The Cognition of Innovation

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There are some people that make their
work just another thing they have to do,

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and there are those that make their
work something that they want to do.

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Welcome to Working on Purpose with your
host Elise Cortez. In our program,

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we provide guidance and inspiration from those
people who have found deeper meaning and

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personal connection to their work life.
It's beyond nine to five, it's working

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on purpose. Now Here is your
host, Elise Cortez. Thanks for tuning

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in again this week. Great to
have you. I'm your host, Elise

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Cortez, joining you from Dallas,
Texas, which is home base for me.

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This program is all about helping people
more meaningfully and productively connect with their

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work and equipping organizations to do the
same for their employees. So I bring

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on guests to have a particular perspective
or experience that I think expands this conversation,

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and I often draw on a meaning
and work research I've conducted over the

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last fifteen years, as well as
from my own experience consulting, speaking and

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developing workforces across the globe. I'll
get to the program and just well,

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five zero short for Working on a Purpose

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fifty percent off. Last week,
if you missed the show live, you

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can always catch a v recorded podcast. We were on the air with Rachel

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Melow. She was an entrepreneur,
speaker, author and mentor. She's the

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author of The Ten Commandments of Success
Without Apology. We talked about meeting our

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own expectations of success, what we
have to give up to do success on

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our own terms, and how we
can sport and empower each other as women.

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Along this journey with us this week
is doctor Erica Jacoby. She is

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the executive director of LC Global Consulting
Incorporated, and she's all about change,

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growth and innovation, consulting with offices
in New York and Munich, Germany.

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We'll be talking about her fresh research
on the cognition of innovation she just completed

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in her PhD program, among other
things. She joined it today from New

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York City, Erica. Welcome back
to Working on Purpose, Oly You.

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Thanks so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here with you again.

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And it is so great. You
know, I think about I was

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doing a little bit of historical looking
as I thought about our show tonight,

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and I was remembering, of course, we started together at the university,

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well, the Field and Gradge University. You were working on your PhD,

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so as I. We were both
at a conference sharing what we'd come up

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with in terms of our research.
And that was so great. We were

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both in India. That was amazing. That was twenty fourteen, by the

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way, if you can possibly believe
that, and I think it was two

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sixteen. You were a guest on
my show and at that time the topic

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that we took on was do you
have what it takes to make your dreams

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come true? And you had just
opened up your second consulting firm in American

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had Simon Tailsey started your doctoral program
like a crazy woman. So in hindsight,

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first things first, did your dream
come true? I think it did,

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and I'm smiling while you're introducing me. It wasn't easy in all fairness,

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and I think your description sort of
covers me. At times I felt

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like, oh my gosh, this
what's the best, the worst decision ever?

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And I felt like a crazy woman
many, many, many times.

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But I do think my dream has
come true. And my dream for sure

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includes lifelong learning, and I think
that is one of the key factors,

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at least for me for working on
purpose, which is what the show is

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all about. I suppose well.
And first let me also say something that

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I want to call out, because
any listeners that have heard me a couple

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of times know that I have an
affinity for languages, and I want to

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call out that I so appreciate that
you have such an ability to speak English

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and German and I don't know what
else do you speak? What else?

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Oh my gosh, it's a number
of other languages, but you know,

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English, French, and Spanish,
but English and German for sure being my

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best languages. That's really wonderful.
I certainly applaud that, and the show

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does enjoy a global listenership, so
it's great to have people on who can

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speak other languages as well. Yes, I love it. So I want

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to get into your research incredibly exciting
stuff that you worked around cognition and identity

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and really in self describe successful businesses. So first as before we even get

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into that, I want to understand
what in the world made you to decide

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to go and look into this field
in the first place. It's not I

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wouldn't say this is probably an easy
field to inquire into. No, it's

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really not. And a lot of
people sort of warn't me to do this

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research, and it wasn't easy,
And I had a lot of help from

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really great people and great scholar is
out there, So it was a true

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collaborative effort. What made me explore
the cognition of innovation and what successful companies

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may be all about. Of course, we need more research and how we

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can link cognition and linguistic patterns into
this is my simple work as a consultant.

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Whenever I go into an organization,
people throw certain what I would now

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call identity claims towards me, they
would say, we're all about innovation and

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Erica, let's use the stat and
the other or believe it or not.

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I've been in very very successful organizations, companies Fortune fifty, where people would

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continuously say, all over the globe, it's time to leave the thinking ship.

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And I was always thinking, that's
really interesting. For as long as

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the people have been saying that in
such consistency, the company had never ever

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gone down with the same married.
I was always wondering, whenever a company

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says we're so innovative, is it
really true? And you know? And

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what if so, what makes it
true? What's the secret sauce behind it?

