American writer and psychologist, Daniel Goleman, brought a paradigm shift to the meaning and use of emotions, particularly in leadership and strategic management through his self-definitive work and best seller, ‘’Emotional intelligence: why it can matter more than IQ’’. His more recent work, ‘’Focus: the hidden driver of excellence’’ focuses on how strategic leaders and corporate organizations can navigate distractions, leveraging the matrix of emotional intelligence. Adopting concepts such as self-awareness, empathy and social intelligence from his previous work, Goleman reflects on how focus can be practiced at the different levels of social relation and organizational development.

The time to practice focus is now. The continuing digital revolution and its consequent information bubble on the internet have made it difficult for an average worker to focus or pay attention to details. Distraction is a reality for the individual as much it is for the corporate organization. An average worker is said to be distracted every 4-8 minutes for an average of 8-12 minutes. Therefore, embracing practices that improve focus is advocated for organizations to improve work performance and organizational efficiency.

Focus, simply put, is the act of directing and concentrating the self (both the mind and the body) towards the achievement of a particular goal. In an organisation context, focus may be described as the concentration of resources towards the execution of a plan or strategy that is expected to result in the organisation’s growth. The design and execution of a business model in itself implies focus in action.

The types of Focus

Goleman identified three types of focus, namely; Inner, Other and Outer focus.

Inner Focus: This entails self-awareness or ability to understand one’s thoughts and feelings, and leveraging same for personal or social benefits
Other Focus: This entails empathy or ability to understand other people’s thoughts and feelings, and leveraging the same for personal or social benefits.
Outer Focus: This entails system consciousness or ability to understand the complex web of environmental factors that affect or shape one’s realities.

At the corporate level, the ability to integrate these variants of focus can determine one’s progression through the corporate ladder. In fact, the survivability and the sustainability of a business derive from the combination of the inner, other and outer focus. In Goleman’s word, ‘’a well focused leader is one that balances an inner focus on the climate and culture with an  ‘’other focus’’ on the competitive landscape, and outer focus on the larger realities that shape the environment the outfit operates in.’’

Focus as the bedrock of innovation and creativity.

Creativity and innovation are constructive and demanding endearvours, requiring no meagre focus. According to Goleman, creativity and innovation are a function of the intertwined workings of creative intelligence and executive intelligence.

Creative Intelligence Vs Executive Intelligence

Creative intelligence is the hub of ideas found in the subcortical cortex of the brain or the subconscious mind. The creative intelligence can be unleashed and developed by recurrent exercising of the executive intelligence. This means that persistent practice actually leads to creativity. And this is why experts often advise people to consistently do what they love in order to unleash the creative intelligence in them.

The executive intelligence on the other hand drives conscious or effortful action, and the seat of this intelligence is the prefrontal cortex. Since the conscious mind is only short-lived with an attention span ranging between 10 -15 seconds, impressions on it can be held down or controlled through a nerve force popularly known as the will-power. The will-power is therefore the nucleus or basis of executive intelligence. Because the conscious mind is wired to be lazy, the will-power exists to goad it to action.

Without executive intelligence, the creative intelligence will produce little more than a day-dreaming effect. Also, without the creative intelligence, the executive intelligence will be directionless. Using the myth of the 10 thousand hours rule, Goleman makes a case of how the two types of intelligence work in sync. Thus, in a world full of distractions, a creative and innovative mind is one adept at exercising will-power.

The Bottom-up Vs Top-down Brain

The human brain has two systems, namely; bottom-up and top-down. The bottom-up system is the earliest brain developed in ancient man. It helps with basic survival skills such as eating, sensing danger and fight or flight. This brain is intuitive, involuntary and automatic. It is driven by emotions.

The top-down brain on the other hand is the mental activity mostly within the neocortex that can monitor and impose its goals on the bottom-up mind. The top-down brain evolved much later on (hundreds of thousands of years down the evolution of man) and adds talents like self awareness, reflection. It is slower, voluntary and effortful and rational rather than emotional. While we are conscious and are doing mentally demanding tasks, we are using the top-down system. But the mind can wander off and switch to bottom-up which usually helps us incubate ideas and spurs our creativity.

What Strategic Leaders should do

Give enough time for ideas to incubate: In a highly dynamic business climate where agility is highly desirable, the thought of taking things slow generally seems contradictory. However, some leaders have realized in the hard way that success does not necessarily answer to speed; rather, success answers to velocity which is speed + direction. Mostly, latching on to the direction to thread or run your ideas takes more time than the time taken for the initial conception or spark of the idea.

Constantly reflect and re-imagine the organisational values: Working with the grand purpose in mind ensures originality and definiteness of creativity. Strategy implementation must be anchored on the value proposition. Although, at some point, strategies may need to be adjusted based on the existing market realities, making reference to the original plan, ensures one does not veer too far off the line.

Encourage Open interaction and Brainstorming: Allowing members the liberty to express their feelings and thoughts without the fear of gaffing and being persecuted invariably generates a glimmer of wonderful ideas or what may be termed as honest creativity. It also allows the leader to see through the formal climate and uncover the informal condition that affects work and employee productivity; the leader is able to inquire into the inner desires and troubles of his subordinates and provide viable solutions to them.

Diversity and Inclusion: Having a heterogeneous or mixed team is highly desired to have a well rounded perspective and develop solutions that can significantly impact lives.

Use selective attention: The management understands and focuses only on the unique strengths and values of the organization in its prevailing competitive landscape. This helps the management to sift through the market noises and avoid waste of resources.

Resources:

Daniel Goleman. 2013. Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence. HarperCollins Publishers

I took this picture on my way to Usman Danfodio University Sokoto, between the main gate and the campus, to help set up the electronics lab there a few years ago, before the age of insecurity in Nigeria! And now that importing buses, trains, boats, etc could be challenging due to exchange rate paralysis, do we create a national policy on breeding camels? That would be a major import substitution strategy!

Seriously, I maintain my position: Nigeria’s problem is not fuel subsidy. Our challenge is the corruption within fuel subsidies. We must not necessarily eliminate ALL fuel subsidies when we could have focused on killing corruption which makes the subsidy sub-optimal. We must manage this double whammy of removing fuel subsidy and floating Naira urgently.

Nigeria’s fuel subsidy problem is that it was designed to feed corruption (you can photoshop invoices and the government will keep paying you because you have one special connection in Abuja). In my book, Nanotechnology and Microelectronics, which received a Book of the Year award from IGI Global, and upon which I received an invitation from Harvard Business Review, I explained how nations drive technology growth, looking at 2,000 years of data.

The US postal service has not made a single profit in the last 20 years. That is a massive subsidy to improve the supply chain, across America, by making sure commerce works. But they’re smart: the money used to subsidize post office is recovered when profits of companies which depend on the postal system are taxed. Provided there is no corruption, the government has no need to turn the post office into a direct profit-making machine. Recently, the government tried to clean the books, and even after, the postal service still recorded red! That subsidy is a platform strategy as we do in startups.

Nigeria’s Problem is Not Fuel Subsidies