Power of Paradox - Instinctive Logic
“When we talk about analytic versus intuitive decision making, neither is good or bad. What is bad is if you use either of them in an inappropriate circumstance.”
“There are, I think, two important lessons here. The first is that truly successful decision making relies on a balance between deliberate and instinctive thinking.”
― Malcolm Gladwell, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
When is the last time you made a bad decision? Was it because you didn’t trust your gut or was it because you didn’t gather enough evidence before making the decision?
I recently didn’t follow my gut instincts on a decision and as a result, I now have tendonitis!! My body was telling me I needed a break, and my physical therapist was telling me to keep doing the exercises he assigned. I made the mistake of continuing the PT instead of letting my body recover.
When should we follow our gut instincts and when should we rely on logic to make decisions? Often the best decisions are a combination of both. Harrison Assessment calls this Instinctive Logic. It is one of twelve paradoxical skills and important not only for decision making but also for innovation.
What is Instinctive Logic?
Instinctive logic consists of two behavioral traits:
- Analytical: the tendency to logically examine facts and situations
- Intuitive: the tendency to use hunches to make decisions
Dr. Harrison defines instinctive logic as the tendency to use both logic and intuition when making decisions and creating strategies.
When we lean into logic for decision making, we are using our right brain.
When we lean into intuition for decision making, we are leveraging our left brain.
When we use both left and right brain in our decision making, we are now making decisions with our whole brain!
What can help us with Instinctive Logic?
Here are a few ways to build up logical intuition and improve decision making:
1. Recognize whether you have a natural tendency to rely more on logic or intuition when you make decisions.
For those that are highly logical, accept that it is often impossible to have all the information you would like before making a decision. Instead of simply gathering more information yourself, consider bringing other people into your decision-making process, especially those that have more experience than yourself. Their experience gives them better intuition, a.k.a. pattern recognition abilities.
For those that rely on their intuition, look to gather more data, and take a similar action. Bring other people into your decision-making process that can provide you with more information before you move forward.
2. Recognize when you need to slow down on making a decision. Identify what type of decision you are dealing with - is it a reversible or irreversible decision and how significant the consequences will be. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, makes reversible decisions quickly but takes his time when making irreversible decisions.
We make so many decisions throughout the day, most of them we need to make quickly and often instinctively.
When we are dealing with more important decisions that have significant consequences, those situations are the ones that will benefit the most from leveraging both logic and intuition.
3. Recognize when to trust your instinct!
In areas where we have a lot of experience, our instinct is often a form of pattern recognition. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, says that “being able to act intelligently and instinctively in the moment is possible only after a long and rigorous of education and experience.” He also argues that “The first task of Blink is to convince you of a simple fact: decisions made very quickly can be every bit as good as decisions made cautiously and deliberately.”
A good way to confirm whether you are making the right decision is when there is an alignment between your instinct and the data. When there is a mismatch, this should serve as a warning sign.
What could I have done to avoid tendonitis? I had “data” or information about my ankle and had shared this with my therapist. There was obviously a difference in our interpretation of the data because we came to different conclusions about next steps. My intuition was not simply a gut instinct; it came as a result of a series of events. In this situation, the lesson I learned was that pausing to get a third opinion, that of my doctor, would have probably saved me from a lot of pain (literally!).
How does Instinctive Logic Improve Innovation?
When we are able to leverage the whole brain of our entire teams, we can come to better decisions and speed up innovation instead of causing conflict.
Let’s look at this team that has a manager (“A” – let’s call him Adam) who tends to make decisions based on logic. The individuals in this team make decisions using very different styles. If Adam is not aware of the value of intuition in decision making, he may discount or downweigh the opinions of C and H. This could cause them to not speak up or voice their opinions as much, leading to less engagement and input. If Adam can appreciate both paradoxical traits, then he would be more open to the opinions and “hunches” from B, F, C, and H which can help the team make better decisions faster.
Instinctive logic is especially important in the early stages of innovation. Often what happens is that a hypothesis is made based on a “gut” feeling and then data is collected to either confirm or dispute that hypothesis. If we discard too many ideas or hypotheses prematurely in this early stage of innovation because they do not have enough logical “proof” behind them, good ideas are lost. The innovation process is like a funnel. You don’t want the funnel to be too narrow at the beginning.
If you would like to discuss how to improve innovation or collaboration on your team, book a complimentary discovery call with Claritas.
You can also check out the blog for past articles on Focused Innovation or Insightful Curiosity.
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