the feminine and masculine energies join to cooperate creatively, where improbable solutions can come to our rescue.

In our postmodern age we are still not used to the discomfort of the unknown, the demands of the feminine, and the fact that we are not in control.  But with determination, courage,and faith we can surrender to another belief system, one that enables us to overcome our fear and escape the deadening impact of our need for control.  As is the case with any creative journey, we have no guarantee of success, and no one can show us the way, because the way is unique for each one of us.  But we can receive guidance from the part of ourselves that knows better–the intuitive voice of feminine wisdom–and finally find our way out of control mode into a novel clarity and a deeper relationship with life.

Just as it always is for the mythical hero, the path we’re facing is filled with challenges and unknown factors.  However, we can choose to look at these challenges as parts of a creative process:  the process of evolution.  And we can rely on Intuitive Intelligence to help with decision making and creative problem solving in these unpredictable times.  It will provide unexpected creative answers, which will feel like magic to us because we cannot always explain them.  In this particular time of many unprecedented challenges we have a unique opportunity to engage and be taught in new ways.  

There are many real-life successful examples in the business world that prove there is a plausible route beyond conventional logic.  This will always require a leap of faith, but the leap can be an educated one.  We need to rethink the way we think.  We need reinitialize our thinking program in light of a new scientific understanding of the power of instinct and play and the quantum laws of matter, which show the paradox of our limited individuality within the holistic force of our interdependence and an unlimited number of possibilities.  In this new world view, power has to be reconsidered, money deconstructed and reconstructed into its real purpose:  the prosperity of all.  We’re called to move on.  No time to waste.  A new generation is already there, and we can all do it.  Together we can create a more meaningful, more prosperous, and more balanced world, It requires some adjustments and faith, but it is possible.

The Lakota people have a saying: “It is not about peace on earth but peace with earth.”  When we observe nature, we see how everything and everyone in nature contributes to the whole; that nothing can exist without the others, the conflict, tension, destruction, complexity,  and mystery are also part of it; and that the sum of it all is the most mystifying system we could ever imagine and learn from.

 

An Important Listening Exercise to Sharpen and Develop Your Creative Skills

Posted on August 31, 2015 by Bianca Le Mouël

Excerpted from Francis Cholle’s The Intuitive Compass, Jossey-Bass3

I am going to teach you an exercise, call The Listening Posture, in which you focus on your ability to listen differently.   Listening is very powerful.  It is a receptive function, which is a feminine quality.  Therefore proper listening can greatly help you access the feminine dimension of your psyche and develop your creative sensitivity.  There are many other reasons putting the emphasis on your auditory sense.  Some are scientific; some are related to ancient wisdom and rituals. Professor Alfred Tomatis developed the Listening Posture.  Although designed for therapeutic reasons, it is also a great way to sharpen your sensitivity, and access and develop your intuition.  You can do it anyplace–in your office, or even in a loud environment such as a waiting room.

Instructions for the Listening Posture:

  1. Set your intention: Think about an area in which you would like to get insights.  Make your question open ended.  Write it down.
  2. Sit still in a comfortable chair, feel your seat in the chair.
  3. Leave your legs and arms uncrossed and relaxed.
  4. Close your eye and focus and your breathing.  Breathe naturally.
  5. Relax your diaphragm (allow the muscular “floor” in your abdomen to move up when you exhale and down when you inhale).
  6. Relax your neck and shoulders, lower back, middle back, and upper back.
  7. Relax your facial muscles and the muscles around your upper lip, and tighten the skin of your face up and out to make it more smooth and even.
  8. Pay attention to the sounds in the room
  9. Focus on your right ear (unless you have impaired hearing, it is the one that can relay sound to your brain in the quickest way).
  10. Focus on all high-pitched founds,
  11. Focus on the harmonics of all sounds )the luminescent part of all sounds, like the crest of a wave).
  12. Float in this sonic bath.  Let these harmonics energize you as much as they open you to greater awareness.
  13. Stay in this state for five minutes.
  14. Open your eyes and look around the room.
  15. Look at your question.  Write all the ideas that come to you.