Memorandum from the Prefrontal Cortex

To: All staff
From: Your Prefrontal Cortex
Date: 21 June 2011 : 8:41 AM
Subject: Management training and organizational direction.

This morning, prompted by David Eagleman’s book "Incognito” (which some of my staff and I read this weekend) and using some other ideas we have acquired about neurological function, my executive staff presented me with a very exciting idea. I think it’s a Big Idea. I’d like to share with you now, and I will provide you with more information as we develop the idea.

Now to explain the Big Idea.

As some of you know I and the Prefrontal Cortexes (PFCs) of other humans are widely considered to carry the out the executive functions of the brain. We PFCs make high level decisions, meddle occasionally, and don’t fiddle with the details. This is often due to incompetence rather than disinterest. Consider visual perception. PFCs can decide (as can a few others parts of the human brain) what the eyes are to look at. In some cases we are asked to help resolve ambiguous visual data. But when it comes to image processing--to taking the raw data, as it arrives from our retinas and other sense organs, and turning it into information that is useful to us and to the rest of the organism--well, there we are completely out of our depth. For that work we depend on teams of specialists in the primary and secondary visual cortex, in the superior colliculus, and in many other units of the brain. They, in turn depend on support staff, including millions upon millions of unheralded glial cells who do such a great job of keeping things together and running smoothly. (My thanks to all of you in my brain!)

Responsibly for executive function makes me metaphorically speaking, the CEO of this organization. This is one of several useful metaphors the Eagleman uses, and I will be writing about later. Following this metaphor, I have certain responsibilities. One of them is continuous learning and finding ways to improve organizational performance. Carrying out this responsibility led to the Eagleman book and this Big Idea.

Another of my duties as CEO is assessing organizational performance. Of course, we know that our performance is excellent relative to most human beings, but I now realize that we do that in spite of our management techniques, my own included. Most of them date from well before the stone age! Modern civilization and continuing education have given us better management techniques than the ones that we inherited form our hominid ancestors. But the fact is most of what I, and others in management have learned—beyond our caveman tricks—has been learned in a haphazard and accidental way rather than an organized and intentional way. Following this management metaphor: none of has an MBA; we’ve gotten where we’ve gotten through on-the-job training. Indeed often it’s just been on-the-job experience, and not even training. Effective yes, but not effective as I believe a more structured approach would be.

So I'd like to start by focusing attention on my management skills and those of our executive management team. I’d like to consider, and have us all think about how we might improve those skills. Here are some of my initial thoughts. These will be developed further as we develop and roll out this plan.

We can start by simply adopting this management metaphor more widely and more consistently. Metaphors are powerful tools for human brains. They can help us acquire new ways of thinking far faster than "classroom learning” can. This one has certainly helped me.

Another way we can improve is by introspection, using this metaphor as a guide. We can find places where there are "low hanging fruit” for management improvement. I believe there’s a lot of low hanging fruit around, and I intend to have us pick it.

Another is by explicit

Technorati Tags: Prefrontal Cortex,Neurobiology,Productivity,Management

management training. There are several parts to the management training syllabus that I'm beginning to have in mind, and which I will address in later memoranda.

Another approach, which I particularly want to note for future consideration, is to find ways to get fast feedback through outside coaching, either from others, or in some mechanical way. Eagleman has a section in his book that describes how airplane spotters and chicken sexers are trained. (Yes, chicken sexers!) They are not and cannot be trained by teaching them a set of steps to follow because those who have demonstrably acquired these skills can’t explain how they do it. They just do it. Airplane spotters and chicken sexers, among others, are trained through fast feedback from experts. I think this is applicable my own training—and training for many others of us.

I am asking the executive team, and indeed any of you with management responsibilities, to start looking for opportunities to improve your management skills. You might think that there are limits that derive from our organizational structure, which dates from even earlier than our pre-stone-age management techniques. Indeed our organizational structure makes “stone age” look positively modern! But recent research indicates we can do quite a bit within the existing framework—if we work at it. Particularly we may be able to open new communication pathways between related functions and change some of the ways in which we delegate decision-making and other responsibilities, to mention just two.

