ENGAGING AND MOTIVATING OTHERS Another study, of two different approaches to executive coaching, yields more insight into how leaders might affect others. A group of researchers at Case Western Reserve University sought to examine the effects of, a) a thirty-minute coaching session focusing on what is called the Positive Emotional Attractor (PEA), and b) a thirty-minute session focusing on the Negative Emotional Attractor (NEA) (Boyatzis, Jack, Cesaro, Passarelli & Khawaja, 2010). We were able to show that asking sophomores to talk about their dreamed-about future ten years hence (i.e., the PEA coaching) activated parts of the visual cortex that is involved in imagining things, and components of the DMN and social networks mentioned earlier. Meanwhile, the NEA session, which asked students about how they were doing on their homework, readings and assignments, revealed little that was noteworthy, except that such a line of questioning activated areas known to indicate self-consciousness and guilt. Again, the more positive approach to coaching stimulated those parts of the brain involved in being open to new ideas and other people. This raises serious questions about whether many performance-management practices and performance reviews are as developmental or productive as people think. Our results suggest that engaging in a performance review, which is an important part of the managerial and leadership responsibility, is quite different than engaging someone in a developmental discussion. The more evaluating – or developmental — discussion actually leads a person to be more neurologically closed to new ideas or to work on learning or changing. Another implication is that when engaged in a developmental discussion, a focus on what needs to be fixed, and overcoming weaknesses and “gaps” has the exact opposite effect on the subject of the interview. The discussion only cements the subject’s defensiveness and potential to discount any benefit of the recommendations or advice. While it may invoke compliance-oriented behavior, any positive effect of such activities or desire for improvement will probably be short lived. Although he did not conduct a neurological study, Masud Khawaja, now at the University of Manitoba, found that a patient’s experience of more PEA than NEA in their relationship with their physician had the significant impact of determining treatment adherence for Type II Diabetics. Treatment adherence is typically about 50 percent for Type II Diabetics, and only half of the diagnosed patients take their medicine and follow the dietary restrictions explained by their physicians. But those who experienced more PEA than NEA in their relationship with their physician followed the desired treatment plan better than others. When your doctor tells you to exercise more and eat less, do you do so? Many of us do not, which is why obesity-related complications are one of the largest published health hazards in North America today — and put the most financial strain on the health care system. When our resolve to maintain a healthy life appears to be weakening, the PEA approach to coaching and strengthening the motivation to change is much stronger than the more typical NEA approach of telling people what they “should” do. On the basis of 29 longitudinal studies at Case Western Reserve University, we now know that the emotional, social and cognitive intelligence competencies of managers and executives in development improve dramatically when these programs use the PEA approach. This is important because, as other studies have shown, such competencies predict leadership, management and professional effectiveness. (Boyatzis, Stubbs & Taylor, 2002 and later studies). So, if the PEA approach to coaching works better in management and leadership development, health care, and higher education, the fMRI study mentioned earlier suggests why it works better than the alternative. It gets our attention.
Posted on: Sat, 21 Sep 2013 20:02:08 +0000
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