I Think, therefore….
A lot can be inferred from a name and we think ours is spot on. You see, we believe that if organizations think smarter, differently, better, faster, in essence, more Wisely, that they can have a better organization. In my doctoral training, I was brought up under what is called the Cognitive Behavior orientation. This sounds like a fancy phrase, but it is pretty straightforward and simple. And truth be told, its power is in its simplicity and ease of understanding. It essentially means that how we Think drives how we Feel and Behave. That is it. But think about that for a minute. There is something very powerful here. How we think, in large part, determines how we feel and behave.
I want you to see the power of this for yourself. Try doing something without thinking about it (no, reflexes don’t count). Go ahead. See, you cannot do it. From the simplest of activities (e.g., brushing your teeth) to the most complex (e.g., selecting a strategy) our actions or behaviors are simply the result of some thinking process. That is very, very important for organizations and individuals to understand. You see, I have found that what people want is behavioral change. They want people to be more flexible, take more risks, increase speed, be more innovative, etc. And, on the surface, it truly does seem like some form of behavioral intervention makes sense. Thus, we often send people to training, try to tell them what to do differently and incentivize them to change. Yet, for all of the efforts to get people to change, very little change is sustainable and most of the change is modest at best. In fact, I often tell my clients that getting people to change is easy, but sustaining that change is nearly impossible. We see this all of the time with “New Year” resolutions, exercise programs, company initiatives, etc.
The reality is that unless we get people to change how they think, they are never, ever going to truly be able to sustain change in how they behave. How they think and what they believe is in large part who they are. In fact, when you get right down to it, belief systems or mental models of the world tell us how things are suppose to be. It is our thinking and belief systems that act as a map on how we are suppose to behave. These thoughts often are so intrinsic that we take them for granted and they begin to direct our behavior without us even realizing it. In fact, we take these models for granted, yet they show up when we interact with our boss, visit the doctor, attend a meeting, etc. We are often “locked” in to these models for better or for worse. Most of the time, these models and belief systems are very helpful. However, when they don’t allow us to see how things could be better, how our current ways of thinking are no longer creating effective behavior or completely blind us to other possibilities, they can be very limiting.
Understanding the power of our thinking allows us to see that behavior is really just the output of our thinking processes. In other words, our behavior is secondary and thinking is primary. Thus, when people try to get other people to change their behavior, they often forget that unless they change their thinking, there is little chance the behavioral change will stick. So in a nutshell, while we can spend countless hours and resources on trying to get people to behave differently, we recommend you begin by getting them to think differently. If you do this, you will find that your organization is better prepared to go ahead and ThinkWise.
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