Benefiting at work from Brain Based Insights

Are you the person you’d like others to see in you?

People who give evaluations often complain that some more problematic workers tend to give themselves highest scores in every assessment category. When I ask graduate students to evaluate team members the same problematic people give themselves and all their teammates perfect scores.

Have you seen this tendency?

It’s really a matter of intrapersonal intelligence – or a person’s ability to spot, admit and work with their strengths as well as their weaknesses. How so?

Intrapersonally smart workers tend to …

1. Fit in time for thought and reflection – even on a busy day
2. Seem satisfied with life’s offerings, and factor in tougher times
3. Run from jealousy by capitalizing on their own strengths
4. Offer concrete help on any project – even when others do better
5. Laugh about their own weaker areas and spread the humor
6. Act ethically and take stands without fear of what people will think
7. Worry less because they act more
8. Model openness to grow and develop new skills and habits

9. Ignore cynicism and avoid sharing their hopes or dreams with cynics
10.Encourage and support others more than criticize people or events

Are you intrapersonally intelligent? Here are questions that show where you score out of a possible 10 yes responses.

Ask:
1. Do you schedule in time to think and relax on your busiest days?
2. Would others say you model contentment on an ordinary day?
3. Do you support and admire people who achieve more than you?
4. Are you one of the first to offer supportive ideas to the project team?
5. Can you list three weaker areas and show how do you handle these well?
6. Did you solve an ethical dilemma lately the way Mother Teresa might solve it?
7. Rather than worry, did you convert any problems into possibilities this week?
8. Can you describe any specific time this week you learned and used a new skill?
9. Do you avoid cynics and diffuse cynicism where you work?
10. Would people congratulate your ability to encourage more than criticize?

How’d you rate? The survey will help you to identify one or two areas to work on developing more intrapersonal intelligence ... and since IQ is no longer seen as fixed ... that growth quite straightforward.

Simply act on one weak area a week. I say … act … because the brain rewires daily based on what you do in a day. Take a grump for coffee, for instance, and the next day you’ll arrive at work with new neuron pathways  for being a more intrapersonally kind person. Or perhaps you'll grow more dendrite brain cell connections to resolve conflicts before they take people down.

Can you see how more of intrapersonal intelligence would add well-being to your day, your career and your circle?