Collaborative Intelligence: Thinking with People Who Think Differently

by Dawna Markova

Including

Innovation

Love of Learning

Storytelling

Two common assumptions cause us to deny our blind spots. The first is the belief that we should all be competent at everything. The second is the belief that we should be able to think through and solve any issue independently. Both of these erroneous beliefs can lead to what I call “skilled mediocrity,” and they point to the inescapable fact that we need one another.

TALENT Adapting LIGHTS YOU UP • Helping when there are many balls to juggle or plans go awry. • When there is rapid change happening. BURNS YOU OUT • When others are inflexible. • Long-term plans or routine.

TALENT Connection LIGHTS YOU UP • Making connections between things or ideas. • Linking people to one another. BURNS YOU OUT • Thinking linearly. • Conflict.

TALENT Creating Intimacy LIGHTS YOU UP • Teaming with others long-term. • Consistent one-on-one connection with others. BURNS YOU OUT • Meeting and greeting new people in casual settings. • Hectic schedules that don’t allow for deeper connection.

TALENT Feeling for Others LIGHTS YOU UP • Demonstrating emotional care for someone. • Anticipating others’ needs and feelings. BURNS YOU OUT • Being around negative feelings or pessimistic people. • Too much communication (email, text) when you cannot sense the other person’s emotions.

TALENT Humor LIGHTS YOU UP • Lightening otherwise-tense moments and putting others at ease. • Using humor in written communication or speeches. BURNS YOU OUT • Using humor as a defense strategy to protect yourself from others or your own emotions. • Highly analytic situations or those where humor is seen as a challenge to authority.

TALENT Innovation LIGHTS YOU UP • Creating new processes or products. • Figuring out all the new ways to accomplish something or keep them interesting. BURNS YOU OUT • Routine and standardized ways of doing things. • Looking back at how something was done before.

TALENT Love of Learning LIGHTS YOU UP • Continual learning. • Sharing what you are learning. BURNS YOU OUT • Leapfrogging from learning thing to thing without any depth. • Having to do routine things when no learning is involved.

TALENT Loving Ideas LIGHTS YOU UP • Having a new idea, concept, or theory. • Being involved at the beginning of something. BURNS YOU OUT • Having no place to contribute your ideas. • Coming in at the middle or end of a project, when you have to suppress your ideas or give input on how it could be done.

TALENT Standing Out LIGHTS YOU UP • Doing something for which you know you’ll be recognized. • Performing in a way that allows you to stand out as having made a difference. BURNS YOU OUT • When your contribution is not acknowledged. • Being invisible in a team or group.

You approach challenges by asking yourself three simple questions: • What can I learn from this? • How can I grow my capacity? • How can I do this better?

What is most important to you about this? • What is surprising to you right now? • What is inspiring you? • What is challenging you? • No matter what, how can you grow your capacity in this situation? • What do you want to learn from this? • What feeling do you want to have when you leave this meeting?

Pay attention to your blind spots and get input from someone who is strong in this form of inquiry. Adopting a growth mindset will enable you to ask for support, because you know it does not mean you are incompetent. It actually indicates you are self-aware of your mastery—and of areas where you need backup. This is the essence of collaboration.

Analytic Questions: Thinking about “Why?” • What is the logic behind this? • Why am I attending this meeting? • What is the purpose of this call? • What are the facts that I know so far? • What are the measurements and data used? • What is clear and known? • Why should I do this? • What’s the bottom line? • What will this cost? Procedural Questions: Thinking about “How?” • When can I expect this to happen? • What’s the plan? • How long will this take? • What resources are needed? • How does this relate to what I am already doing? • How can I minimize the risks? • What methodology do I have in place? • What have I done in the past that ties to this?

KEY CONCEPTS There are three kinds of inquiry: 1. Success-based inquiry 2. Intentional inquiry 3. Influential inquiry GUIDELINES Use these kinds of questions when you are stuck in your thinking and need to broaden your perspective. KEY CONCEPTS Success-based inquiry helps you gain confidence by accessing past successes. GUIDELINES When thinking isn’t moving forward, use success-based inquiry to discover what conditions have worked in the past. KEY CONCEPTS Intentional inquiry reminds you of what is important to you. GUIDELINES Use intentional inquiry to gain clarity about what really matters to you. KEY CONCEPTS Influential inquiry uses questions to help you identify where you have natural strength and competency for influencing people and where you need support. GUIDELINES Inquire from all four of the compass directions: Analytic questions: thinking about “Why?” Procedural questions: thinking about “How?” Relational questions: thinking about “Who?” Innovative questions: thinking about “What if?

HOW DO I USE INQUIRY IN TEAMS?

Step 1: Success-Based Inquiry Discuss with your team what has been effective when you faced a similar challenge in the past. Be as specific as possible.

Create a visual track so you can collectively see the elements that can be applied to this challenge or project.

Another success-based-inquiry practice is to end every meeting by asking, “What worked? How can we do more of what worked next time?” as well as “What didn’t work? How can we do less of that next time?” Use each project, each client, each meeting, as an opportunity to refine your team’s own handbook of effective processes that bring out the best in each of you. Be picky, be honest, be diligent, and don’t sit back and be too busy for this. Invest energy and have collective ownership of the time spent thinking together. The return will be worth it.

Take time to be clear on what specific result you want and to agree on your desired outcome. Have each person answer the question, “What is my intention here?” and then ask the group, “What matters to us all?

You can also be metaphorical. Charlotte’s executive team posted a picture in their conference room of a Malaysian child holding a science award. It was a constant reminder that their intention was to support children falling in love with learning through the sciences. When new challenges arose, the team faced them with more confidence, because they literally held the image of this child in their minds.

Do you need help thinking in a particular vacant quadrant?