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And so my first masters was in
cognitive linguistics from the Ludwig Maximilian's University

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in Munich, Germany, and so
I married my two fields for an interdisciplinary

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research study on the cognitive linguistic patterns
in what I would now call emergent identity

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claims we are innovative, it's time
to leave the thinking ship. We are

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moving forward always, so whenever the
words we are are involved, That's what

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I was interested in, And what
is the cognition behind it? And how

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does the sense of who we are
actually emerged in an organization, and how

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does it get fostered and sustained in
an organization? Oh, you know that

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I find this hopelessly yummy on all
fronts because you know that, in addition

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to my research into meaning and work, I also looked at how our work

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informs our sense of self or our
identity. So I'm very interested and definitely

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want to dive into this. And
so next, if you would, now

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with that kind of a backdrop of
where this came from, help us get

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into your research. Can you summarize
it a bit? What exactly did you

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look at in your study and how
did you go about your study? I

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was capable. You know, one
of my mentors and committee dissertation committee members,

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doctor Mike Manning, gave me access
to their research data. They have

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been working with the Center of Values
Based Leadership from the Benedictine University. They

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had been doing a long term research
project that discovered the relationship between values and

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culture and success. So they had
a huge archive of data that dealt with

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these questions and they had done their
own research around this. So Mike Manning

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gave me access to some of that
and we looked into the self described organizations

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as self described successful organizations, and
so I got the data anonymized, and

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then I just really looked for the
magic formulas for my research. We are

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in various different shapes of forms,
you know, it's not always we are.

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It could be it is time to
leave the thinking ships. And so

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I did a whole lot of thinking
in preparation for this research as to how

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people could voice their reference to their
own company. And I had come up

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with five categories. One was who
we are if it pertains to that subject,

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what we do, how we do, what we do, how we

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know we belong because I thought that
also cater to the sense of who we

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are and what we can be in
the future. So I had come up

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with these categories in preparation for this
research, and then I looked I had

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closed these and grammatical formulas so that
also a computer program could search this after

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my research, and then I had
just isolated those phrases and then I would

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run all of these phrases. I
think all in all, it was like

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fifty thousand words that I looked at. Well, I know, I know

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it was. It was tough,
and there were many times when I really

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really wanted to give up because I
thought it's too much, it's not manageable.

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But I'm glad I I went through
with the whole project. So around

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fifty thousand words that I looked at
and I analyzed them with the typical cognitive

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linguistic lens. What we do is
a couple of things. We look at

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how much thought diversity versus thought homogeneity
is there. We do know that groups

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of any size, as it could
be nations, it could be teams,

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it could be you know, a
couple, a romantic couple, that groups

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of any sizes have what we call
a shared memory, a shared semantic memory.

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They use the same words, they
often make the same grammatical mistakes,

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or they have their own lingo,
so to speak, and that tells us

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something about the thought homogeneity and the
thought diversity and within that group. So

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my first question was, like,
in these self described successful organizations, how

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much how much shared semantic memory do
we have because some of these organizations were

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extremely geographically dispersed, and is that
really also true this assumption? Is it

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true for companies that at times have
four and forty thousand employees all over the

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world, And this assumption that we
have in cognitive linguistics. Does it still

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hold true? And the answer,
at least based on my research, is

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yes. They all the companies I
looked into have that shared semantic memory.

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They would use very often the same
vocabulary, although they were geographically dispersed,

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very often not even very much in
touch with the headquarters. For example,

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they would use the same vocabulary to
describe their identity, the sense of who

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we are. And I thought this
was breathtaking to start out with, but

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then I also found a certain dynamic
behind the whole thing. But I might

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want to pause here to give me
a little bit of a breather to digest

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the whole thing. Yes, thank
you for that, because I do want

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to hear a little bit about some
of your surprises and AHA's and wow,

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I didn't think of that. I
would see that kind of stuff. That's

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always wonderful as a researcher to be
delighted like that. So those five categories

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in terms of your actual results,
are your results that there are these five

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categories? Or how would you summarize
your actual results? The five categories something

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I went in with, right,
so that would sort of be a circular

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Yes, I did find them,
but we all know we all know that

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when you're looking for something, you
will also find them, right, yes,

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right, so, yes, that
was confirmed. But I was much

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more interested in how would I find
them in which proportion leading to so I

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was very very surprised that these self
described successful organizations would hardly ever talk about

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who we are. They would always
almost always talk about how we do what

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we do. Another finding that blew
me away, really and I might want

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to say something up front so that
people can understand my own assumption that I

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had. In cognitive linguistics, which
is of course very closely related to anything

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that goes on in your brain and
your psyche and so on, we have

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a certain definition of the word success. It is that you can that you

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can construe and co construe the future
to your own desire, so that you

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can really construe a desired future.
For that very reason, I was very

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interested in how often was a quantitative
study as well, how often people would

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talk about the future of this company, you know, And as a consultant,

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I very very often go into organizations
and it's all about tomorrow, you

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know, what, what are we
going to do tomorrow? What? And

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let's do this, and let's do
that, and so I was relatively certain

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that I would find predominantly the sense
of what we can be in the future,

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that people would talk about that,
and they in our companies, they

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practically did not talk about that.
That was my first finding that blew me

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away. And that also confirmed in
a way my own research set up,

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because if you don't find what you
expected, then I think, you know

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that you set the research up fairly
well, you know another you know,

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I was really surprised about that,
and instead what those companies were doing,

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they were talking about what we're doing
now and how we're doing things, not

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the future, got it, Not
the future. And then there were other

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true surprises that I didn't expect at
all, given I mean with my background

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and linguistics and cognitive linguistics, I
did expect those companies to have a shared

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semantic memory. What I didn't expect
was that it was so clear, and

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that there was also a certain cognitive
type behind each and every company. So

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for each and every company, I
could really almost come up with the cognitive

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DNA, the way they think across
numbers, across levels, and a surprising

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ogeneity in those companies around the way
they think about their company and about how

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they do the things that they do, so that surprised me. And another

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thing that surprised me was also that
we do have certain cognitive linguistic patterns that

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we find, shall we say,
healthier than others. For example, that

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we normally wouldn't use the word no
too often. Right, But there was

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one company that consistently described themselves via
negated sentences. They would always describe what

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they don't do, and that surprised
me. But it was so consistent across

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their own organization that it was just
their type of conversing with each other.

