the neuroscience of leadership in systems of care...

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© Copyright 2011-13 Zero Point Leadership, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Neuroscience of Leadership in Systems of Care: Transform the Way We Lead Systems

Change With Insights From Brain Science

27th Annual Children’s Mental Health Research and Policy Conference

Laurie Ellington, MA, LPC, RCC, PCC

March 3, 2014


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Why Neuroscience

• System of care work is about thinking differently

• Growing need to understand what drives human behavior and motivation in the workplace

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What Science Tells Us Doesn’t Work

• Incentives and threats

• Telling people what to do

• Giving advice

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Current Leadership Paradigm

• Using principles from the industrialized age

• A need for thinking deeply

• Track record for positive organizational change

doesn’t look so good

• Outdated perception of change


To change human behavior, you have to change the human brain.

To change the human brain, it must be engaged.

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Organizations and Systems


From a scientific perspective, what does it mean to be

engaged?

What creates the right state for brains

to change?

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Prefrontal

Cortex (PFC)-

(Conscious)

• Thinking

• Decision

Making

• Regulating

behavior

• Planning

• Understanding

• Social control

Limbic System

(Non-conscious)

• Emotion

• Memory

• Motivation

• Mammalian

brain


• Reduction in thinking resources

• Decrease in Prefrontal Cortex capacity

• Reduction in creativity

• More negative thinking

• Constricted field of view

• Decrease in ability to collaborate

• Increase in mistakes

• Generalize to other areas

• Increase in cortisol (stress hormone)

• Better access to cognitive resources (Amy Arnsten)

• Increase in creative ideas (Barbara Frederickson)

• More Insights (Mark Jung-Beeman) • Able to see and take in more information

(Schmitz, De Rosa, & Anderson) • Decrease in mistakes

• More collaborative

• Increase in dopamine levels

Gordon, E., 2000, 2008

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Social Needs = Survival

Our response to the need for food, water, air, sleep and safety from physical harm is the same as our response to how we feel people treat us.


• Social pain = physical pain

• Social pain activates threat

response (disengagement)

• Brain’s solution to ensure

nurturance/attachment

(survival)

• Deep biological need for social

connection and belonging

Eisenberger, N & Lieberman, M., 2004

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Basic Survival Needs?

Did Maslow Get It Wrong?


5 Core Social Needs

Status- importance to others, how we rank

Certainty- being able to predict what’s coming up

Autonomy- feeling of control over events, choice

Relatedness- safety with others, connectedness

Fairness- perception of fair exchanges between people Rock, D., 2008

SCARF Model

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Insights?


“When will the way we relate to each other catch up with developments in technology?“

-Theodore Zeldon

the neuroscience of leadership in systems of care...

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