This article originally appeared on SMPS Boston’s website.
Going Full Frontal – Leveraging Your Brain for Business Success with Emotional Intelligence
by Kelly Auld
As if managing a team isn’t enough of a challenge, add in a global pandemic, lockdown, working from home, and a team scattered in different locations and you have a recipe for burnout that could shake even the most experienced of managers.
The Rise and Lead series was developed to support senior leadership during this unprecedented time. Suddenly regardless of experience, we are all discovering that in order to manage effectively and compete in this brand-new world, we have to relearn skills that were once taken for granted. The Rise and Lead series offers inspiration and guidance on how best to navigate these new challenges all before your second cup of coffee.
In his recent presentation, Going Full Frontal – Leveraging Your Brain for Business Success with Emotional Intelligence, Jeff Hurt, a neuroscience expert, shared an insider’s (inside the brain, that is) perspective on how to be an effective leader during a time of chaos. He offered science-backed suggestions on how best to ensure that you are being productive and an effective leader, even while sitting in your living room in your PJs.
One of my favorite tips Jeff gave was to wait 40 minutes before responding to an annoyance, whether it be an email, a comment, or you are in a meeting during which something upsetting occurred. We feel before we think. Within the first 40 minutes of reacting to an annoyance, we are operating on emotion and are unable to engage in logical decision making. Jeff’s advice is to step away, move on to a different task, or reconvene a meeting in 40 minutes so that your brain has time to process the emotional response and your decision making will not be affected.
During his presentation Jeff also discussed:
- Why you need to schedule time to think
- How to focus on the elephants rather than the rabbits
- What the amygdala is and how to control it
- What to do for the first hour after you wake up to make sure your day is productive
- How to turn off your brain and go to sleep
If you missed this event and are wondering the answers to the discussion points listed above, you are in luck, the recording of Jeff’s presentation will be available within the Rise and Lead recording bundle which will be on sale at the end of the 2020-2021 programming year.
Kelly Auld is the Marketing & Communications Manager at DBVW Architects in Providence, Mass.