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It was just their style of thinking
around their company, and it obviously didn't

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do them any harms. So one
could summarize that by saying, maybe those

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culture brandings are overrated. It doesn't
really matter so much what people think about

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their own organization. It's much more
the homogeneity around it that that state is

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consistent. Wow, And with that, I want to delve more into what

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you talked about their Erica, but
let's go ahead and take a quick break

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here. I'm a last Cortez,
your host we want on the air with

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Erica Jacoby. She is a freshly
minted PhD. She is the executive director

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of LC Global Consulting, Inc.
Which is a change, growth and innovation

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consulting firm with offices in New York
and Munich, Germany. We've been talking

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a bit about what got her into
her research and some of her actual results.

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After the rig, we're to talk
about some of the applications within organizations

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and what she's learned there. Stay
with us, we'll be right back.

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Elise Cortez is a speaker and engagement
and development catalyst. She designs and delivers

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00:18:19.960 --> 00:18:26.680
professional development, leadership and engagement workshops
and can bring her expertise to your organization.

212
00:18:26.920 --> 00:18:32.000
She will help ignite meaningful development within
your workforce that will increase employee engagement,

213
00:18:32.079 --> 00:18:36.079
performance and retention. To learn more
or to invite Elise to speak to

214
00:18:36.119 --> 00:18:41.480
your organization, please visit her at
www dot Elise Cortez dot com. She

215
00:18:41.599 --> 00:18:52.720
would welcome the opportunity to help get
your employees working on purpose. This is

216
00:18:52.839 --> 00:18:56.720
working on Purpose with Elise Cortez.
To reach our program today, send an

217
00:18:56.720 --> 00:19:03.920
email to Elise Ali see at Alice
Cortez dot com. Now back to working

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00:19:03.960 --> 00:19:08.559
on Purpose for just joining us.
My guest is doctor Erica Jacoby. She's

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the executive director of LC Global Consulting, Inc. Which is a change growth

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and innovation consulting firm with offices in
New York City and Munich, Germany.

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Before the break, we were talking
about your some of the findings that you

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found, Erica, and I want
to give you a chance to add anything

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else that you would like to presence
for us around finds. Then I want

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to make one comment on some of
the things you've been saying. Okay,

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you want to make a comment afterwards, okay, yes, So I think

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I've been stressing the thought homogeneity quite
a bit in the last outline before the

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break, but there was not only
thought homogeneity there. There was also diversity.

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There, quite a considerable diversity thought
diversity. And what I thought was

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really interesting is that that thought diversity
did not always originate at the top level.

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Much of the homogeneity originated from the
level, from the top management levels.

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That spontaneity, the diversity in their
thinking around their own identity and their

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cognitive types, that was much more
driven by, shall we say, the

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lower levels of the organization. And
I thought that was quite breathtaking. I

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was fascinated by it. And another
tendency that I saw that really blew my

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mind away was that there were certain
tendencies in the top management across all companies

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that almost overdid things. They were
so certain of how to almost brand their

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companies, and they always knew how
to sort of position their companies. And

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surprisingly so in the lower levels.
I don't like the word, but you

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know, just for lack of a
better one, in the other levels of

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the organization, it was a true
soul searching. They weren't sure of how

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to brand their company. It was
really almost stream of consciousness. They almost

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made their identity up in the moment. And it was even more surprising that

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then they used the same vocabulary around
it. But there was a tendency in

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all organizations to level extreme tendencies,
mostly by the top management, where it

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was an overbranding, an overbranded pattern, shall we say, those would be

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leveled out, they would be really
interpreted, they would be softened. And

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I thought this was really for me
one of the signs of the cognition of

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innovation that if we have extreme tendencies
in any organization, that in a healthy

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organization, these will be leveled out
by other parts of the organization. In

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the same way if we have a
consistent way of describing and feeling and living

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and practicing our identity by around eighty
percent in a healthy organization, I think

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this much we can say at least
for this research, there would also be

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totally new ways of describing the very
same phenomenon. And by that I really

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mean important words like what does it
mean to be successful in this company?

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So we would have different representations for
what that would mean. So we had

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an overall homogeneity around what it means
to be successful here, But then there

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would be new tendencies and that's where
the innovation can start. So it is

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this almost crazy, almost wild dynamic
of difficult to replicate for sure, dynamic

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of yes, we need this sense
of identity and that's where we need homogeneity.

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And then we also need this dynamic
of new things to emerge, and

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that needs to be possible. And
in my eyes, the strongest reading that

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I had from the from the findings
is really that in a healthy organization,

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whatever wild tendencies, overdone tendencies,
off balanced tendencies there are in an organization.

