{"id":359,"date":"2022-03-21T16:09:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-21T16:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/petrasc.codemonkeys.dev\/?p=359"},"modified":"2024-04-21T05:58:43","modified_gmt":"2024-04-21T05:58:43","slug":"leadership-neuroscience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/petrascoaching.gr\/en\/leadership-neuroscience\/","title":{"rendered":"What neuroscience teaches us about leadership (Neuro-Leaderhip)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In recent years, an intense dialogue has developed between Neuroscience and Leadership to scientifically enrich the way leaders perform their role. Neuroscientific research studying the structure and function of the brain informs the way modern leadership should be practiced and suggests a number of changes. That cartel answers the following questions:\u00a0 a) what is needed to enhance the productivity and effectiveness of executives and b) how to stabilize their active involvement in the pursuit of the organization's goals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In this article, I summarize and detail what neuroscience teaches us about leadership, what behaviors modern leaders should develop, and what we should all pay attention to every time we engage in the conversation about neuroscience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The shift of attention in relationships<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The result of this partnership is a (theoretically) shift of leadership attention from outcome to relationships. We know from both organizational and social psychology that too much focus on outcome and performance at the expense of learning and values, has a heavy cost ultimately, on performance itself, mobilization, leads to employee losses (redundancy or resignation) strengthens internal competition within groups, and forms a framework of threat rather than trust and development.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Relationships motivate and inspire people as long as their social needs are met, as Neuroscience informs us. More specifically, these needs are as follows:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Reward<\/strong>. The need for encouragement, positive emotions and reward in the relationship.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Confidence<\/strong>. The need to control the future through well thought out plans and preparation.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Options<\/strong>. The need to have choices, not to have so many one-way streets. To form alternative paths and to come up with a conscious choice.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Equivalence.&nbsp;<\/strong>The need for fairness and impartiality in the functioning of relationships.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Reputation<\/strong>. The need for good reputation, positive image and appreciation from others.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What does neuroscientific leadership do?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Below I summarize in a list of nine points, how a neuroscientifically informed leadership works, according to what neuroscience teaches us about organizational behavior. The list is indicative and not exhaustive.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Neuroscience-informed leaders:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>They focus on building relationships, personal connection with others. Relationships that satisfy the needs of the human brain and connection, inspire and motivate. They are relationships of trust and encouragement that support openness to new ideas, solutions and innovation.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They recognize the feelings of others, take them seriously and respond to them as they know they influence decisions and behaviors.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They focus on positive emotions, ensure that they are experienced by people as complex plans and solutions emerge based on them.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They know that under threat and aggression, the brain's superior information processing and decision-making functions are inhibited and the capacity for creative thinking and collaboration is reduced.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They know that unconscious processes lead to resistance, even when there is explicit agreement on it. That is, that there is often a contradiction between the saying and the irrational. People tend to repeat attitudes, behaviors and goals at the expense of young people.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They take into account fatigue and take care of the rest of their strains. They formulate appropriate working hours, plan decompression and socialization activities of the groups.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They are interested in the way each executive personally experiences change by emphasizing their subjective experience, the particular difficulties and changes in their development.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They ensure that everyone involved knows the \"why\" of change and the benefits it will bring to their personal development.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They work systematically with themselves to enhance their self-awareness. The purpose here is to develop behaviors based on rationality rather than impulse.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Neuroscientists and knowledge about the structure and function of the brain first, inform leaders and management executives about all the above and second, respond to the&nbsp;<strong>why<\/strong>&nbsp;They have to follow them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">However, as you can see, this is a&nbsp;<strong>project<\/strong>&nbsp;and not everyday reality in businesses and organizations.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Critical self-reflection<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The reflection that I present is developed in three axes: Firstly, the power of biological explanation for things we already know; secondly, biological reductionism; and thirdly, ethics and ethics.