1. MARKET SHARE Uses power over others to win. MIND SHARE Uses influence with others to connect. 2. MARKET SHARE Leads as a hero. MIND SHARE Leads as a host. 3. MARKET SHARE Perceives differences as a deficit. MIND SHARE Dignifies differences as a resource. 4. MARKET SHARE “I have it and you don’t.” MIND SHARE “The more we share, the more we have!” 5. MARKET SHARE “How smart am I?” MIND SHARE “How are we smart?” 6. MARKET SHARE Analytic and procedural thinking are the most valued. MIND SHARE Analytic, procedural, innovative, and relational thinking are all valued equally. 7. MARKET SHARE Asks who is right and who is wrong. MIND SHARE Asks what can be possible. 8. MARKET SHARE Considers value to be created by and carried by things. MIND SHARE Considers value to be created by and carried by exchange of ideas and connections. 9. MARKET SHARE “What will others think of me?” MIND SHARE “How can this grow my capacity?” 10. MARKET SHARE Values independence. MIND SHARE Values interdependence.

THREE KEY ASPECTS OF MIND SHARE: ATTENTION, INTENTION, AND IMAGINATION

One of the following is unclear: process, timeline, resources, best practices, or skills needed.

Focus on the assets and successes that are present in the room, on what is working and what has worked. Do it in as multi-sensory and experiential a way as possible. • Remember that different people give their attention in different ways. Recall what you’ve learned about mind patterns. Observe the factors that switch people on—i.e., is it standing, talking in dialogue, asking lots of questions? For some it happens when they look right at you, for others when they are looking away. Some find their focus when they’re walking beside you, and for still others it’s when they are engaged in heated debate. This will help you enter the model of the world of those with whom you will be thinking and find the conditions and circumstances where they are naturally fully attentive. Then you can replicate them as much as possible. • Recognize that people have a natural rhythm of “here now, then gone, here now, then gone.” They shift between open and focused attention. This rhythm is different for each person. Sometimes “gone” simply means that a person may be incubating a new idea or digesting what has just happened. • Tell people what you need to be present: “I need to walk while I listen to you,” or “I need you to show me what you mean so I can follow you.” Knowing and naming what you need to be fully present increase your effectiveness. • Be aware that people may feel awkward in a non-habitual thinking environment. You might need to “host”—help them find comfort as you would a guest a...

The following questions will help you recognize whether a group is aligned or not, and they can also help connect your intention so you can pull one another forward. Analytic Questions • What is the predominant motivation for you right now in your current situation? Is this moving you away from what you are afraid of or moving you toward what you want? • If you analyze your intentions in areas of your life where you are in a group/team (work, family, other interests), what is one common denominator? Procedural Questions • When in the past has the team’s intention been aligned? • What were the processes and conditions that made this possible? Relational Questions • Who are the people who inspire your team? • What is the story that inspires your team’s intention? Innovative Questions • What would your team be doing in the future if its intention was aligned? • What might be a new way to evoke and align the individual intentions?

One of the most unused collective resources is imagination. How many meetings have you attended in which someone called for a pause, during which all were to imagine what could be possible in this situation? I have never heard this question asked in a corporate meeting, yet everyone would agree that imagination is what makes progress possible.

Those who know how to evoke collective imagination will lead the mind-share economy.

C—Create ideas. A—Analyze ideas for effectiveness. R—Refine your best ideas into an action plan. E—Execute your plan by aligning task and talent.

‘What would we do differently to unleash the potential of all fifty thousand employees of this company?’

Most wanted multi-sensory meetings in a larger room, where they could break into pairs and small groups, move around, and use images and several flip charts.

To generate future pull, aim the collective attention, intention, and imagination of your group.

Shining the light on the assets of the people present. • Focusing on possibilities rather than constraints. • Thinking in multi-sensory ways so all diverse minds can contribute.

Bring to mind those who stand behind you, those who dreamed of you and prayed that one day there would be one such as you who could move beyond the limitations of their previous history. Now bring to mind those who stand next to you, those who, in small and large ways, make it possible for you to do the work you do, make the difference you make, and have the influence you have. Last, bring to mind those who will come after you, those whose lives will be enriched and improved by what you are doing now, those who will think back with gratitude to your efforts and accomplishments. Shift your awareness to one person you are working with (perhaps he is particularly difficult or challenging). Enjoy a long, slow breath and then bring to mind those who stand behind that person, those who have prayed for and dreamed of him. Consider those who stand next to this person and make it possible for him to do the work he does. Last, think of the future that is pulling this person forward, and imagine that he is realizing the specific gifts and talents that are the contribution only he can bring to the rest of us. Conclude by asking one open question that inspires your respect, such as,

“What can we make possible together?

Your Most Effective Decision-Making Strategies • You may not know you’ve made the right decision until you try it in action. Take the first step in a specific direction and notice how it’s working and/or how you feel.

You tend to love pilot programs and aren’t afraid to regroup and fine-tune in the middle of a project. • If you’re struggling to take action on a decision, it can help to imagine yourself having made the choice and how you would feel. • You may also find it helpful to talk with others who have made the choice you are thinking about, to gather information, and try it on for size in your mind.

Your best work environment is one that allows for a great deal of freedom of motion and a varied schedule.

You learn easily through discussion and lectures or by talking about what to do.

Even if you feel impatient when other people speak more slowly or are less to the point than you want them to be, resist the urge to finish their sentences. • Try to allow for silence so that others feel they too have an opportunity to talk.

To listen more comfortably, consider getting up and moving around or going for a walk with the other person.

Be aware that people of other thinking patterns who may take you literally ca...

Be aware that others may be frightened or alienated by the energy ...

You prefer verbal, direct, to-the-point feedback.

You may appreciate feedback that is as humorous as possible.