The Magic Bullet of Belief– Part Three

A collision of beliefs in an organization plays out every day with leaders, managers and team members whose business-life experience has straddled the 2008 global financial meltdown. And just to be clear, it has been less than 10 years since we experienced the 2008 melt-down. Unless you are 10 years old and running your own business, you yourself have straddled the 2008 global financial infrastructure break, and the resulting disruption to your industry and business infrastructure.

Pre-2008 Global Financial Meltdown

Pre- meltdown, the use of force, control, rational logic, and power-over tactics aligned perfectly with the legacy approach to the strategy>structure>process>rewards infrastructure that contained the human element and spit out predictable results year over year. Pre-2008, the economy was not broken, it behaved in ways that were relatively stable, predictable and calm. To ensure efficiency and effectiveness, the mechanics of business were perfectly matched with the mechanics of the behaviour of the economy, and the behaviour of the people within that business. There was absolutely no reason to delve into the working of the brain, how memory is created, stored, or altered or the impact that this has on performance.

Post-2008 Global Financial Meltdown

Post-meltdown, the use of force and control destroys infrastructure. In VUCA, this is now self-evident. Rational logic needs to be balanced with an understanding of the irrational emotional/complex logic of both the environment (the economy, business-to-business interaction and business-to-consumer interaction) and people. The infrastructure needs to accommodate the reality of VUCA. The business mechanics need to be agile. The behavioural mechanics need to be adaptive. Leadership, as a discipline, is transforming. There now is every reason in the world to delve into the working of the brain, how your memory is created, and how other people’s memories are created. How beliefs are formed and how beliefs are altered—and even neutralized. In fact, it is now mission critical that you understand how this works.

Whether you believe you can or can’t, you’re right. The power of our unconscious beliefs will override our conscious effort every single time.

Unconscious Belief

Behavioural experts estimate that about 95% of our activity occurs below our own radar. Our heart pulses blood throughout our bodies, our digestive system extracts nutrients from the food we eat, our lungs ensure that oxygen is carried to the far reaches of the landscape of us…and we respond, often unthinkingly, to triggers in our environment. How we were treated—or how we interpreted the way influential people in our world treat others—has a powerful influence on how we react to the people and conditions that surround us.

Much like the programming of a computer, our brains are wired to pick up on the beliefs that permeate our environment, and they help determine the conclusions we come to about the world and our place in it. Much of what we subconsciously “decide” to believe about ourselves and others is protective in nature and it stems from our experiences as children. But what a six-year-old needs to believe in order to feel protected is very different from what a 40-year-old needs to believe in order to drive the company forward. There comes a time when it’s OK to let those things go, isn’t there?

At Light-Core we help our clients take a look at the beliefs that are informing the behaviour of their leadership team. Some of those beliefs are supportive and powerful. Some of them are just getting in the way of a productive, stress-free life. Shining a light on those beliefs is often enough to put people in a position of choice: do they want to keep this one or is it OK to let it go now? They get to design their belief system afresh from the perspective of a mature adult and in that incredibly creative process comes a powerful paradigm shift: they are neither victims nor are they deprived in any way. They have the complete potential of the universe available to them. Everything happens for them, not to them.

What happens next is often astounding: Productivity increases, the spirit of team strengthens and creativity abounds. The limits come off in all vectors and our clients become magnetic to the best that is out there for them and their enterprise.

Again, we are dancing in the realm of transformation. Our work on the level of beliefs is a delightful cocktail of brain science, academic research and business smarts. Sometimes our clients know what beliefs are holding them back – a fear of public speaking, for example, or undertaking difficult conversations. Other times they identify their problematic beliefs as we problem solve around the results they’re getting in completely unrelated areas. It’s exciting work with an incredible return on investment.

Best of all, it allows our clients’ leadership teams to see themselves and their world in a new light. It gives them new choices and expands the range of opportunity available to them and their businesses.

Would that be helpful for your organization?

If you’d like to find out how Light-Core can support your organization to unprecedented returns in the months and years ahead, we invite you to get in touch. We excel at helping businesses navigate change.