Leadership's Future: The Evolving Brain
by Miki Saxon
I received a call from a reader, I’ll call him Doug, (I love calls, you may reach me at 866.335.8054, 9 AM to11 PM Pacific time.) who wanted to know why I kept harping on the need for long-term this and long-term that. He said that he’s 26 and part of “the online generation” and used to “instant gratification.”
We talked for quite awhile and I found him to be intelligent, well-spoken and, in his own way despite what he said, thoughtful—but also impatient.
Influencing others is always stressed as a major trait of leadership—maybe the most important trait. But to lead on any level requires an understanding of the larger picture, along with strategic understanding of what’s coming down the road.
Neither one of those offers much instant anything.
I’m not saying Doug speaks for his entire generation, but in a post last summer I linked to several books and articles discussing changes occurring in brain functions as a result of the digital world.
One of the links is to an essay in the Atlantic Monthly by author Nicholas Carr in which he says, “the net is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation”. He cited other high-powered thinkers and online commentators: what if the way I THINK has changed? asked one. “I’ve lost the capacity to read War and Peace any more,” said another, whose current best effort was to stay with a three or four-paragraph weblog entry.”
Another article talks about Dr. Gary Small, a professor at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at the University of California, Los Angeles and author of a new book, iBrain, “who cites a Stanford University study that for every hour a person spends on a computer, personal interaction with others drops by 30 minutes.
“With the weakening of the brain’s neural circuitry controlling human contact,” Dr. Small writes, “our social interactions may become awkward, and we tend to misinterpret, and even miss, subtle, non-verbal messages.”
You can think of it along the scale of Asperger’s syndrome, which is a mild form of it, where there’s not social connectiveness and difficulties with eye contact.”
And this isn’t just about the so-called digital generation, “Scans of the more practised internet users [55-78] during those search tasks showed increased activity in the front of the brain, where reasoning, complex decision-making, short-term memory and the processing of sensations and thoughts all originate. … Within five days though, the digital newcomers were showing the same neural activity.”
Along with greed, is it possible that this new style brain affected the people who ran the banks, hedge funds, and other businesses that played fast and loose with your money?
How will these new brains lead as they move into the workforce and the world?
Your comments—priceless
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Image credit: sxc.hu
February 19th, 2009 at 8:18 am
It is really very interesting article.
I spent a lot of time browsing through internet, but I never thought that my association with digital world might bring out any change in the thinking process in my brain. It seems that spending time in the net requires our brain to be more active which might be a workload on it.
However, I have a question here. We generally know that keeping the brain active in something is very important and it enhances the brain’s ability, rather than keeping it idle in what would, as many say, cost the brain’s ability. So, even if our brain gets more active during our association with digital world, what is the loss of it?
February 19th, 2009 at 11:07 am
HI Biplob, thank you for stopping by and taking time to comment.
Based on my reading it seems that browsing the internet creates a different kind of activity. Taking in information and thinking about it are not the same thing.
There is no great need to focus on the web, one clicks, scans and moves on. Often the subtleties of the information or opinion are lost along with much of the meaning. What percentage of what you browse through do you remember? How much do you discuss and consider ramifications?
There are different kinds of exercises for muscles and each accomplishes different goals. While web surfing might exercise the brain in one way, it does not exercise it in others. Social networking seems to destroy or seriously limit people’s skill in face-to-face interaction.
The human race has never been particularly good at moderation; as wonderful as the digital world might be it needs to be visited in moderation.
I’m not any kind of an expert, but I’ll bet that two hours spent with friends discussing whatever offers more brain stimulation than two hours surfing.
February 26th, 2009 at 12:41 am
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