Daydreaming and Leadership
When I was a child my school reports always reprimanded me for daydreaming, i.e. being lost in thoughts that were disassociated from the present. Without exception these comments were framed in the negative and the reports home were intended to restrict such behaviour by bringing it to the attention of my parents.
Little did my teachers know that my mother was delighted by such commentary as she so valued the use of imagination. Nevertheless, she was the exception, as the concept of daydreaming is essentially seen to be frivolous, unproductive and, in some circumstances, positively dangerous.
All this comes back to me some fifty years later as I work with senior leaders from across industry, public and charitable sectors. The unifying feature from all of these walks of life is the public notion that daydreaming has no part to play in their, busy, high-pressured and high-stakes world.
The idea that there could be space for ‘daydreaming’ is positively ridiculous, and so many leaders set out model behaviour that is the very antithesis of daydreaming –?and heaven help anyone who dares to manifest such irresponsible and off-task practice. So it is always with some trepidation that I introduce the topic of daydreaming to my conversation with senior leaders. Inevitably it provokes a uniform initial response – triggered by similar negative associations.
However, what is fascinating that more often than not these selfsame leaders will then go on to describe behaviour that conforms to the parameters of daydreaming albeit in a much more focused manner than simply ‘drifting off’ into flights of fancy whenever the mood takes them.
On further exploration it has become clear that they all employ a version of daydreaming to help them and their organisations achieve their goals – despite the fact that so few of them would even admit to themselves, never mind their colleagues, that daydreaming played a crucial role in their success.
And so it comes to pass that ‘daydreaming’ still carries with it all the negative associations for prospective leaders – despite it often being the singular differentiator between successful and unsuccessful leaders.
As ever an appreciation of the definition of the word and it’s application can help us to understand that the capacity for ‘daydreaming’ can be as important to leaders as the more explicit, and accepted, capacities such as technical knowledge, numeracy or literacy.
As one might expect the human behaviour of ‘daydreaming’ has been a topic of psychological study for many years, and has interested the minds of some of the most preeminent names in the field including?Freud, Maslow and Carl Rogers.
To grossly simplify the research, the psychologists have identified three distinct forms of daydreaming:
Of these we are interested in the former, for it is this very focused and forward looking daydreaming that captures the essence of the ‘secret’ behaviour of so many successful leaders.If this is the case then why is daydreaming behaviour rarely – if ever – mentioned (let alone taught) in the multiplicity of global MBAs to in-house leadership programmes?
So, with this in mind I share with you some of my ‘permission to daydream’ guidance that I use with those leaders who are still locked into the powerful orthodoxy that leadership and daydreaming are mutually exclusive behaviours.
1.???Select a challenge that requires an alternative solution to what has worked before.
2.???Identify a fixed time when you will let your mind drift to the future, e.g. a car journey, a walk, a private period of time in your office, etc.
3.???Don’t engage in internal editing – allow seemingly crazy ideas to emerge.
4.???Don’t force a solution and place the unformed ideas to the back of your mind don’t write it down.
5.???The next time you daydream draw the recalled ideato the front of your mind what you had been thinking and refine and develop the idea.
6.???Keep repeating stage 5 until the idea begins to take on a definitive shape.
7.???Commit the idea to paper and begin to consider how you might go about putting it into action.
8.???Use the implementation question to further inform your ‘daydreaming’ and think about how you will?‘reverse into the future’.
9.???Productive daydreaming take practice – especially if the facility has been squeezed out over time.
I first used the idea of a ‘permission to’ licence back in my days as a Director of Education, when I created a tongue-in-cheek “Permission to Innovate” permit of credit card size, signed by myself and stating five simple behaviours that teachers were ‘licences’ to exhibit. Such was the success of this ‘for fun’ scheme that I was overwhelmed by requests for a permit.
I offer the following Permit for anyone who needs something a bit more concrete to inform their ‘daydreaming behaviour.’
Have fun!