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 In the
Spotlight
Get Your Money's Worth
From Each Employee
As the downsizing trend continues to mount in
companies large and small, employers must take
creative measures to get the most productivity out of
each remaining employee; however, if Albert
Einstein’s observation is right—that most
people use less than 10% of their brains’
capabilities—getting the most from your
employees can seem like a daunting task. So how can
you tap into the other 90% of your employees’
mental capacity and get more for your money? One
solution is to send them to boot camp … boot
camp for their brains, that is.
Current research suggests that “pumping
dendrites” can be every bit as beneficial for
the brain as “pumping iron” is for the
body. Intelligence pioneer, Dr. Win Wenger, author of
The Einstein Factor, has found that certain
exercises actually can raise a person’s IQ.
Amazingly, the same “use it or lose it”
logic that applies to muscles also applies to our
brains. Another researcher, Dr. David Snowdon, author
of Aging With Grace: What the Nun Study Teaches
Us About Leading Longer, Healthier, and More
Meaningful Lives, concurs that deterioration of
the brain is not necessarily inevitable as we get
older.
Unfortunately, for many people, thinking has
become a lost art. John Sculley, former chairman of
Apple Computers agrees. He said, “In the new
economy, strategic resources no longer come out of
the group. The strategic resources are ideas and
information that come out of our minds. The result:
We have gone from being resource rich in the old
economy to resource poor in the new economy almost
overnight. Our public education has not successfully
made the shift from teaching the memorization of
facts to achieving the learning of critical thinking
skills.”
This type of critical thinking is what entertainer
Steve Allen encourages in his book, Dumbth.
In the first half of the book, he delineates the
problems, sharing specific examples of
“dumbth” and divulges many hilarious and
several rather alarming examples to back up his claim
that the art of thinking has been lost. Then he cites
the collapse of American efficiency with specific
examples from the airline, hotel, and other service
industries. In the second half of the book, Allen
offers “101 ways to reason better and improve
your mind.” Though not specifically written for
business owners, you may want your employees to
emulate “TV’s Renaissance Man”
because his achievements—which include winning
Peabody, Emmy, and Grammy awards and composing more
than 8,500 songs—suggest that he successfully
tapped into his other 90%.
If you want your employees to use the incredible
power of their minds so they can contribute more to
your organization, encourage them to perform some
simple and fun mind exercises. The following sample
exercises of “whole mind strategies” will
help improve your employees’ mental skills,
which will translate into increased productivity
while they’re punching your clock.
Exercises for Engaging the Whole Brain
Sometimes during the day, employees get busy and
begin to feel stressed by all the demands placed upon
them. This is hardly an optimal scenario for
productivity. Here are some quick solutions to get
them back on track.
- Place the index finger of your dominant hand
above your lip and the middle finger below the lip.
Place your other hand over your navel. Look up, and
then down, taking three deep breaths as you lightly
rub the points near your lips. Then reverse your
hand positions. Look up and then down again and
take three more deep breaths.
- Using your thumbs and first fingers, slowly
pull the edges of your ears out and backward, as if
you wanted to unroll them. Start at the tops of
your ears and work down to your earlobes, unrolling
them three or more times.
- Take a load off and put gravity to work. Lie
flat on your back on the floor with no pillow. Rest
your feet and lower legs over the seat of a chair
or sofa. Make sure your legs are supported up to
the knee so you don’t stress them, but not so
high on the knee as to impede circulation. Loosen
any tight clothes. Once you’ve settled in and
are comfortable, take several deep sighs. Because
the body’s natural biological clock tends to
slow down in the afternoon, spending 10-15 minutes
in this position is an excellent way to oxygenate
your brain and increase blood flow. This will chase
away the typical mid-afternoon slump and add
remarkable zest to your afternoons.
These exercises will help your people become more
focused, improve concentration, decrease
distractibility, activate memory, increase
attentiveness, relax the central nervous system, and
facilitate feelings of rejuvenation. Although these
exercises take very little time, they do greatly
enhance employee performance.
For those times when your people feel
“stuck” and are unable to come up with
creative solutions to some pressing business issues,
more drastic mind exercises may be necessary. Their
stuck feeling is similar to writer’s block.
When this occurs, encourage them to do the following
mental exercises:
- Mix up your mental patterns by taking common
knowledge and configuring it in uncommon ways. For
example, say the months of the year backwards, then
in alphabetical order—without pen or
paper!
- Or make a chart with the alphabet on it in
several rows, as shown below:
 etc.
Then, stand up and read the chart, saying the
alphabet out loud. As you do this, move your body to
approximate the shape of the letters. For example,
when you see an “R” for the letter, bend
your right arm; when you see an “L,” bend
your left arm; and when you see a “T,”
bend both arms. Next, read the chart backwards as you
do the motions with your body.
- Add another layer of difficulty by
incorporating your lower body into the exercise. So
now, for every “R,” bend your right arm
and lift your right knee; for every
“L,” bend your left arm and lift your
left knee; and for every “T,” bend both
arms and both legs.
Continue to add difficulty by changing the path
you follow. Zigzag through the alphabet or read it in
vertical columns. By doing these exercises, you
engage both hemispheres of the brain and activate
multiple intelligences as you clear out the mental
cobwebs that can cloud your creativity.
- Look at 3-D stereograms. Focusing on these
images causes your eyes to diverge, which opens up
the visual field and widens your perspective. It
also activates the parasympathetic nervous system,
triggering the relaxation response, which is ideal
for getting the creative juices flowing
again.
- Create an IQ obstacle course. Have puzzles,
brainteasers, and riddles in prominent places or in
the common areas, such as the cafeteria or the
employee lounge. Pipe in some classical or jazz
music and encourage a learning environment. Instead
of coffee breaks, encourage crossword puzzle
competitions or create company-wide chess
tournaments.
By creating an environment conducive for mental
stimulation, your employees will learn how to think
more critically and creatively. The end result is
that you’ll be able to tap into the other 90%
of their brains’ capacity and get the most
productivity for your payroll dollars.
LINDA BARRETT
specializes in business applications of brain
research. She helps employers maximize their
resources by teaching their employees strategies to
help them compete more effectively in rapidly
changing arenas. For more information on
Barrett’s “Boot Camp for Your
Brain,” contact her office at 504-468-8716 or
visit her Web site at www.jazzspeaker.com
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