Decisive Intuition: Use Your Gut Instincts to Make Smart Business Decisions
256
Decisive Intuition: Use Your Gut Instincts to Make Smart Business Decisions
256eBook
Related collections and offers
Overview
At last a practical guide on intuitive decision-making for anyone in the business world to get to the answer they need faster.
Intuition is the great differentiator in business. Listening to, trusting, and acting on your intuitive intelligence separates you from the pack as most people are not listening to theirs. Intuition is the one intangible skill that enables teams to function at a higher level and add more dimension and power to their ability to solve problems and grow. Yet the question that each business leader and manager struggles to answer is how do you train and develop intuitive thinking in a team to achieve the greatest result?
Decisive Intuition is for business leaders, managers, and employees who want answers to this question and are ready to accelerate their company culture.
- Practice this 6-step process for harnessing your intuitive intelligence with practical business applications.
- Hear how successful business leaders are integrating intuitive skills into their companies for cutting-edge results.
- Explore directional, social, and informational intuition and how you can apply them to different areas of your business for greater results.
- Learn about the 5 roadblocks to accessing your intuitive intelligence and how to overcome them.
- Discover the latest findings in neuroscience and techniques to access your intuitive, subconscious mind for arriving at better decisions, faster.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781632658623 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Red Wheel/Weiser |
| Publication date: | 03/01/2019 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 256 |
| File size: | 1 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Intuition Demystified
It is through science that we prove, hut through intuition that we discover.
— Henri Poincare
Nelia Joubert was sweating under her sheets, but she didn't know exactly why. Her company had just landed a dream gig: a huge wedding for the nephew of South Africa's president, Jacob Zuma. Things were in motion, seemingly going great, and yet she was tossing and turning all night and couldn't shake the feeling that something felt "off."
Nelia and her business partner, Zane Carim, joined forces a couple of years earlier to form White Rabbit Productions, an event production and management company in Johannesburg, South Africa. Their company produces a wide range of events, including awards shows, corporate events, custom parties, and weddings in South Africa and beyond. They were elated when one of their suppliers referred them to Zuma's representatives to help stage one of the most high-profile weddings in the country.
All hands were on deck as they worked around the clock to put together all of the details for the initial proposal. With a multi-million-dollar budget, they planned for more than 2,000 guests. The event was also going to be covered by the major media networks.
This event was the opportunity that Nelia and Zane had been dreaming of for their budding company — the opportunity to show the country and the world the White Rabbit way. In addition to providing great profit and making the company financially stable for the near future, it would enable them to showcase their unique flare for creativity, deliver a memorable experience for the wedding party and international guests, and make a splash in the industry. They were thrilled.
After initial talks with Zuma's representatives, they were tasked with handling the entire event's infrastructure. There were so many moving parts in coordinating the wedding, including celebrations in Swaziland and South Africa, and dealing with the multitude of vendors and suppliers. Everything was going smoothly, but Nelia couldn't shake the feeling in the pit of her stomach that something was off.
She decided to ignore the feeling because she and Zane were flying to Swaziland that afternoon to see the venue and put finishing touches on the final proposal so that they could move closer to the contract. She didn't want to share her doubts and fears with Zane and come off as a downer, especially since she had nothing concrete to point to. She convinced herself that she was just anxious and her concerns would be resolved after meeting with Zuma's representatives to gather information about the logistics.
Upon arrival, Nelia and Zane agreed that they were impressed by the natural beauty of the venue and had favorable initial impressions of everyone they met. Zuma's representatives must have been equally impressed because they told Nelia and Zane to come back with a final budget and they would make it happen. The project was going to be a three-week setup with no expense spared. White Rabbit had never thrown a party for someone with such deep pockets. Nelia was caught up in the moment. Her creative juices were flowing as she thought about what the White Rabbit team could accomplish. The artist in her was doing cartwheels. Hands were shaken and verbal agreements made.
They had no time to waste. As soon as they returned to Johannesburg, they paid deposits to the suppliers and set the wheels in motion. As a young business, White Rabbit didn't have a lot of money to front, but Nelia and Zane knew that this wasn't the time to hesitate. All of their experience culminated in that moment. They were ready.
Nelia was buzzing. This was the greatest opportunity of her life. It was what she and Zane had always wanted. But something inside her was still telling her to stop. And as much as she tried to push that nagging feeling down, it wouldn't go away. She had a sense that the event wasn't going to happen. Something wasn't right. Yet she had no direct evidence to support her intuition. She wanted to share her feeling with Zane, but she hesitated.
What would her business partner say? Would he chalk it up to pressure from such a big opportunity getting to her? Would he give any credence to her feeling? She wondered whether she might be second-guessing herself.
After another sleepless night of being tormented by her internal radar, Nelia knew that Zane wouldn't take her feeling seriously unless she took it seriously first. She remembered the time they hired a new project manager. Although his resume seemed perfect, she knew he wasn't the right fit. Yet, she let the urgency of the moment override her inner knowing. Soon enough, he was volatile with staff and rude to clients, and eventually stormed off the job. She now thought of several instances, such as when she and Zane chose the wrong accountant or promised a too-ambitious deadline, when she had an inner sense that turned out to be dead-on.
