Benefiting at work from Brain Based Insights

Whenever we toss the now back into business – we equip the human mind for ringer success. I mean that moment of epiphany, and adventure that adds urgency to a day’s work. 

It’s related to the way human brains rewire for winning action. A highly focused person creates new neuron pathways to adventures that remain hidden to people stuck in their past or fast forwarding their minds to future concerns. How so?

In as much as the past holds all our regrets, our failures, and our disappointments … it also causes mental noise of sorts. Racket that drains current energy the brain needs for peak performances.

When caught like a deer in headlights of anxiety for the future, the mind loses brainpower for adventures at hand. Susceptible to stress the anxious brain tends to severely limit or shut down mental energy required to meet daily goals. Have you been there?

At times, in my younger years, I barely survived financially, because regrets of past failures as well as fears for future inadequacies drained any mental energy for solutions. That was before I discovered the brain’s capability to rewire itself daily to conquer the now with new zest.

What epiphany do you see today, that will inspire an adventure with zip?  As soon as you spot it … go for it … and watch your brain leap frog over speed bumps that slowed you down in past.

The Economist recently showed how many firms are uniting for financial gain in some areas … and then competing frantically for financial advantages in others. It’s a bit like people joining forces to win a war but then competing to win key battles. 

Can this approach work?

More importantly …

Are leaders equipped with skills to bring cultural differences together?

If you agree that joint endeavors can inspire excellence and challenge growth for your bottom line, you’ll likely also agree that distinctive skills come in handy to make profitability happen. In brain based approaches … these critical tools are smart skills.

Few would deny that successful merges are becoming increasingly urgent as leaders unite to adjust for turbulent times. Most also go along with the fact that human brains possess top tools to collaborate effectively at the peaks.

Would you agree though, that it takes unique skills to reconcile differences across cultures, backgrounds, departments, ages, IQs, locations, genders, and capabilities?

No question … cultural merges can help your firm step past mediocrity and into rejuvenation … when leaders come equipped with tools for rejuvenation. Could it happen where you work? 

Contrary to what some believe, the most highly gifted leaders are not necessarily able to show the way successfully at your firm.

Sad at it may seem, some highly capable leaders work at and barely survive the most dysfunctional corporations out there.

What can be done … when workplaces harbor bigger problems than leaders can confront?

Ensuring that skilled leaders take a firm to its fullest potential requires first … an understanding of what goes wrong in failed corporate cultures. Second, it requires practical tactics from neuro discoveries to rejuvenate tainted brainpower.

One common problem that works against gifted leaders is lack of tone skills commonly practiced at many workplaces. Although leaders may possess competent skills to motivate … and while they may attempt to direct peak performance at work … staff still perform poorly where few skills exist to disagree while at the same time building good will, for instance.

In some cases, cynicism shuts down and kills creativity. As a result the corporate culture emerges with rigid routines that keep potential leaders safe from skeptics’ criticism while performance suffers. Along with a workplace’s loss of morale … comes lack of encouragement to take calculated risks that keep winning companies at cutting edges.

If your firm has frustrated workers who grow aggressive … or gifted leaders who opt for workplace clowns to survive the cold climate … you may be wasting brainpower unnecessarily.

One way to avoid the traps of dysfunctional settings … is to support talented workers who remain hamstrung at work. Start with a survey of brainpower at work to discover performance hotspots impacted by tone.  

Then add one or two tone tactics at a time for new zest found only at the brightest workplaces … where skilled experts find courage and confidence to lead.

While many people speak of the need for change at work, a few lead transformational practices. Powerful economic and social forces continue to set in motion an urgent need for change. In response …  brain based practices will ensure transformation at your organization. How so?

When transformational practices come tethered to recent life-changing discoveries about the human brain … people grow flexible and prepared to meet that firm’s modern and fast paced world demands. Have you seen it happen?

Consider common problems that create crisis and watch the brain at work:    

1. Tenured workers refuse to change: Many firms unknowingly offer incentives for people to stay in the ruts that kill business deals daily. Invention, with all its dynamic rewards, provides the inspiration that drives winning markets.

2. Daily practices fail to align with vision: The part of one’s brain that dreams big differs from the part that steps daily toward that vision. Both need to be nurtured.

3. Poor tone diminishes corporate culture. Good tone often comes for sharing and communication a great vision in ways that workers can see personal and organization dividends.

John Kotter, in his bestselling book Leading Change, emphasized ongoing learning and changes as keys to reaching maximum potential at work. I’d like to add that when transformational practices align with brain based discoveries, growth follows.

Do transformational practices keep you and your firm at peak-performance?

If you’d  answer yes to common complaints increasingly found in current workplaces … you’re likely short-circuiting  your brainpower in ways that hold you back unnecessarily.

Can you identify with any of the following?

1. Lost sight of life’s challenges?
2. Anxious for your financial future?
3. Dealing poorly with problem people?
4. Worrying about health?
5. Struggle with organization?
6. Concerned for family?
7. Stopped using talents?
8. Sleep problems?
9. Feeling sidelined?
10. Bored?
11. Losing autonomy?
12. Lonely?
13. Is time wasting away?
14. Lack fulfillment?
15. Fearful?
16. Lost your legacy?
17. Sitting on the shelf?
18. Misunderstood?
19. Problem relaxing?
20. Feeling out of shape?
21. Missing business engagements?
22. Not getting ideas across?
23. Burning out?
24. Frustrated with changes?
25. Lost your leadership?
26. Stopped learning new skills?
27. Memory problems?
28. Feeling old?
29. Fighting mood swings?
30. Stopped laughing at the little things?
31. Stuck in a rut? Lost your influence?
32. Feeling cranky?
33. Sinking under conflicts?
34. Losing focus?
35. Spotting more problems than possibilities?
36. Trouble communicating across ages?
37. Not taken seriously?
38. No longer the person you want others to see in you?