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In a healthy organization, at least, that's what I would like to

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probe into for my next research,
these will be balanced out. So those

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for my pretty surprising findings that would
say, how delicious. I'm so glad

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that I get to be here to
catch this and share it with our listeners

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across the globe. I'm very,
very interested and wanted to ask a couple

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of questions here and forgive me their
first One's probably going to sound very very

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German and basic. Two, But
I don't have a background in cognitive linguistics

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like you do. I am noticing
that when you talk about how you're paying

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attention to this language of how they
talk about, how they innovate and sort

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of the thinking that comes behind that. What I'm present too is within the

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work that I've been doing in management
consulting is we talk a lot about the

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declative power of language. That when
the way in which we use language is

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so important and can empower us or
disempower us, can limit us, can

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give us to can send it into
possibility. And I'm very present to the

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power of that those language structures that
you're talking about with an organizations. Can

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you comment on that? Yes,
number one, I would say you are

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saying it much more eloquently than I
ever think. That's wonderful. Yeah,

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I would say I would confirm that
and I would say that much of the

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research would confirm that too. And
it's not the big wuha, it's not

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around positive thinking. It's just really
how almost our brain is wired. And

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I think, I don't want to
over complicate things, but it is almost

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a way of how our brain and
therefore organizations and people how we learn,

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and that happens through language very often. So our brain whenever we look at

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any phenomenon, it could be a
chair, it could be the word success,

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which is really multilayered, but he
really knows what success is. Right.

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So the way our brain works is
we look at an object or a

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thing, a phenomenon and attached meaning
to it, that meaning will of persons,

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where human beings come by a language. And then we would also say

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there has been decade long, century
long research around this, that there is

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language that can enable future possibilities better
than other language. I would say,

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and we have so much research around
what we call, for example, generative

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metaphors, where companies also use metaphors
to create future worlds. I know of

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one company that for example, modeled
their organization designed via looking at how a

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city is modeled and so on,
and that's how they use that language around

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that metaphor to shape their organization design, which is very powerful. With that

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said, it's unfortunately my research is
not that easier didn't lend itself to these

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findings quite so readily. Well,
I for sure, language that I would

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usually pin down as not so helpful, but it worked for them. It

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was an extraordinarily successful company, so
it worked for them. And I even

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developed the thought further because I was
so struck by the idea that they would

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use all this relatively negative language.
And I really found out that each and

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every company had cognitive around matters of
growth. For example, so one company

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would have a conservative, preservative cognitive
type around the way they grew, so

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they would always say we're not doing
this and this and this, but we're

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doing that. And that was consistent
throughout the entire organization. They would always

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construe their identity in respect to their
growth strategies or even subconscious or unconscious growth

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strategies, with we will never ever
do this and that, but we will

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always do something else. So in
their company it didn't play out negatively at

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all. And so it's almost at
least in my research, if it goes

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along well with your identity with your
growth type, with your cognition, then

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it just goes along well, wonderful, wonderful, Okay. So that leads

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me to the next question that I
want to pose before we go on to

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00:29:00.279 --> 00:29:03.039
our next break. Here we've been
talking a bit about where this research came

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from and some of the interesting findings
that you found. Let's now apply it.

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So people that are listening to the
show who care about innovation, care

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about culture leaders, how what can
they take from what you've shared. What

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00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:18.279
does it mean in terms of being
a consultant or being a business leader what

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you've learned. Yeah, thanks for
that question, because I think it's a

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00:29:22.440 --> 00:29:26.319
very important question. None of us
want to do research that just stays in

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00:29:26.440 --> 00:29:33.839
the in the drawers or in the
business of our computers. Right. I've

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been thinking about this one long and
hard, and of course we need more

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00:29:37.160 --> 00:29:41.920
research. But I think we have
very strong indicators that, of course we

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have tendencies in the Western business culture
to overbrand our culture, to overbrand our

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identity. But I really didn't find
any of those over We're branded patterns or

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sentences to even only fly around the
organizations, so those would really go last.

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Instead. I think this free sense
making of things. This leaving room

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for attaching new meaning to old words. I think that is so important.

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And while I don't want people to
go out there and overbrand that, I

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do think it's important to sort of
establish the sense of home. We know

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who we are, we know what
we do in this company, and we

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do know how we do certain things. But it cannot be this relentlessly repeated

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slogan. It should be based on
this sense making that people can only have

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if they live and practice these things. That's what we know about language.

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It will only come out that way
if people have a lived memory behind it,

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a practiced memory behind it. So
it's it is something that comes from

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the shared practices, and it doesn't
come from branding. So I want to

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00:31:21.240 --> 00:31:23.680
be a little bit careful what I'm
saying here, but just to be a

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00:31:23.759 --> 00:31:30.440
little bit poignant, I would say, maybe notch down the culture initiatives a

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little bit. Don't overbrand your identity, don't don't overbrand your branding and your

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culture initiatives. For true innovation to
take place, I think we need the

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freedom to really, on the one
hand, feel at home, have shared

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sense of how we do things.
But then there needs to be this free

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floating, let's attach again meaning new
meaning to old things. And if we

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look at things like agile team collaboration, one thing that I could tell people

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maybe is, of course it's based
on giving each other daily feedback. But

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then let's look at each other whether
we have really understood the differentiations a lot,

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because sometimes when we give each other
feedback, we just go like,

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00:32:25.200 --> 00:32:29.000
oh, I understand what you were
trying to say, and then we take

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00:32:29.039 --> 00:32:34.039
it from there. But I think
for true, for truly new things to

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00:32:34.119 --> 00:32:39.279
emerge, it's important to really establish
mechanisms where you can say, oh,

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00:32:39.440 --> 00:32:44.359
hey, we want to reframe this
a little bit together as a team.