So, I'd like each of you individually, and in your workgroups, to consider what this new direction might mean to you. I know it means change. And I know many of you (thankfully) are responsible for our organization’s homeostatic self-regulation. Operationally this means that your job function is to resist change. I thank you for your excellent service in the past, but ask you to reconsider your role with respect to these changes, and think how you might retain homeostatic control but not block progress.

I believe that a well thought out, well planned, widely understood, widely agreed on, and well executed change effort can take what is already a highly successful organization, and move us fairly quickly to levels of performance (and satisfaction) that I, and some others of us have only dreamed of. That’s what I am hoping to develop, deliver, and ultimately help manage.

This is not (and given the way we are organized it cannot be) a unilateral decision. I expect discussion and I hope that this memorandum will generate a lot of new, good ideas. We are an excellent team and I see potential for us to do a lot better--individually, as teams, and as an entire organization.

Let me close by reminding you of what (I hope) is well known to senior staff, but which I may have not made explicit in the past. We have an open door policy here. We are looking for new ideas. We are also very interested in exploring, not suppressing, dissent. If this plan heads in a direction that you don't like, or are concerned about, then metaphorically speaking, speak up. We’d like to hear about these opinions sooner rather than later. We may adjust plans based on your input. Or we may need to communicate more clearly so that those of you who don't see value in our changes can support them—or at least not oppose them. I can't promise that we will please everyone (indeed, given the diversity of our group, I can pretty much guarantee that some will be dissatisfied) but I can tell you that as much as neurally possible that I and executive staff will listen, will do our best to understand, and will attempt respond to every one of you intelligently and respectfully .

Because of the time I've spent writing this memo, I believed that I had cancelled this morning's executive staff meeting—until one of my staff reminded me that this memo has actually required considerable staff input. I agree, and thank all of you for your help. This is a much better document than I could have produced by myself. We’ll meet, as usual, tomorrow morning, to discuss these ideas, and others.

As you can tell, I'm very excited by this idea. The cynics among you will point out that I am very excited by almost any new idea. And I admit that this is true. But I believe that this idea is one that, like daily pages which I have sustained for more than three years, I will be able to sustain. Indeed my plan is to use daily pages, which has served the occasional function of my executive staff meeting, to help ensure that this process continues.

These proposed changes will be new for all of us, and I'd like continuous monitoring and feedback as we proceed. I know that all of you are busy with other responsibilities, but my staff and I consider this very important. Please do your best to prioritize accordingly and please pass the word to any who do not receive this memo directly.

I'd like to get feedback quickly and directly from those who are in feedback loops directly connected to the Prefrontal Cortex, and indirectly from those who are not. And unless there are extremely strong objections we will proceed immediately to implementation

I'm looking forward, as always, to working with you.

Regards,
“Mike”
Prefrontal Cortex

12 Irrational Beliefs

From Albert Ellis, a definition of irrationality, and the most common irrational beliefs, with arguments (D) against them.

According to Dr. Albert Ellis and REBT, an idea is irrational if:

1. It distorts reality.
2. It is illogical.
3. It prevents you from reaching your goals.
4. It leads to unhealthy emotions.
5. It leads to self-defeating behavior.

The list of twelve irrational ideas is worth reading, here.

Technorati Tags: ABCD,REBT,Albert Ellis,Irrationality,Rationality

Rational ideas

I found the following definition of rational thought useful (from a site on stress management)

Stress Reduction Techniques
Rational or Irrational?

Whenever you experience stress, it would help a great deal to check in with your perception of the situation before allowing your stress level to build too greatly.

Ask yourself five questions to determine if your thoughts are rational or irrational.

1) If I believe this thought to be true, will it help me remain safe and alive?

2) Is this thought objectively true, and upon what evidence can I form this opinion?

3) Is this thought producing feelings I want to have?

4) Is this thought helping me reach a chosen goal?

5) Is this thought likely to minimize conflict with others?

In the place where I originally came on this idea, “The Small Book” by Jack Trimpey, he adds: “An idea can fail on one or two criteria and still be fairly rational, because rational thought is..nonperfectionistic.”

So an idea that: helps you remain safe and alive, produces feelings you want to have, helps you toward your chosen goal and minimizes conflict with others can be viewed as rational, even if not objectively true.

