I gave this talk earlier this year: How Neuroscience Informs Leadership. Over the next two weeks, I’ll talk about the SOCIAL BRAIN, what we know, and why it matters. After that, I’ll include articles on the MOTIVATIONAL BRAIN, what we know, and why it matters. I also have some video clips to provide regarding BIAS at it relates to the EXECUTIVE BRAIN.
But first things first, let’s just start with the brain in this post.
About Your Brain
It may be that the brain is not the single most complicated thing in the universe, but it’s hard to imagine anything more complex. Inside the fatty tissue of your skull sits 100 Billion neurons. That’s not even counting the supporting glial cells. These 100 billion neurons all talk to each other through their connection, and if you add up all these contact points of neurons “talking to each other”, a conservative estimate is that there are 100 trillion of them. That is at least 1,000 times the number of stars in our galaxy. That’s in your head!
The upshot of all this crazy potential is that things are going on in there that we just don’t understand. And the more we know, about knowing, the better we’ll be able to make informed decisions.
What I want to with this series is to think about our thinking, to check assumptions at the door, and look at the most recent research on the brain as it applies to being and becoming better leaders. I put these into three sections:
- The Executive Brain to understand how what you think you know can help or hurt you in workplace decision making.
- The Social Brain to look at a crazy need that the brains of your employees have just in order to for them to perform at their best – you know what that need is? Other brains.
- The Motivational Brain to better understand the fundamental need to create drive and motivation.