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Because other than that, I think
even in an agile team, things can

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00:32:49.559 --> 00:32:53.839
become the same old, same old
really quickly. Okay, perfect with that,

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00:32:53.960 --> 00:32:57.079
hold on, let's take another quick
break because I want to come back

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00:32:57.079 --> 00:33:00.480
and ask more about that. I'm
only SCRTEZ your hope. We're on the

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00:33:00.519 --> 00:33:04.640
air with doctor Erica Jacoby, who
is the executive director of LC Global Consulting,

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00:33:04.680 --> 00:33:07.480
Inc. A change growth and innovation
consulting firm with offices in New York

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City in Munich, Germany. We've
been talking about her research for findings and

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00:33:13.119 --> 00:33:15.920
how they can be applied with an
organizations to improve innovation. Stay with us,

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00:33:15.920 --> 00:33:21.359
We'll be right back. Elise Cortez
is a speaker and engagement and development

364
00:33:21.400 --> 00:33:27.119
catalyst. She designs and delivers professional
development, leadership and engagement workshops and can

365
00:33:27.160 --> 00:33:31.000
bring her expertise to your organization.
She will help ignite meaningful development within your

366
00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:37.200
workforce that will increase employee engagement,
performance and retention. To learn more or

367
00:33:37.240 --> 00:33:42.039
to invite Elise to speak to your
organization, please visit her at www dot

368
00:33:42.039 --> 00:33:45.960
Elise Cortez dot com. She would
welcome the opportunity to help get your employees

369
00:33:46.200 --> 00:33:58.519
working on purpose. This is working
on purpose with Elise Cortez. To reach

370
00:33:58.559 --> 00:34:04.559
our program today, end an email
to Elise ali Se at Elise Cortez dot

371
00:34:04.559 --> 00:34:09.360
com. Now back to working on
purpose. If you're just tuning in,

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00:34:09.400 --> 00:34:14.199
My guest is doctor Erica Jacobe.
She's a newly meanted PhD. By the

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00:34:14.199 --> 00:34:16.360
way, She's the executive director of
LC Global Consulting, Inc. Which is

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a change, growth and innovation consulting
firm with offices in New York City and

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00:34:20.880 --> 00:34:23.480
Munich, Germany. I want to
also thank my sponsor, Recover Mattress.

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00:34:23.880 --> 00:34:30.519
They are a hybrid mattress designed to
improve sleep from muscle recovery for active lifestyles.

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00:34:30.800 --> 00:34:34.159
They helped make the show possible.
Thank you to them. So before

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00:34:34.199 --> 00:34:37.639
the break, Erica, we were
talking a bit about some of your findings

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00:34:37.639 --> 00:34:40.440
and how companies can start to use
what you found to improve their innovation.

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And one of the things that I
really was riveted onto is what you had

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said earlier on in the show about
that the innovation wasn't necessarily driven from the

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higher up leadership, but rather some
of the more individual contributor team members.

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And I got this idea of you
know, really letting them play, letting

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them just letting them loose, if
you will. Can you comment a bit

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00:35:01.039 --> 00:35:05.320
on that of how that showed it
for you in your research? Yeah,

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I mean I would have. I
would absolutely agree with you, and I

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think in my dissertation, which is
going to be published very very soon,

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I sort of drew the parallel to
sort of saying like identity is almost acquired,

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like in the way we acquire a
first language. It's like, yes,

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00:35:29.719 --> 00:35:35.119
the parents give the role model,
and they will just be who they

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00:35:35.679 --> 00:35:40.920
are and they will speak the way
they speak. And that's how any child

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00:35:42.440 --> 00:35:46.280
of a first language just by being
in the same environment and so on.

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And then at one point, I
think for really being able to freely construe

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00:35:52.079 --> 00:35:59.519
desired future states again, that is
the definition of success in many kinds of

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00:36:00.039 --> 00:36:04.719
linguistic literatures. That's when we almost
need to say, okay, now you

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00:36:04.760 --> 00:36:07.400
can use your language and do with
it whatever you want to do, right,

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00:36:07.960 --> 00:36:15.199
And that's where the innovation and the
success and the new future desired states

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00:36:15.360 --> 00:36:22.320
can emerge and come into being.
And I thought this was quite a nice

399
00:36:22.400 --> 00:36:28.639
parallel, and I would second your
thought. It is about Yes, of

400
00:36:28.679 --> 00:36:32.599
course there are boundaries, and I
think boundaries are equally important for innovation and

401
00:36:34.079 --> 00:36:38.119
success. But the rest we need
to trust people that they will just get

402
00:36:38.159 --> 00:36:43.840
it right, so to speak.
Right they if they play with things,

403
00:36:44.679 --> 00:36:50.400
it'll it'll be all right. They
will probably not say anything bad against the

404
00:36:50.440 --> 00:36:53.440
culture or so. I think it's
a big credle for we don't need to

405
00:36:53.440 --> 00:37:00.760
be quite so concerned. In a
vibrant organization, things will be all right.

