Shaping Change Brain Science Archives

3 more ways your business can be more persuasive and influential

Today, we’re continuing our series on communication. Over the next several weeks, we’ll be sharing insights, strategies, and tips for communicating during all kinds of circumstances: under stress, in the workplace, when delivering a presentation, and so on. The valuable content we provide will help you excel as a communicator and gain a highly coveted skill that can see you rise in both your personal and professional life.

Last time, we discussed communication in the sense of a business communication plan, specifically focusing on 3 ways your business can be more persuasive and influential.

Today, we’ll share 3 more principles of […]

By Ros Cardinal|June 7th, 2017|Brain Science, Communication, Motivation, Relationship Building, Research, Values and Behaviours|Comments Off

5 ways to become more charismatic

Today, we’re continuing our series on communication. Over the next several weeks, we’ll be sharing insights, strategies, and tips for communicating during all kinds of circumstances: under stress, in the workplace, when delivering a presentation, and so on. The valuable content we provide will help you excel as a communicator and gain a highly coveted skill that can see you rise in both your personal and professional life.

Last time, we discussed 4 ways to help you communicate more effectively in meetings. In case you missed the post, you can read it here.

This time around, we’re going to discuss communication […]

By Ros Cardinal|May 10th, 2017|Brain Science, Coaching, Communication, Development, Emotional Intelligence, Leadership, Mastery, Personality, Positivity, Potential, Research|Comments Off

5 More Things Productive Leaders Do Differently

In our last blog, which you can read here, we began a mini-series on productivity tips. Understanding how to maximize your time and talents is essential as a leader. Strong leaders understand the value of time management and make the most of their hours so that they can accomplish more and still maintain quality in their work output.

Today, we’re revealing 5 more habits that productive leaders master that help them to realize their goals and ensure their teams are operating at optimal levels.

Adopt these habits as your own, and the way you conduct business and check off your goals […]

By Ros Cardinal|July 28th, 2016|Brain Science, Coaching, Development, Leadership, Mastery, Productivity|Comments Off

2 Brain Myths That Are Dangerous to Your Potential

Today, we’re wrapping up our mini-series on brain science.

If you’ve missed any of the installments in this series, you can learn more about unconscious bias in Part 1 and Part 2 of the series, and in Part 3, you can discover 3 easy ways to help your brain learn.

Today, we’re going to bust two of the most popular myths when it comes to what our brains are capable of. In the same way that unconscious bias can hold us back from working with different people, creating more diversity in the workplace, and being more open-minded about what others are […]

By Ros Cardinal|June 21st, 2016|Brain Science, Development, Mastery, Motivation, Personality, Potential, Research, Resilience|Comments Off

3 Ways to Help Your Brain Learn

Julia Sperling is a medical doctor with a background in neuroscience. She’s also a faculty member of McKinsey Leadership Development. Her work focuses on shifting mindsets and behaviors by highlighting beliefs and biases that constrain personal growth, learning, and job performance.

These include misconceptions about how the brain works, often popularized by bad journalism and now disproved by neuroscience. You may have heard that you’re either right- or left-brained. Wrong. Or that you only use 10% of the capacity of your brain. Nope.

In fact, the latest research suggests that the brain is infinitely more capable of learning in myriad ways, with […]

By Ros Cardinal|June 10th, 2016|Brain Science, Development, Mastery, Mindfulness, Positivity, Potential, Research, Resilience|Comments Off

5 Strategies to Overcome Unconscious Bias

Last week, we began an in-depth look into unconscious bias. It’s especially important to be aware of unconscious bias because of how much it contributes to our decision-making. As a leader, you must be aware of just how much your thinking is shaped by unconscious thinking. Then, you must learn how to overcome it so that it doesn’t negatively impact your judgment, personal growth, learning, or job performance.

Today, we’re going to discuss how you can do just that.

But first, a quick recap from our last blog about how unconscious bias works and why it’s developed among us:

“Research suggests that […]

By Ros Cardinal|May 24th, 2016|Brain Science, Change, Coaching, Communication, Community, Development, Hiring, Leadership, Mindfulness, Organisational Culture, Relationship Building, Research, Unconscious Bias, Values and Behaviours|Comments Off

A look into unconscious bias

For the past several weeks, we have taken an in-depth look into emotional intelligence and explored the ways in which this skill can either help us or harm us in both our personal and professional lives. One important area of our lives that is particularly affected by emotional intelligence is our decision-making.

But emotional intelligence isn’t the only thing inside of us that impacts decision-making. There’s also the matter of unconscious bias, and according to a recent article published by McKinsey & Company, unconscious forces can be shaping our thinking more than we know.

Julia Sperling is a medical doctor with […]

By Ros Cardinal|May 10th, 2016|Brain Science, Coaching, Development, Leadership, Research, Values and Behaviours|Comments Off

How to effectively motivate your employees, Part 2

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

In his book Drive, Pink uses 50 years of behavioral science to overturn the conventional wisdom about how to effectively motivate your employees. Last week (read the article here), we discussed how the underlying theme to Pink’s book is the clash between extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation.

To summarize, extrinsic motivation relies on incentives outside of ourselves for motivation. In other words, it’s behaviour that’s driven by external rewards. These rewards can be tangible (money, for instance) or they can be psychological (praise).

Extrinsic motivation has been the usual ‘order of business’ for […]

By Ros Cardinal|November 26th, 2014|Autonomy, Book Reviews, Brain Science, Employee Engagement, Extrinsic Vs. Intrinsic Motivation, Motivation, Organisational Culture, Purpose, Teamwork|1 Comment

Building a positive culture in the workplace, Part 5

We have spent the past several weeks discussing positive psychologist Martin Seligman’s “PERMA Model”. It’s a model for lasting well-being that was widely published in Seligman’s influential book “Flourish” and serves as the foundation for principles that can lead to a more positive environment and culture in any workplace.

We have discussed…

Positive Emotions: Positivity can enhance team members’ ability to think creatively, help them cope with challenges, nurture their progress in their career, and aid them in getting along with others in the workplace. As social psychologist Barbara Frederickson posits in her Broaden and Build Theory, the more positivity we […]

By Ros Cardinal|October 9th, 2014|Brain Science, Change, Coaching, Emotional Intelligence, Employee Engagement, Leadership, Motivation, Organisational Culture, Positivity, Relationship Building, Teamwork, Values and Behaviours|Comments Off

Building a positive culture in the workplace, Part 4

Productivity. Teamwork. Happiness. Wellbeing.

These are all things we want in any workplace.

When we find ourselves in a work environment that embodies these attributes, we thrive. Creativity soars. Collaboration takes place more regularly and does so at enhanced levels. Team members build health relationships with each other and thereby make the workplace enjoyable.

For the past few weeks, we’ve been discussing building a positive culture based on respected positive psychologist Martin Seligman’s PERMA model, which was widely published in his influential book “Flourish” in 2011.

PERMA is an acronym with each letter representing one of five fundamental pillars essential in feeling well-being […]

By Ros Cardinal|September 24th, 2014|Brain Science, Change, Emotional Intelligence, Employee Engagement, Leadership, Mindfulness, Motivation, Organisational Culture, Personality, Positivity, Relationship Building, Teamwork, Values and Behaviours|Comments Off