Your Brain and Business: The Neuroscience of Great Leaders (29 page)

Conclusion

One of the most challenging tasks for many companies is “getting to action.” If we understand how the brain operates in order to act, we would be in a much better position to institute the relevant steps to increase productivity and prevent procrastinating with ideas that never come to fruition.

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Chapter 7. Coaching Brain Regions

In the book so far, we have introduced some of the critical concepts that you, as a coach or organizational developer, can use to communicate with leaders. In my experience teaching and doing this work, leaders and followers are very receptive to interventions placed within the neural framework because this framework is concrete and can be grasped more than some “emotional” and “organizational psychology” frameworks. Effective coaching involves integrating all of these approaches and having as many tools available as necessary to reach the leader.

Although we have implicated many brain regions and concepts in the various stages and aspects of coaching managers, leaders, and followers, one question remains: Can we use this information as part of an organized approach or in a systematic way (and how specifically)? The answer to this question is complex. The principles are as follows: (1) By understanding the concepts relevant to a specific phenomenon, you can prime your own brain to think of the relevant interventions from a neural perspective. (2) Because the brain regions fundamentally do the same things (the ACC is involved as a conflict detector and part of the attentional mechanism, whether we are talking about change or decision making; and the vmPFC is the accountant that weighs factual and emotional risks and benefits, whether we are talking about positive psychology or imagery), the actions with
which we target these regions are similar in nature but relate specifically to the concept relevant to your reason for being hired. Hence, I did not include this in each chapter because this would have been redundant. (3) Because each brain region may serve multiple functions, we can use a concept that I call “alternative brain probing” (ABP) or “backroading” to reach the relevant coaching targets through another pathway. For example, if an employee, manager, or leader complains that she is unable to attend to her work, you may use interventions under “fronto-parietal interventions” (increase attention), “ACC interventions” (decrease conflict, which then decreases disruption to attention), or “amygdala interventions” (decrease emotional disruptions to attention). Ordinarily, when we ignore these connections, we focus on the primary problem (in this case, attention), but when we understand these connections, we can utilize this understanding to find alternative ways (hence ABP) or backroads to stimulate this same brain region.

Thus, this chapter is divided into two sections: (1) a review of brain regions and their basic functions; (2) interventions targeted to these brain regions. One of the critiques that one must consider is that the brain does not function as independent brain regions, making an appearance when we want them to. It is most accurately understood as a network of brain regions. As such, these “regional brain interventions” are more like symptomatic “cures” in that they do not get at the causes of the behaviors directly, but in engaging these regions, we can increase the comfort as well as the intellectual and emotional functioning of the manager, worker, or leader.

The data that is missing is what coaching specifically does to the brain, and when we obtain this data, it will add to the tremendous body of knowledge we already have.

Review of Brain Regions and Their Basic Functions

1. The Thinking Brain

The success of leaders is based on their actions. Actions arise from decisions, and decisions arise from an assessment of risks and benefits, as shown in
Figure 7.1
.

Figure 7.1. The process of decision-making

The “thinking” part of the brain is the cerebral cortex. This is the outer part of the brain and is sometimes referred to as “neocortex.” The outer part of the brain is divided into several lobes. They are the frontal, temporal, parietal, and occipital cortices (see
Figure 7.2
).