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00:37:02.119 --> 00:37:06.679
I just had a wonderful, marvelous
another delicious thought. I want to

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00:37:06.679 --> 00:37:08.400
try to sound really quick and see
if this also jies with what you came

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00:37:08.480 --> 00:37:14.360
up with, and what you know
about cognitive linguistics. When I'm out speaking

409
00:37:14.360 --> 00:37:17.159
to audiences, especially around passion and
purpose and identity, I talk to them

410
00:37:17.199 --> 00:37:22.079
about how they have their own life
story, that they themselves are the author

411
00:37:22.480 --> 00:37:27.360
and therefore they're also the editor.
They can change the way that they see

412
00:37:27.360 --> 00:37:30.159
themselves and therefore their identity based on
how they talk about their life stories.

413
00:37:31.000 --> 00:37:36.039
Are we talking the same sort of
thing? Absolutely? Okay, That's why

414
00:37:36.119 --> 00:37:39.239
I thought it was so, you
know, we all when we look at

415
00:37:39.280 --> 00:37:43.519
research, we always want to know
the findings from the end, but I

416
00:37:43.559 --> 00:37:47.639
think there were some findings in between, and for me, one of the

417
00:37:47.719 --> 00:37:52.679
greatest findings of all was that they
all, and I'm talking every single person

418
00:37:54.039 --> 00:38:00.440
that I looked at, they all
had the stream of consciousness whenever and remember

419
00:38:00.519 --> 00:38:05.519
I didn't even look at other things
of the interview. And also we need

420
00:38:05.559 --> 00:38:09.880
to remember that these things happened rather
unconsciously. The interviews were conducted around a

421
00:38:09.920 --> 00:38:15.599
totally different topic, so whenever they
were talking about who they are as a

422
00:38:15.719 --> 00:38:22.199
company, that's when they would go
into this almost insane stream of consciousness,

423
00:38:22.800 --> 00:38:29.119
which made the research and the analysis
really really difficult. For me. And

424
00:38:29.880 --> 00:38:34.079
you know, of course I had
cocoders and it was reviewed and by other

425
00:38:34.119 --> 00:38:37.119
people, and some other cognitive linguists
said like, oh my gosh, you

426
00:38:37.119 --> 00:38:42.559
know, the grammar goes off.
They're almost totally off here. How can

427
00:38:42.599 --> 00:38:46.400
we analyze this that I was thinking, this is the greatest finding. They

428
00:38:46.480 --> 00:38:52.800
do not draw upon slogans that you
know, they are not preaching to the

429
00:38:52.920 --> 00:39:00.280
choir, they're not chanting their values. They have to construe what it means

430
00:39:00.320 --> 00:39:09.159
to be us in the moment.
That's how unconsciously they're operating in the way

431
00:39:09.239 --> 00:39:15.840
we are and the way we do
things. And for that to come out

432
00:39:15.880 --> 00:39:22.400
eighty percent the same in an organization
that I found really breathtaking. And of

433
00:39:22.440 --> 00:39:28.639
course I would also almost like to
develop this into a you know, towards

434
00:39:28.679 --> 00:39:31.679
an assessment tool and things like this. But it is that stream of consciousness

435
00:39:31.679 --> 00:39:36.400
where I thought like, this is
something that happens in the moment, and

436
00:39:36.440 --> 00:39:40.639
that's what I found so breathtaking around
this. So I don't know whether you

437
00:39:40.679 --> 00:39:45.599
see the connection to what you said, but I do. I do,

438
00:39:45.760 --> 00:39:49.599
And I also want to acknowledge just
again how lovely it is to see somebody

439
00:39:49.719 --> 00:39:52.800
living in passion and purpose in the
work that they do. It's lovely to

440
00:39:52.840 --> 00:39:55.519
behold, it's enticing, it's enchanting. Who doesn't want to be around stuff

441
00:39:55.519 --> 00:39:58.960
like this? When someone's turned on
about what they're up to in life,

442
00:39:58.960 --> 00:40:01.840
it's just great because I'm so glad
you're here with me and we're sharing what

443
00:40:01.880 --> 00:40:07.559
you've been up to with the listeners
them here. So let's take it again

444
00:40:07.599 --> 00:40:10.239
back. So when when I'm gonna
think that I'm an organization, I met

445
00:40:10.280 --> 00:40:15.920
with a fantastic leader today in Dallas
and really respecting to admire his work in

446
00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:20.440
leadership. If if we were going
to introduce, and I suppose we are

447
00:40:20.440 --> 00:40:23.239
in this moment, introduce this research
to some various leaders across the globe.

448
00:40:23.519 --> 00:40:28.880
How can they take what you learned
to help improve their organization and help improve

449
00:40:28.920 --> 00:40:37.079
innovation within their organization? Again,
I don't think we are ready to have

450
00:40:37.159 --> 00:40:43.639
ready made answers, but yes,
but what I would hope is almost Peter

451
00:40:43.800 --> 00:40:49.960
Sanky once said about his really groundbreaking
work. Not that I want to compare

452
00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:54.480
myself to him, but he once
said in one of his books around his

453
00:40:55.119 --> 00:41:00.960
concept of the learning organization, I
do hope this doesn't not become the next

454
00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:05.760
fad. Right, yes, far
from it, of course with my research,

455
00:41:06.079 --> 00:41:09.079
but I do hope that nobody would
ever take this and sort of say

456
00:41:09.119 --> 00:41:13.360
like, Okay, now we do
X Y Z right, So it's it's

457
00:41:13.440 --> 00:41:19.159
not that easy, and I find
that a blessing. What I would hope

458
00:41:19.199 --> 00:41:29.360
for leaders to take away is that
is maybe an affirmation of the capability to

459
00:41:29.440 --> 00:41:38.880
stay within uncertainty exact sense. It
does beautifully. So, you know,

460
00:41:39.000 --> 00:41:46.400
as we have so many leadership concepts
nowadays, the question really is how do

461
00:41:46.480 --> 00:41:51.840
we live in a very, very
uncertain world where we have many threats?

