We love the idea of the rational brain

And it does not exist. It is instinctive and reactionary and thus biased.?As renowned?neuroscientist,?Lisa Feldman Barrett, states: Our brains are not designed to think. They are designed to keep our bodies alive. And in order to do that, it has developed a super quick and efficient way to assess a situation: predictions, or as they are often (somewhat?laden with value judgment) called:?bias.

So this month's BIASED BRAIN is going to look at the positve aspects of bias and?ask: How can you use bias to your advantage in our ever-changing and competitive?world?

1. Bias is the enemy of innovation, curiosity is the enemy of bias.

In an ever-changing, competitive world?bias is your friend – but also your worst enemy. But you can?learn how to use bias to your advantage so it doesn't stifle innovation and development.

Bias is a term that has crept into everyday language in recent years, also in leadership lingo. However, the phenomenon of bias is by no means new, it is an ancient and completely natural and essential part of being human. Biologically speaking, bias covers the function in our brains where we make assessments and assumptions based on previous experiences and information. This helps us navigate the world and make decisions quickly.

Our brains are designed to associate. Finding patterns, connections and coincidences is what we do best, and that ability is the very foundation of our neural function. We have a strong urge to classify people, experiences, objects and so on into our little mental boxes; boxes that are made up of stereotypical combinations of notions from our biased brain.

Broadly speaking, this means that bias affects organisations' relationships, worldviews, strategies and systems and entails an attempt to make everything fit into the 'boxes'.

In other words, our bias gives us a wildly skewed view of the world, and therefore our strategies will be too if we don't make an effort to avoid it. We also tend to gravitate towards someone who looks like us and thinks like us, and devise solutions that immediately make the most sense. But when we do that, "we usually do" too often wins, and we cut ourselves off from being innovative as an organisation.

The risk of that is that we become irrelevant in a world that looks very different from what our bias tells us. All in all, unmanaged bias is of very little use in an environment where we need to be able to do and think something new.

3 ways to intercept bias and use it constructively:

1. Slow down to reveal bias - We have said it before: You need to force your brain to slow down in order for you to stop jumping to conclusions and thereby missing out on opportunities for innovation.
2. Force new processes - If we don't have a systematic approach to inspire and challenge beliefs throughout the organisation, then we are missing out. So use different problem-solving models (and change them often) to simply force the organisation to slow down and question what it is doing.
3. Be more curious - A really excellent question to ask when you want to train your curiosity is: "What good intention could the person behind this statement/product/etc. have had?" That question will automatically challenge our bias, as even the most alien attitudes or actions are illuminated from a completely different angle when we ask like this.

So where bias is the enemy of innovation, curiosity is the enemy of bias.

“An emotion is your brain’s creation of what your bodily sensations mean, in relation to what is going on around you in the world.”

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ??Lisa Feldman Barrett

2. Emotional intelligence in action (see video below)

Bias is just predictions. Predictions that your brain makes by sifting through your past experience in order for you to spend as little energy as possible to assess the situation. They are super quick and efficient - just what the body battery is all about: preserve as much energy as possible.

And they are possible to detect and steer in a? different direction. And just like that, bias becomes somthing you can work with. Not something you can eradicate, but something you can detect and be aware of and through that awareness, work with to your advantage.

Bias is emotion, and?emotions are guesses

In this video, neuroscientist?Lisa Feldman Barrett,?talks about bias, and although she uses the term 'predictions' it is the same. Our brains are guessing from within a black box, so it is no wonder that we have biases. But it is from within that same black box that our powers of imagination origin, and in so, our ability to innovate.

Watch video here:

Your brain doesn’t detect reality. It creates it. | Lisa Feldman Barrett

3. This month's article

From our own biased brains... HEXES' ebook on bias

"Imagine an organisation that is?completely without bias. What?would it look like? We can tell you?what it would look like: it would be?a complete and utter disaster, a?total train wreck. No alarm systems?would be in place, none of our?survival mechanisms would work?and the decision process would?move with the speed of a glacier.

We are dependant on bias for our?survival and our ability to make?decisions and function, so bias?should not be eradicated, bias is not?evil, and bias is here to stay. What?bias should be is be dragged out?into the light."

Growth through bias awareness and the ability to respond, not react.

GET EBOOK HERE

“You are continually cultivating your past as a means of controlling your future”

Lisa Feldman Barrett

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