The Future of Coaching – helping leaders overcome ignorance, hubris, blind-spots and become more self-aware

Defaults

Defaults refer to an option that is automatically applied when people are required to make a choice decision and are indecisive. The notion of defaults is increasingly common in behavior change programs attempting to, for example, get employees to select a 401k investment or a health plan during open-enrollment. Most of us will likely be aware of the more frequent use of default choice architecture over the past few years, as this has been studied and applied. Closely related to “default options” in decision-making is the concept of “inevitability” in choice and change. Elliot Aronson describes this psychological response as it relates to, for example, earthquake preparedness, how people respond to information about election outcomes as well as racial integration. In the context of organizational change, there is powerful leverage when change leaders construct communications in a way that provides the default message that change is inevitable – it is certain! How this change is managed and handled may involve employee engagement and innovation, but whether or not it will occur is not up for debate. People respond very differently simply based on how the message is presented – and most are entirely unaware of this influence. 

Salience

We are bombarded with so much information these days, it is impossible for our brains to process even a small volume of it. Our brains (largely unconsciously) filter what we pay attention to. Dolan and others describe a number of factors that influence how we pay attention to a barrage of information:

• Novelty – If the information is presented in a novel manner.
• Accessibility – information is available at a point of purchase or is top of mind.
• Simplicity (information is presented in an easily understandable way). Simplicity is particularly important because our attention moves more rapidly to that information we understand and we tend to automatically screen out complexity.

Change leaders are often under pressure to put out information with tight timelines, and we often do not give adequate thought to the issue of salience for our target audiences. Coaches and consultants can provide significant benefit to clients to educate and make aware of this process.

Affect

In psychology “affect intensity” is the experience of emotion. Those of us involved in organizational change tend to pay little attention to emotions, but affect is a powerful driver in decision-making for all of us, whether we are aware of it or not. Daniel Kahneman describes the brain’s System 1 (fast automatic) and System (slow cognitive) in how we react to stimuli and make decisions. Emotions versus System 2’s careful consideration) is a greater driver of our decision-making than most of us realize. Research shows that by simply placing an attractive female model in an advertisement for a financial loan increased demand for the loan as much as by reducing the rate by 25% (Dolan). Few of us I’m sure would admit to being influenced by this! And, there is little logic why a sports character on a box of Wheaties dramatically improves sales versus a nutritionist with a sound explanation of the benefits of the cereal. It’s primarily emotionally driven influence (although many of us would likely refute being influenced by “trivial” factors like these!).

As leadership coaches, we should think more deeply about the behaviors we are trying to shift, and the emotions associated with each particular behavior. Companies, particularly with an engineering focus, can tend to communicate with a bias to logic, data and detail, while missing the opportunities to harness emotional messages that motivate more effective behaviors.