462
00:41:51.840 --> 00:41:54.880
In the business world, we have
so many threats that we don't even want

463
00:41:54.679 --> 00:42:00.679
that and I think that is the
number one leader ship capability that we need

464
00:42:01.519 --> 00:42:07.400
for leaders to develop, that they
can stay within an absolute uncertain space and

465
00:42:07.559 --> 00:42:13.199
make sense of that. And the
only news I have is, guess what

466
00:42:14.039 --> 00:42:19.320
you can in a healthy organization.
You can trust your people, you can

467
00:42:19.400 --> 00:42:27.320
trust your you will have established everything
it takes for these people to operate in

468
00:42:27.360 --> 00:42:30.920
the best way they know around their
company. Again, almost like with children

469
00:42:31.079 --> 00:42:37.800
and great parents, that at one
point we do know what it takes to

470
00:42:37.840 --> 00:42:42.159
be successful in this company, and
then they can go out and play.

471
00:42:42.199 --> 00:42:45.639
As you said, and do things
on their own, and a leader of

472
00:42:45.639 --> 00:42:52.000
such an organization can rest assured that
they will have done everything it takes to

473
00:42:52.320 --> 00:42:58.159
sort of give them that sense of
belonging. There was one other finding that

474
00:42:58.159 --> 00:43:01.119
I would like to point out.
It's a little bit early days, but

475
00:43:01.400 --> 00:43:08.360
all of them, to an extraordinarily
high percentage, we were almost talking like

476
00:43:08.400 --> 00:43:16.280
four times across companies per identity claim, which is right seriously doubled and triple

477
00:43:16.360 --> 00:43:22.920
checked my own findings. Those people
were attaching their sense of who we are

478
00:43:22.000 --> 00:43:29.480
and how we do things to spatial
categorizations. And from what we think we

479
00:43:29.519 --> 00:43:35.800
know around cognitive linguistics is that we
can almost draw a mind map in there

480
00:43:36.039 --> 00:43:42.920
from their brains. They are really
while they were doing their their their sense

481
00:43:42.960 --> 00:43:47.519
making, while they were in that
stream of consciousness, you could have almost

482
00:43:47.559 --> 00:43:52.320
seen how they were walking around in
the company. That means they were there

483
00:43:52.360 --> 00:43:57.880
and they felt so great about this
that they just went like, huh,

484
00:43:57.920 --> 00:44:00.039
how do we do things here?
You know, they did even feel stressed

485
00:44:00.079 --> 00:44:06.800
out of having to, you know, to chant certain sloans quite to the

486
00:44:06.840 --> 00:44:12.280
country. I also found that a
good twenty percent they were totally contradicting each

487
00:44:12.280 --> 00:44:15.119
other. You know, one person
would say we always do things like this,

488
00:44:15.199 --> 00:44:22.199
and another would say the exact opposite, and that is healthy. And

489
00:44:22.239 --> 00:44:27.559
I think that can help leaders as
well, to sort of stay in that

490
00:44:28.320 --> 00:44:35.960
uncertainty space and almost roll with it, and and and rest assured that as

491
00:44:36.039 --> 00:44:45.760
long as we have this dynamic diversity, that's what keeps the organization healthy.

492
00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:49.599
I you know, I need to
still do the next research, which would

493
00:44:49.639 --> 00:44:57.119
be research on companies that are stuck. But what I would expect is really

494
00:44:57.159 --> 00:45:02.400
the opposite. I would almost expect
very branded language or you know that people

495
00:45:02.440 --> 00:45:08.480
have much more thought and mugenity or
whatever else. It remains to be seen.

496
00:45:09.480 --> 00:45:17.400
But I am relatively certain that for
companies to be that successful we're talking

497
00:45:17.400 --> 00:45:23.960
of extraordinary success, extraordinary success here
with these case companies, we need that

498
00:45:24.079 --> 00:45:30.280
dynamic. So I don't know whether
this is helpful. I know there are

499
00:45:30.360 --> 00:45:36.159
easier answers around leadership, but I
don't believe in them any longer. Well,

500
00:45:36.239 --> 00:45:37.440
a couple of things to that,
A couple of things to that.

501
00:45:37.559 --> 00:45:39.679
At first, I want to get
what chook up. What I got out

502
00:45:39.679 --> 00:45:47.639
of that was the importance of diversity
and enrolling or inviting diversity and encouraging people

503
00:45:47.679 --> 00:45:52.840
from various diverse perspectives and experiences to
contribute their their thought and their their perspective

504
00:45:52.920 --> 00:45:55.719
is what I got out of that. Another thing that I got that you

505
00:45:55.719 --> 00:46:00.239
said earlier too, that I think
is really interesting. We'll be before I

506
00:46:00.280 --> 00:46:04.000
say that just a sect let me
also say that I also appreciate that you

507
00:46:04.079 --> 00:46:07.079
are not giving pat answers like companies
should go do this, I recommend that

508
00:46:07.119 --> 00:46:10.719
they'd take this action, this behavior, which would be very very prescriptive.