What bombshells take down you or torpedo fellow workers?

More importantly, did you know that new discoveries on the brain address each of these brainpower leakages,  that many people suffer unnecessarily?

Over the next weeks we’ll tackle these mental maladies … and point to neuro research that offers winning strategies to zip beyond each. 

If I tossed out the words leader, age and the human brain what one observation would you shoot back first?

If you zoned in on the word leader and considered current complaints in many companies … you might add:

- arrogant
- rigid
- authoritarian

Zero in on popular myths about the word age I and you’d possibly suggest:

- over the hill
- boring
- weak

Focus on hearsay about the word brain and you might offer back:

- fixed IQ
- loss with age
- test results

Hopefully rich revolutionary discoveries about the brain’s potential offer finer realities to your firm than myths stated above which limit performance far more than most people realize. How so?

In a brain based workplace … the terms leader, age, and human brain conjure up amazingly potent images – with rejuvenated values at work. Pulled together into brain based business settings … these three concepts suggest how:

Successful  leaders model inspiration …and  help workers to rewire neuron pathways for success.  grow dendrite brain cells for competitive edges … well past their senior years.

Can you see dividends through rewiring for brain based possibilities in three key forces that fire up your bottom line?

Firms tend to go down in flames when finances trump people … or when monetary concerns snuff out human potential. Have you noticed?

In fact, financial woes become the first indication that it may be time to reboot the brains where you work. Do you agree?

Here are 5 instances  I’ve spotted where financial woes make people smarter:

1. Gas prices leap off the chart … and people tend to consider the world’s distribution of wealth … so they pony up wiser travel options. They may not buy a smart car … but neither do they dash out to buy gas guzzlers proliferated before gas became gold.

2. Housing takes a nosedive … and suddenly people begin to value their shelters as well as budget for reasonable living conditions they can afford.

3. Health care costs more … and many people tend to eat healthier, exercise more … and educate themselves for robust physical well-being.

4. Employment’s less assured … and that can lead to people craving currency in their field, and finding ways to stay smarter on the job. Less tenure options can lead to more reflective people when it comes to career choices.

5. Leaders hold fewer financial keys … and in response workers assume more financial leadership.  Many take charge of personal investments, plan for their future, and chart adventurous paths for doable retirements.

Have financial fiascoes made people smarter where you work? How has the shrinking public purse hit your pocketbook?

If you’ve tried to change any broken parts at your organization lately, you’ll likely recognize the speed bumps and sinks holes that prevent growth. Any barriers where you work?

Luckily, I’ve also found amazing windows for fresh air when I wiggle a few handles open, and risk brain based approaches that cool hot spots.

Over my own 30 years as a student of the brain and an activist to bring more brainpower to work … I’ve discovered 5 lynchpins for growth that lasts.

1. Bureaucracy can be breached with retrofits it can handle … you can live with …  and leaders will prosper by. Find one open bureaucrat where you work and you’ve already begun to make spaces for new approaches that bring visible benefits. Then celebrate these benefits with that person – offering credit to that bureaucrat for change … as a way to keep improvements rolling. 

2. Tone takes the cake when problems arise … and troubles will pop up like geysers under pressure … whenever tradition meets change. Interestingly, leaders often tell me that tone holds power for change that few firms recognize … and yet most admit that tone skills are rarely taught at failing organizations. Have you noticed?  

3. Procrastination may make firms poorer … fatter … and unhappier …  but it rarely gets the last word at successful,  growing organizations. How so? Prioritize key targets for your day, and watch creative zip color the calendar and enhance peak performances.

4. Stress shrinks the brain and shuts down change efforts … and yet you can turn harmful cortisol chemicals into serotonin hormones …  with brain based skill. Move a group into the directions of change through laughter, classical music at work, and watch new solutions light up like fireworks illumine a dark sky. Sound like growth?

5. Inventions come from shared insights, and point firms in opposite directions from routines and ruts that lock out life and kill incentives. In his book  … Physician Invent Thyself …  Michael Neuvirth makes innovations at your firm seem as easy as the inspiration that drives his winning markets.

How well do you help leaders to embrace the changes that will point your firm in a direction of growth. Why not start with a survey to determine where brainpower already creates progress. Then tackle these hotspots for change … one at a time.

When any firm begins to nosedive financially, it’s often due to disengaged people who lose interest in offering peak-performances. Have you seen it happen?

The Gallup Employee Engagement Index reported that 70% of workers are disengaged ... and that $300 billion a year is lost in productivity across US firms. Futhermore, it's a global problem. The 2005 Watson Wyatt Survey stated that a mere 12% of UK workers are engaged, for instance. It doesn't have to be that way.

Have you  noticed what triggers rally up any workforce … in ways that also raise the bottom line?

Disengaged people in business or university settings seem to leap back onboard when:

1. Talk moves away from leader-centered and exchanges occur regularly in vibrant roundtables … where diverse talents act as tools to solve daily problems.

2. Novices and experts alike find opportunities to explore new angles and create products that reflect strengths from their unique mix of intelligences.

3. Tone sustains goodwill so the workplace community remains both safe and challenging and provides a place where quality results are evident.

4. Discovery becomes the handmaiden of best practices and where more participants get involved in the organization’s vision.

5.  Workers are encouraged to bring their unique mix of intelligences to their work daily, and performance reports factor in the firm’s goals as well as worker strengths.

Not surprisingly, people do better and the bottom line improves … when workers engage their unique solutions to problems that tend to strike any organization.  How do you engage people in ways that build better work communities?