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>The Power of \"Biological Explanation\"&nbsp;<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The list we have seen above, it is true that it does not inform us about something that we did not already know from organizational, social psychology or even from clinical psychology. The value of the relationship and the environment of trust as a means of development and operation is not something new. What is new is that this knowledge&nbsp;<strong>It also has a biological basis.&nbsp;<\/strong>through neuroscience. And now it is \"heard\" as a scientific project and is not considered \"philosophy\" or \"fine letters\".&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Let me ask the question:&nbsp;<strong>Why<\/strong>&nbsp;Do we need \"biological evidence\" to show empathy, personal interest and connection, to create meaningful relationships within work? What does that tell us about our culture and behavior?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Biological reductionism.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As neuroscience offers \"objective biological evidence\" for issues involving human behavior (here leadership and mobilization), there is a risk that it will all be reduced to electrochemical stimulation of areas of the brain.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If this happens, we leave out of discussion the parameters that really affect behavior, that is, culture, personality, the context in which one interacts and the dynamics that develop through all of them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is a risk of homogenization, since \"we all have the same brain\" and dubious motivational oversimplifications, such as formulating the \"profile of the ideal brain\" for leadership or establishing the gene of the \"qualified leader\". That is, they could ask us at some point to submit brain scans and DNA for recruitment to a position.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Biological reductionism can easily lead to views about \"normal\" and \"pathological\" within organizations and businesses.&nbsp;<strong>The ineffective should not be pathologized.<\/strong>. We cannot go so far as to understand the ineffectiveness of a worker as a pathological problem of his brain.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Knowledge: ethics and ethics in its use.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Knowledge, any knowledge of human behavior, the brain, connection and relationship, the&nbsp;<strong>The Unconscious World<\/strong>, it always implies a morality and an ethics. It is knowledge, the use of which needs demarcation and framing. In the partnership of neuroscience and leadership, what is the ethical and ethical framework? What is the boundary between the permissible and the impermissible, who and with what competence makes use of these \"tools\"?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The organizational\/operational framework operates on the values of profit, efficiency and productivity. It is a framework of hierarchy and evaluation. And well, that's how it serves its strategic purposes. However, in this context counterweights and compensatory processes are needed when leaders are equipped with knowledge that gives them the right to manipulate others.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Concluding<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The partnership of neuroscience and leadership brought to the discussion, in new terms, the value and importance of relationship and connection. This, in my opinion, is a very interesting and positive creative contradiction. In the sense that, within a framework that operates for profit and based on hierarchy, qualitative characteristics of people are highlighted, the focus shifts to emotions and behaviors. However, we need an ethical framework for the use of neuroscientific knowledge and the correlation of its findings with what we already know from other, related fields.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>This article includes my announcement at the 2nd interdisciplinary conference \u201cTaking Care of the Brain\u201d held 18-19 March 2022.&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Bibliography:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Becker, William &amp; Cropanzano, Russell. (2010). Organizational neuroscience: The promise and prospects of an emerging discipline.&nbsp;<em>Journal of Organizational Behavior 31.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Boyatzis, R. E. (2014). Possible Contributions to Leadership and Management Development from Neuroscience.&nbsp;<em>Academy of Management Learning &amp; Education<\/em>, 13, 300-303.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Boyatzis, R. E., &amp; McKee, A. (2005). Resonant Leadership: Renewing Yourself and Connecting with Others through Mindfulness, Hope, and Compassion. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Boyatzis, Richard &amp; McKee, Annie. (2006). Inspiring others through resonant leadership.&nbsp;<em>Business Strategy Review.<\/em>&nbsp;17.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hills, J. (2013), \u201cAre your leaders brain-savvy, and why should you care?\u201d,&nbsp;<em>Strategic HR Review<\/em>, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 11-15<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lindebaum, D., &amp; Zundel, M. (2013). Not much of a revolution: Scrutinizing organizational neuroscience in leadership studies.&nbsp;<em>Human Relations, 66<\/em>(6), 857\u2013877.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lindebaum, D. (2013). Pathologizing the Healthy But Ineffective: Some Ethical Reflections on Using Neuroscience in Leadership Research. Journal of Management Inquiry, 22(3), 295\u2013305.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lindebaum, D. (2016). Critical essay: Building new management theories on sound data? The case of neuroscience.&nbsp;<em>Human Relations, 69<\/em>(3), 537\u2013550<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Waldman, D. A., Balthazard, P., &amp; Peterson, S. J. (2011). Leadership and neuroscience: Can we revolutionize the way that inspirational leaders are developed?&nbsp;<em>The Academy of Management Perspectives, 25<\/em>(1), 60\u201374.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In recent years, an intense dialogue has developed between Neuroscience and Leadership to scientifically enrich the way leaders perform their role. Neuroscientific research studying the structure and function of the brain informs the way modern leadership should be practiced and suggests a number of changes. 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