Everything we teach at #HumanIntelligence about generating better critical thinking, creative thinking, and collaboration depends on teammates feeling safe enough to express themselves, including the diverse perspectives they bring. Recently, I’ve spent more time working to understand how to lead a team with inclusive practices that allow for neuro-diversity in addition to the more common forms of diversity we normally consider. You don’t have anyone neurodiverse on your tea

I’ve spent more than 50% of my life working to create positive impact inside a bureaucracy. I had more failures than successes along the way, but I learned a few lessons along the way. Here’s what you need to know: Bureaucracies don’t innovate. Fighting against this reality wastes time, effort, and money as the bureaucratic machine delays, derails, or destroys ideas that could be game-changers. But, that doesn’t mean you can’t innovate despite the bureaucracy. Whether you ar

Trust is an action verb…believing. It isn’t a feeling. It isn’t a reward that is earned. It isn’t even a noun built over time. It's a choice

Last year, as I presented more and more workshops about innovation, I discovered I had a blindspot. Most of my examples of true innovators, people who changed their world with creative problem solving, were white men. It was easy for me to point to Steve Jobs, the Wright Brothers, or Albert Einstein as people who made a lasting, world-wide impact through the force of their ideas, but I struggled to have the name of a more representative person at my fingertips. I worked hard

This is precisely the problem of overthinking. I burned through mental energy, thinking harder and harder, passing more and more possibiliti

Psychological safety is not about avoiding consequences. It is not trusting an organization, and there are some things more important than psychological safety. But, to read social media posts about the powerful concept, it is permission to be radical without consequences. Semantics evolve in every language, but some words evolve faster than others. New words or concepts begin unknown, then are misunderstood, then accepted into common use, then overused, then twisted to mea

You see it everywhere…”we need more critical thinking.” Whether the World Economic Forum, Indeed, Forbes, or hundreds of other articles, there is a growing consensus that critical thinking is one of the top skills you need to survive and thrive in the world today (and tomorrow). So, let’s start right now. There’s 100+ years of research on Critical Thinking with dozens of definitions of critical thinking, but, honestly, none of those academic definitions are helpful for people

Doing the Double Diamond isn't enough...change your mindset to generate lasting impact.

Episode 12 of Monday Morning #HumanIntelligence with Ken Kato, Presidential Innovation Fellow. Ken talks not only about the power of Agile thinking to improve software development, but also how he applies the mindset to other areas of his life. He highlights Empathy as the #1 skill he aims to teach new team members and the importance of understanding the human dimensions of technology. Here is the quick hit on the importance of Empathy. Here is the full 30 minute version: Jo

Johanna Quintero, Founder of SmartVine, joined Monday Morning #HumanIntelligence to talk about her experience as a businesswoman and consultant. If you only have 2.5 minutes, watch this one: If you have time for the full show, watch this one:

A bit off the beaten path for #HumanIntelligence, but the events of the day and their connection to collaborating humans demanded an honest

Understanding and mitigating the status quo bias helps you make sure you are making a choice rather than walking a well-worn path.

Critical thinking defines constraints. What is knowable? What information is trustworthy? What is my confidence in this information?

The awful combination of lazy brains and an increasingly hostile information environment powered by artificial intelligence could destroy us

Updated: Jun 27, 2019 As the world moves into an age of autonomy and artificial intelligence, human skills such as creativity become more important. To thrive in the new reality, leaders must also shift their management styles. The manager who successfully increased assembly line productivity 10% by optimizing the position of workers and their tools will find himself out of workers and ideas when the robots show up. The CEO who increased output by offering bonuses to employee

In late October 2018, the Journal of Psychopharmacology published a study from The Netherlands (where else?) demonstrating that low doses of psychedelic truffles increased a person’s creativity. Notably, the study showed improvements in both divergent thinking skills (finding many possible solutions to problem) and convergent thinking skills (using insight to find the most appropriate solution to a problem). In a test designed to score idea originality, the mean score for th