509
00:46:12.159 --> 00:46:16.360
And I appreciate that you're actually help
making us think. And I think that's

510
00:46:16.480 --> 00:46:22.280
really an important distinction between what we
often hear in terms of what's out there

511
00:46:22.320 --> 00:46:24.880
and what you're doing for us today. And I really applaud that, Erica

512
00:46:24.960 --> 00:46:30.039
think it's important for us to think
for ourselves. And then the other thing

513
00:46:30.039 --> 00:46:34.079
that I wanted to call out a
little bit was you said something about reframing

514
00:46:34.159 --> 00:46:38.079
before, and I can certainly imagine
that in a conversation in an organization where

515
00:46:38.159 --> 00:46:42.719
somebody's maybe they're talking about something and
maybe they are stuck and they keep saying

516
00:46:42.719 --> 00:46:45.480
the same things over and over again, and I wonder what would happen is

517
00:46:45.519 --> 00:46:49.159
if somebody even just said, can
we reframe that for just a moment.

518
00:46:50.519 --> 00:46:54.360
Yeah, I mean, I'm just
really trying to put my thoughts into the

519
00:46:54.480 --> 00:47:00.639
more applicable plots, into a for
example, block articles or webcasts or where

520
00:47:00.639 --> 00:47:07.840
else podcasts. And I was also
really thinking reframing is a great art because

521
00:47:07.880 --> 00:47:12.519
I would even by by now,
I would even urge all of us,

522
00:47:12.559 --> 00:47:14.960
all of us. I mean,
we walk around in the business world,

523
00:47:14.960 --> 00:47:20.400
we walk around in our daily lives, all of us to question certain words.

524
00:47:20.519 --> 00:47:24.280
Diversity is one of them. I
always think when we talk about diversity,

525
00:47:24.320 --> 00:47:28.800
we sort of say, yeah,
we appreciate diversity as long as you

526
00:47:28.840 --> 00:47:32.679
think my way. And I mean
I think we all have me included those

527
00:47:32.840 --> 00:47:37.599
hot you know, hot buttons where
we could explode the minute we hear certain

528
00:47:37.639 --> 00:47:43.639
things. And that's in my work
with teams and organizations and leaders sets where

529
00:47:43.639 --> 00:47:47.119
I always urge people to now as
the time, you know, when you

530
00:47:47.360 --> 00:47:52.280
sense this almost anger. We've all
been there, right, this anger around

531
00:47:52.320 --> 00:47:59.000
certain ideas, this this oh my
gosh, how could you normally say that

532
00:47:59.000 --> 00:48:05.760
that's the time that that those emotions
which we all want to suppress in meetings

533
00:48:05.960 --> 00:48:12.800
and in organizations and so on.
I always think and urge leaders to to

534
00:48:12.880 --> 00:48:16.280
sort of take that as your guide
line to say, Okay, whatever was

535
00:48:16.400 --> 00:48:22.239
said here is probably really really important. So anger is a good signpost.

536
00:48:23.199 --> 00:48:30.679
Laughter another one, silence another one. Whenever we find ourselves in meetings and

537
00:48:30.840 --> 00:48:37.320
people. You know, someone one
of my work with with the company,

538
00:48:37.480 --> 00:48:44.039
we once said, you know,
just brainstorming what could we develop for the

539
00:48:44.119 --> 00:48:49.320
future. And then someone said,
well, what about if this company won

540
00:48:49.440 --> 00:48:55.000
the Nobel Prize? And everybody started
started laughing, and I said, pass

541
00:48:55.079 --> 00:49:00.360
what for? So that's that.
Whenever there is after, whenever there is

542
00:49:00.440 --> 00:49:05.639
anger that we want to suppress,
whenever there is silent, I think those

543
00:49:05.679 --> 00:49:13.519
are good sign posts that we're trying
to gloss over differences. That is a

544
00:49:13.559 --> 00:49:16.320
fantastic way to finish the show.
What an incredibly powerful point to finish with

545
00:49:16.440 --> 00:49:21.119
doctor Erica Jacoby. It is so
great to have you back on the show

546
00:49:22.000 --> 00:49:23.800
and listeners. If you want to
learn more about the work that Erica and

547
00:49:23.840 --> 00:49:27.800
her team do, or check out
her research or engage with her about her

548
00:49:27.800 --> 00:49:32.039
research, contact her. You can
visit her website. It's LCAs Global dash

549
00:49:32.320 --> 00:49:37.440
us dot com. Join us next
week when we have to get another delightful

550
00:49:37.440 --> 00:49:40.719
conversation about this topic of meaningful and
productive work, and remember that work is

551
00:49:40.719 --> 00:49:46.000
at least one third of our life, So let's work on purpose. We

552
00:49:46.159 --> 00:49:51.199
hope you've enjoyed this week's program.
Be sure to tune in to Working on

553
00:49:51.239 --> 00:49:55.960
Purpose featuring your host, Alice Cortez, each week on the Voice America Empowerment

554
00:49:57.039 --> 00:50:00.000
Channel. This week, find your
life's purpose at work