In the next few days, they received mixed signals. Some of Zuma's representatives said they would sign and pay money now, but others said they would sign and pay later. Too many different stories of the vision for the wedding and how it was going to be financed were floating around. There was a growing feeling of chaos smoothed over with smiles and conversation.
White Rabbit was on the verge of paying another round of deposits to suppliers and vendors. Nelia was feeling increasingly uneasy about the situation, and she knew she had to say something. Finally, she pulled Zane aside and said, "I don't feel comfortable with this. I've had this growing sense in my belly, for weeks now, that something just isn't right, that this event won't happen, and we'll put our business in jeopardy if we keep fronting more money for deposits. I know what's at stake here. I want this more than anything, but this feeling won't go away. In fact, it keeps getting stronger."
Zane was startled at first. And then he became angry. They had a heated exchange. Although Zane agreed that Zuma's representatives had waffled in their commitments, he said that he and Nelia should give them the benefit of a doubt. This project was the break they'd been looking for. He chalked up her fears to a case of cold feet.
But Nelia took a stand. She dug in deeper to what she had been feeling. She had nothing to lose in sharing her truth, even in the face of someone who didn't have the same intuitive sense. Although Zanes points were logical, she didn't budge.
Finally, Zane seemed to feel — or at least appreciate — her inner conviction. After some more back and forth, something shifted in the argument and Zane pivoted. He took a deep breath, looked at her, and said, "Hey, you've been right in the past. So, if you're feeling that strongly about it, let's walk away from it." He stood by Nelia's call.
From the outside looking in, walking away was business suicide. Yet Nelia and Zane were honoring something deeper. Zane was trusting Nelia's intuition more than the short-term win, as difficult as that decision was for him.
On the eve of signing the contract and paying additional deposits, Nelia and Zane made the final decision to pull out of the project. The following week, the scandal came out. President Zuma had been embezzling money from the government. Some of the wedding festivities were expected to take place at Zuma's residence, which had been funded by stolen money.
As soon as the story went viral, the wedding was canceled. It was a big blow to all involved, with four major companies supporting various aspects of the event. All of them suffered big losses. Nelia told me that one of the other companies had canceled all of its other events to do the wedding and then lost everything.
Although White Rabbit lost the deposits it had paid to secure its suppliers for those dates, the company's losses would have been far greater if Zane hadn't listened to Nelia's intuition. White Rabbit would have spent a lot more money and time and then not gotten paid. On top of that, the company would have gotten a tremendous amount of negative press. The positive exposure Nelia and Zane hoped for would have turned into a PR nightmare since the wedding would have been partially financed by stolen money. Acting on Nelias intuition saved White Rabbit.
Nelia risked taking a stand. She chose to stay true to herself, even in the face of her desire to have a big-name company with abundant cash flow, new opportunities, and a stellar reputation. Not only had they dodged a bullet, but she set the tone for White Rabbit's management to make future decisions from this internal place of integrity.
Nelia never questioned her intuition again. Her decision-making became more finely tuned. Her communication became even more authentic and straightforward in recruiting, projects, and determining which clients to take on. She realized that it all was connected. If she wasn't listening to her intuition, she wasn't taking care of herself, her company, or her clients. After the Zuma experience, clients trusted Nelia even more. People can feel when others truly trust and listen, even if they don't have the words to explain that feeling in the moment.
As Nelia's story illustrates, listening to our inner guidance as business leaders, decision-makers, and as people is no longer an option in business today. Overriding our inner knowing with the promise of more revenues, profit, market share, and recognition is so easy. Yet, we pay a steep price if those are the only metrics we pay attention to. Quick wins don't hold their weight in the long run if we're not aligned with an inner compass for decision-making. However, many of us are not well practiced in listening to and trusting inner guidance. Many of us don't even know it's on the menu.
Remember when you knew that a new hire or strategy was a bad idea but you ignored that feeling? Or when you knew your partner was cheating but you didn't listen to your gut? Remember how frustrated you were with yourself afterward? I personally feel such a sense of betrayal when I ignore my intuition. That feeling has awakened me to the gift and value of what happens when we lead our businesses and live our lives in tune with our intuition.
So, what exactly is intuition? And where does it come from? The word intuition comes from the Latin root intueri, which translates to "look upon," "contemplate," or "to look within." Throughout the centuries, intuition has become synonymous with a spiritual insight or an instinctive feeling rather than conscious thought or logical reasoning. Since ancient Greek times, intuition has been seen as coming from a source other than the rational mind. Intuition is often defined as the ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reasoning. In this book, I'll use a more applicable definition: an embodied knowing that comes from listening to what wants to happen next. This "knowing" is one that doesn't just come from our conscious mind, but from all of our senses, including what we pick up from our nonconscious mind. There's a critical element of being receptive. By listening to what wants to happen, you allow the surrounding data to inform you on what action steps need to be executed. I'll use various terms throughout the book that are synonymous and replaceable with the word intuition, such as "inner guidance," "inner compass," "inner GPS," "gut sense," "inner radar," "true north," and "inner navigational system."
