www.Corporate-Wisdom.com

Working with Your IntuitionAll Hands Meeting

Nov 12, 2010

Rossella DericksonRossella@Corporate-Wisdom.com

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Bio: Rossella Derickson, ICF Trained Coach

Rossella Derickson, a biochemist, has 22 years experience leading sales, marketing, and project management teams with P&L responsibility. She is a founder and a principal in

the company www.Corporate-Wisdom.com. Over the past 5 years, organizations with which she has worked include Cisco, Stanford University, Phoenix Technology, PARC, eGain,

Formfactor, Morrison and Foester, Santa Clara County Executive Office, Applied BioSystems, Amgen, Kodak, and Hitachi.

Rossella brings a centered style to help clients open up to deal with challenges. She brings clarity and problem solving approaches through tools learned through formal training and practical experience. Rossella has translated her experience into Wisdom in the Workplace training modules to support leadership and emotional intelligence development. She utilizes Kotter and Nadler change models, depending upon the organization’s need for vision or business alignment. She facilitates learning through webinar, video conferencing, telepresence and in person sessions. Rossella has launched customized off-sites and training for multinational companies in the U.S., Europe, and Asia.

Rossella holds a B.S. in Biochemistry from Rutgers University and is an ICF trained executive coach. The speaking topics most requested include Mastering a Positive Leadership Style, Tools for Emotional Competence and Improving Business Intuition. She is a gifted intuitive, having studied Aikido with Robert Nadeau, a student of Aikido founder Morihei Ueshiba.

Rossella is a Director of the South Bay Organizational Development Network - www.SBODN.com and a recent author of "Awakening Social Responsibility, A Call to Action." For more info: www.CSRAction.com.

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In d ivid u a l C o ac h ing

E x e cu tive T ea m C o ach ing

Senior Executive Program s

A c ce ss in g In tu it io n a nd C rea tiv ity

R u n n in g E ffe ctiv e M e e tin gs

C re a tin g Yo u r M a na g e m e n t S tyleO n P u rpo se

B u ild in g a C o he s ive T e am

D e v e lop in g D ire c t R e p o rts

Team M odules

C o a c h in g S k ills fo r M a na g e rs

M a n ag in g w ith W is d omL e a d in g w ith V is ion

B u ild ing W is e T e a m s

C o n flict R e so lu tionS k ills

C o re C o m m u n ic a tio n S k ills

W isdom Series

G re e n T e a m F a c ilita t ion

T e a m B u ild in g fo r G o od

M a n ag in g Yo u r C S R P ro g ram

A s se s s Yo u r C S R P ro g ram

D e v e lo p in g S u s ta in a b le S tra teg ies

Sustainable Program s

"R ig h t siz in g " F ac ilita t ion

P ro ce s s Im p ro v e m e nt

M e rge r In te g ra tion

E m bra cin g a ndS u sta in in g C h an ge

Assessm ent & O D W ork

W isdom in the WorkplaceC onsulting, Train ing, and C oaching

Working with Your Intuition - Agenda

• How Does Intuition Manifest?• When Do Leaders Need Intuition?• How Intuitive are You?• Engaging Your Intuition• Hijacking Thoughts• NeuroScience: Pre-Frontal Stress Vs. Milky Way Intuition• Labeling and Re-Appraisal• Intuitive Empathy• The Heart / Mind• Decision Making With Intuition• Circles of Change Using Intuition• Flow / Close

Intuition Defined

Comprehension without the use of reasoning.

Intuitive information is not received by your 5 senses.

It sometimes comes in the form of symbols.

Intuition is a “physical state.” Laura Day, author of Practical Intuition, states that the normal, waking cognitive “filters” are down. Then we use our rational mind to interpret the impression.

How Does Intuition Manifest? Gut feeling - feeling in the body

Mind perception - Ability to put all the information together without all the “facts,” quantum leap

Audio perception - Hearing the meta-messages when someone is speaking

Exercise:

Ancient Chinese divination tool: • Think of a dilemma. • Toss the coin. • What is your emotional response?

When Do Leaders Need Intuition?Ron Schultz, in Unconventional Wisdom, interviewed what he termed “twelve remarkable innovators.” In their own words, they explained how intuition can revolutionize decision-making.

When is intuition most helpful to leaders?

when there is insufficient data, or not enough time to gather the data

when there is too much information, or the data is conflicting

when data seems to support several options equally

How Intuitive Are You? Check-in

How intuitive are you (on a good day)?

How intuitive are you (under pressure)?

How do you use intuition at work?

Being Curious

Calm

Open

The Mind Setto Engage Intuition

Engaging Your IntuitionIntuition is goal directed. It’s activated by a question asked consciously or unconsciously.

Intuitive information sometimes comes in the form of symbols.

Exercise:

Your eye will be drawn to see what you need to see; to know what you need to know….

Am I on the right track with my career? My intuition guides me …

Developing Core Beliefs

Unstructured

Structured

How do we lose our natural open and intuitive state?

Hijacking ThoughtsHow many of your 168 hours were lost this week?

Hrs / week

Being better than _______

Being not as good as_______

Being pessimistic _______

Judging yourself _______

Pleasing friends _______

Pleasing people at work _______

Pleasing your family _______

Regretting old failures _______

Replaying old hurts _______

Replaying conversations _______

Hrs / week

Telling untruths ______

Thinking about revenge ______

Thinking of enemies ______

Thinking of lost opportunities ______

Thinking of resentments ______

Trying to control others ______

Thinking about how unfair

things are ______

Worrying about what

might happen ______

Exercise: What thoughts hijack you and your intuition?