Technorati Tags: rationality,abcd

 

 

Related articles

• Myths about Rationality (psychcentral.com)

ABC+D: an Example

This morning, writing my pages, I felt tired. I didn’t want to continue. This happens frequently, and when it does, I almost always stop writing and do something else. Instead I decided to Do the Metawork and analyze what I did.

Goal: easy. My goal is to write.

Activating event: I’m tired.

Consequence: I don’t write.

Conclusion: I have counterproductive beliefs. They need to found, and disputed. What are my beliefs?

“I’m just too tired to write.” Dispute: “Can you sit in a chair? Can you move your fingers? Then you’re not too tired to write.” “OK, I can write. But….”

“If I write something when I am tired, it won’t be good.” Dispute: “If you don’t write it, you’ll definitely not produce anything good. If you write, you won’t know if it’s good or not until you write it. There’s a good chance that some part of what you write will be good.” “OK, it might be good. And it’s true, I won’t know until I do it. But…”

“If I write now, I won’t enjoy it.” Dispute: “You might not enjoy it. But what would make you feel better: writing something even when you are tired, or giving up and not writing at all.” “OK, OK, I’d rather face up to my tiredness, and write.”

So I wrote. A lot.

Do the Meta{,meta} Work

Following Albert Ellis’s ABCD model, Beliefs control Consequences—or at least strongly influence them, so it’s important to to understand what we believe and to Dispute failure-promoting Beliefs and replace them with success-promoting Beliefs.

People usually categorize beliefs this way: a belief is true (consistent with known facts and perceptions), false (contrary to facts and perceptions), indeterminate (the facts are not yet known), or undecidable (no facts can be found to confirm or disconfirm the belief).

Another, and better way to categorize beliefs is this: a Belief is productive if it leads to Consequences that get one closer to the Goal; counterproductive if it leads to Consequences that get one further away; ineffective if it leads to Consequences that don’t affect achieving the goal.

This true/false/indeterminate/undecideable categorization is based on “facts” which are also beliefs. And the productive/counter-productive/ineffective categorization means that a Belief could be Productive, yet false.

The relationship among these elements might look something like this:

          

Metabeliefs control Beliefs and can themselves be Productive if they permit Productive beliefs and Unproductive is they prohibit beliefs that can be productive.

Examples:

• I can only believe something if there is enough evidence.
• I can’t control what I believe.
• I can’t believe something that I don’t believe is true.
• I can’t easily change my beliefs.
• I can’t believe something that goes against my intuition.

Each of these metaBeliefs can be Disputed.

ABC+D=?

My continued investigation into addiction has led me to Albert Ellis, one of the originators of cognitive/behavioral therapy. His particular therapy brand is called REBT, for Rational Emotional Behavioral Therapy.

Like most cognitive approaches, Ellis’s focuses on the links between perception, belief and behavior, and works to change the behavior by changing belief. ABC+D is an acronym describing his method.

The goal of REBT is helping people reach their goals more effectively—or at all. So REBT starts with defining goals. Then judge your actions this way: “Did that get me closer to my goal?” If so, then that action is good. If not, then bad. Regardless of the Consequence, you can use the ABC+D model to analyze what happened, and find better ways to reach the goal.

So let’s define terms.

A = Activating Event. An Activating Event is something noteworthy in pursuit of a goal. The event might block or delay reaching the goal. It might be a distraction. It might be a success.

B = Belief. A belief is something that you hold to be true. Activating Events do not result in behavior; according to Ellis’ model the event is interpreted, and action is prescribed according to beliefs. Change the belief, you change behavior.

C = Consequences. These are the results of some Activating Event. I might be a change in what you have been doing—or it might be no change.

All, right, this is nice and theoretical. Let’s take an example to see how it’s applied. Since I’m writing this post, and since I often have trouble finishing what I write (or do), I’ll use this as an example. My goal is to finish this blog post. Along the way there might be Activating Events that result in negative Consequence (I give up).

Of course sometimes the Consequence is that I succeed. We’ll look at that another time. It’s more useful (right now) to consider failure modes.

How do I fail? Often I I sit down to write then I find myself searching for something on the Web. Or I might find myself down in the kitchen looking in the refrigerator for something to eat. Whatever the case, I am not writing, so I am not reaching my goal. Something is getting in the way.