This book is about cultivating the oldest relationship and the oldest source of wisdom we have: ourselves. It's about moving the conversation from the mystical to the practical. It is about reconnecting with a deeper resource of innate intelligence to achieve more effective communication, decision-making, leadership, and innovation.
By combining in-depth research, countless interviews with business leaders around the world, and case studies from my role as a business coach and business owner, I categorized intuition into three dimensions that people exemplify to varying degrees. These three dimensions, directional, social, and informational, have a tremedous impact on business (see Figure 1).
Directional Intuition: "The Navigator"
The directional dimension of intuition is your center point that orients you with your day-to-day business decisions, which align with your life's direction and purpose. It is your personal connection to your inner guidance or innate wisdom. It connects you with the inner you in the most intimate way. Depending on your lens or belief system, directional intuition is commonly described as guidance from your higher self, soul, divine nature, subconscious mind, the environment, the field, or the grand order of things. The idea is that you have an intuitive guidance system embedded deeply in your being that is connected to something greater than your conscious mind, and it picks up on information all around you, all the time. Even when you sleep! It is the source of your inner compass. And to connect with this guidance system, you need to be receptive to listening to these frequencies, which are quite different from everyday thoughts. Some people see directional intuition as the spiritual or mystical access point that connects to a deeper, universal intelligence beyond the egoic mind-personality, yet is still centrally connected to it.
On a practical level, it's your "navigator," which helps you maneuver the daily challenges and opportunities in your business and in life. Directional intuition orients you to the "true north" in your business decisions and guides you toward the next evolutionary steps in your life's journey, even if your conscious mind has no clue what's happening. Have you ever felt that a job or a relationship was past its expiration date or wasn't right in the first place but couldn't figure out why? Maybe everything looked great on paper, but something told you that it was time for your next adventure. Have you ever moved somewhere or followed a calling that didn't make sense to you at the time?
I interviewed Marc David, the founder of The Institute for the Psychology of Eating and the author of the bestselling books Nourishing Wisdom: A Mind-Body Approach to Nutrition and Well-Being and The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy, and Weight Loss. He shared how the moments of listening to his directional intuition and taking action helped him pioneer the key business manifestations for his life.
I don't know that I have a more important navigational system than my intuition. At the end of the day, when I look at how I get from point A to point B in my life, how I make big decisions, how I arrive at where I'm going to live, what college I'm going to go to, what grad school I'm going to go to, what woman I'm going to date, to me, intuition always factors in in a big way — if not in a really big way. I don't think I can operate without it. I wouldn't even know how to do that. I would feel uncomfortably naked if I didn't have it.
Intuition is this voice that comes through that somehow doesn't usually sound like the "me, me, me, me, me." It has a different quality to it. It has a smarter quality to it. It has a more timeless quality to it. It has a more relaxed quality to it. It ain't worried. When intuition is speaking, it's a clear bell and it's very confident.
Social Intuition: "The Vibe Detector"
Once you find the origin point of your inner guidance and directional intuition, you can now extend beyond yourself to feel and sense other people. The social dimension of intuition is based on one's ability to read the energies and emotions — the vibe — among people in a room or the room itself. It is your "vibe detector." Social intuition is related to animal instinct in navigating safety, protection, and connection. Although we may not be consciously aware of doing it, we pick up on nonverbal communication cues, congruence, and dissonance all of the time.
For example, imagine you're in a meeting with new people. Right away, you don't trust the guy sitting to your left. Everything that he says sounds like a lie. There's something about him that you just don't trust, however, you immediately trust the woman sitting to your right. She seems open and friendly. You may or may not be accurate in either case. Yet, like all creatures, we rely on these instincts. And these instincts are animal instincts. Social intuition feels very neurological and primordial. It's subtle. Animals use it all the time. When two of us meet, we sense each other, we size each other up, and sniff each other out. We growl on the inside, hope to win the other's attention and approval, or simply feel neutral about the other.
When I waited tables, one of the first things I did was read the needs of the people at each table so that I could provide the type of service that would best suit them. The salespeople out there know what I'm talking about. On one hand, some tables want little to no interaction with a server. Perhaps they're on a romantic night out or in the middle of a serious conversation and don't want to be interrupted.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Decisive Intuition"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Rick Snyder.
Excerpted by permission of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Introduction,
Chapter 1 Intuition Demystified,
Chapter 2 The Five Obstacles to Intuition,
Chapter 3 You Don't Find Your Intuition; Your Intuition Finds You,
Chapter 4 Slowing Down Is an Action Step,
Chapter 5 Befriend Your Inner Critic,
Chapter 6 Your Body Is Wiser than Your Mind,
Chapter 7 Ask for Guidance,
Chapter 8 Act on Your Inner Intelligence,
Chapter 9 Make Your Company Culture Smarter,
Notes,
Acknowledgments,
Index,
About the Author,