Belief Systems & Blind Spots Positive Beliefs: You expect (and

believe) that you can achieve a certain outcome. That belief guides you to attain your goal.

Negative Belief Systems: Learned patterns of defensive reasoning whose purpose is to help us avoid the appearance of vulnerability and incompetence.

Blind spots represent the unconscious (and often obsolete and destructive) belief that is operating behind the scenes.

At our core, we have a very old story that we tell ourselves based on our experiences and perceptions. Repetitive patterns are clues.

Trigger ThoughtStress/Change

Limiting Belief

Coaching

Learned Defense Reaction

This is Your Brain

During hijacking thoughts.

Adrenaline cando that to you.

The Pre-Frontal Cortex & the Milky Way If the capacity of the prefrontal cortex is

equivalent to a single cubic foot, the rest of the brain's capacity would be the equivalent of the Milky Way galaxy.

Rock notes that complex problems are rarely solved via working memory in the prefrontal cortex. Here thoughts spin in repetitive patterns.

Using the "Milky Way" part of the brain, we can insert an idea and then walk away. Often this "big and intuitive part of the brain" will solve the problem for us while we do something else. Consider those insights you got at the gym, in the shower....

Neuroscience ResearchDavid Rock, www.neuroleadership.org

Release Emotion / Increase Intuition

Suppress

People feel your suppressed feeling even when you think they are hidden. Suppression reduces the ability of the pre-frontal cortex to processinformation.

Express

It’s an illusion that anger is cathartic- anger begets anger. Upset and anger set off biochemical stress responses (increase heart rate, etc)

Stop Pre-Frontal Cortex "Spin"Label and Re-Appraise

LabelingNaming the feelings that have occurred and looking at them from a distance often allows the brain to relax and to feel a sense of control and therefore calm.

Re-AppraisalLooking at a difficult or threatening situation and redefining it's meaning allows the threat to reduce and new neurotransmitters to connect to future states that are more positive.

Dyad Exercise

What thoughts "spin" in your mind and distract you?

Label the feeling associated with the thought disturbance of the conflict. See it from a distance.

Or - reappraise and find a new interpretation of the high level disturbance of the conflict.

Mastering Your MindNeuroplasticity

Dogma for decades that the brain did not develop new circuits…fixed wiring

Over last few decades proved untrueBrain reorganizes itself

throughout lifeStimulation changes brain

structure

Intuitive Empathy We can’t really know what’s going on until we stop

running and connect first with ourselves and then with others.

Ordinary empathy is sympathizing with a friend.

Intuitive empathy is the capacity to energetically merge with others and see life (positively and negatively) through their eyes, and sense the world through their feelings.

It becomes difficult to distinguish these sensations from your own, sometimes throwing you off center.

Dr. J.Orloff, M.D. Second Sight

Heart and MindCalming Both "Brains" The mind “seems to be a non-stop

talking machine with a constant barrage of endless thoughts, ideas, concepts, meanings, memories, plans, apprehensions, doubts, and repetitions. David Hawkins, author of Power vs. Force, states most of us want anything rather than silence.

“One thing is obvious – the mind is totally unreliable…

Heart generates electric field 40-60X stronger than brain. And can be measured 8 feet away from body.

Reflective Practice: Breathe deeply in a rhythmic fashion. Imagine you can breathe into your heart. Recall a positive experience that brings forth a positive emotion.

Decision-Making With IntuitionUsing Intuition to Decide on a Course of Action

Exercise:

Think of a situation you are grappling with.

Define the situation clearly.

Think of 2 possible solutions.

Take a deep breath. Close your eyes. RELAX.

Imagine a jacket, and associate the jacket with one of the possible solutions to the situation you are grappling with.

How does the jacket fit? How does it feel?

Put on the second jacket. How does this one fit? Feel?

What is your intuition telling you?

Using Your Intuition – Circles of Change

This is an opportunity to work with writing and symbols – using your intuition.

Intuition at Work:

Using your intuition, what changes do you forecast at work for the coming year? Write down ideas on the handout that represent future organizational change.

Personal Intuition:

Using your intuition, what do you forecast for yourself in the coming year? On the handout, intuitively draw a symbol that represents your personal journey or describe (writing) your thoughts about your personal journey.

Share in Groups:

- Discuss the changes you predict with the people near you.

Connecting Intuition

PersonalIntuition

Intuition at Work

Are You and Your Team in the Flow?

Adapted from Finding Flow - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Boredom

Flow

Anxiety

Ch

alle

ng

es

SkillsLow

High

High

Low challenge, high skills = bored

High challenge, low skills = anxiety

Appropriate challenge, strong skills = optimal state of flow

Flow – Set the Intention

Quote by Oprah Winfrey: Find the flow and follow it. You can’t go

wrong. Even if you’re in a situation where you are uncomfortable or

out of place, don’t try to swim against the current. Change direction.

Find the flow and follow it.

Being at the right place at the right time. Knowing what is next.

Being awake to possibilities without distraction.

Having a clear question and trusting the “effortless flow.”

Intention: If I followed my deepest intuition I would…