In this analysis we have one part of ABC—the Consequence. We have C, but we don’t have A and B. Now it’s time for detective some detective work. What’s the Activating Event? And what’s the Belief?

For me, a common Activating Event is this: I stop writing for a moment. Perhaps I review what I’ve read, and I decide I don’t like it. It might be missing something. It might be not well thought out. I might think that the argument is weak and has to be presented differently. Perhaps I don’t know what I might do next. The Activating Event is some disruption in my writing flow.

Fine. We have some examples of Activating Events. What Beliefs do I have that lead me to the undesirable Consequences? Doing a bit of introspection about writing failures, I dredge up these beliefs:

• I don’t know what to do next. This is a handy all-purpose Belief that leads me to “step back and think about things” or “take a break and see what comes to me.” These require some subordinate Beliefs:
  • I have no way to figure out what to do next. If I did, then I’d be doing it.
  • If I take a break, what to do next might come to me.
  • I need to do some more research. Then I’ll know.
• This post isn’t going to be good—or good enough, so it’s a waste of time to work on it. I should work on something else.
• I really should be working on something that’s more important.
• I should be enjoying this—and I’m not.

Most of these beliefs lead to my undesired Consequence. One belief leads to a good Consequence. “I should be working on something more important” could lead me to work the more important project. It’s the others that are problems.

So now I’ve got a bad Consequence, an Activating Event, and a few representative Beliefs. That leads us to Ellis’s D step: Disputing.

Disputing is central to most forms of cognitive therapy. Activating events will happen—although sometimes we can do things to prevent them. For example if a person has a problem overeating and seeing a refrigerator full of favorite foods is a common Activating Event that leads to a binge—the probability of that Consequence can be lowered by leaving the refrigerator empty or filling it with foods that don’t lead to temptation. No Activating Event, no Consequence.

But most Activating Events can’t be prevented. Sometimes my writing flows and it’s all I can do to type as fast as I think. But sometimes I stop I might step back and wonder “How is this going?” That event might not be preventable. Or I just stop. There are no words coming to me. Here the leverage point is Belief. So let’s look at these Beliefs. But before we do this, let’s clarify my goal.

When I’m writing my goal is not to write something great, or necessarily even good. It’s just to write. My fundamental Belief is that if I practice enough, study my practice, and make adjustments, eventually I’ll get good.

With that in mind I can Dispute the Belief “I have no way to figure out what to do next,” by saying: “Yes, you do. You can just write whatever comes to mind. Eventually you’ll find something that makes sense. Or not. But at least you’ll be writing, which is the goal.”

Or I can Dispute “I’ll take a break and see what comes to mind,” by reminding myself: “If you take a break you’re likely to quit. Better to stay in your chair and keep going.”

Or I can Dispute “I really should be enjoying this, but I’m not,” with “It would be nice if you were enjoying this, but the writing process is not always enjoyable. What is enjoyable is finishing what you’ve started. So even though you are not enjoying this, keep going,”

Or I can Dispute “This post isn’t going to be good, or good enough,” with: your goal is to get a first draft done. Once you finish the draft you can criticize it and make it better.”

Or after enough frustration I get the belief Belief: “This is getting nowhere. I’m never going to be good writer.”

I can also Dispute it. “You may not ever be a good writer, but that’s not the goal. It’s to write at whatever level of quality you can achieve, and by practice get better. “

Examining, Disputing and changing these Beliefs might lead to a different Consequence: finishing the goddamn post. And if you are reading it, then indeed it has. As I’ve been writing this post, I’ve stopped from time to time and briefly reflected on what I’m doing. Some, but not all, of these troubling Beliefs have arisen. And I’ve Disputed them.

The result: as of this draft I’ve more than 1,260 words written. I haven’t gone off chasing the new. I’m pretty pleased with what I’ve written—and even more pleased that I’ve written.

Now I’ll answer the question that titled the article:

ABC+D = this post.

And more generally:

ABC+D = goals reached more often.

Related articles

• Rational Emotive Therapy Approach to Counseling (rumorsofglory.net): In this post, the author extends the ABCD acronym all the way to F.
• One Strong Belief: A Blog Post (sanjaysabarwal.com)

Technorati Tags: Ellis,Cognitive Therapy,CBT,REBT,Writing