The Biggest Danger to Your Organisation
organizations around the world
are currently obsessed with data and
this makes sense right
leaders believe that if they can just
get the right data and the right
information
then they’ll make better decisions well
i’m here to tell you
that’s not true that actually leaders
are fundamentally
hardwired to make some pretty poor
decisions
add in the multiplier effect of big data
and we’re talking about some
very scary potential results but there
is a way out of this
leaders can actually rewire themselves
to stop behaving this way they can
actually rewire
their own data there’s just one problem
which is this cannot be learned
intellectually
you can’t read it in a book or be told
to stop behaving this way
we are so fundamentally hardwired not to
be open
in the way that i’m about to be open
with you that the only way that you can
get access to this different way of
being
is to discover it for yourself
well how do you do that you can start by
being open
start by listening to this conversation
like you’ve never
had a conversation like this before stop
trying to figure it out
or know where it’s going just let it
unfold
i invite you to set aside your normal
way of listening
which is like a commentator up in the
stands judging what’s going on
down there on the field
and instead i invite you to listen like
you’re actually on the field
right here with me like everything i’m
saying
is about you and can make a real
difference in your life
like this conversation is about you
are you willing to do that
then let’s begin the first thing to get
is that no matter who you are
what your title is or how accomplished
you are
you are a human being this is true for
the co
for the ceo members of parliament
top scientists renowned experts everyone
we’re all human and as humans we are
fundamentally hardwired
to hide we all have experiences in our
lives that teach us
that hiding is safer we take a risk we
put ourselves out there
and when we get shut down we learn not
to do that again
so we learn to hide aspects of who we
are
things we think might make us look
stupid or look bad
we hide from situations that might
embarrass us
even people’s names when was the last
time you were in a conversation and you
forgot someone’s name
and instead of just asking them what’s
your name
you waited and hoped that someone else
would say it so that you could pretend
like you knew it all along
we all hide
this is how it works i’m three years old
i have this big yellow velour chair in
my room and i’m standing on it
and i’m holding a tube of lipstick and i
color the deepest darkest red circle i
can on my stomach and now i’m covering
the chair
my horse with war paint oh yes
i am preparing for battle and i am so
excited
and then i hear something on the stairs
dad’s coming and in that moment i know
i’m in trouble as my dad walks in i dive
behind the chair
lisey he says what are you up to and i
just freeze
and act like nothing
like hoping he won’t know that’s me that
did that to the chair
and that’s it in that moment my brain
hardwires
a formula for hiding this one works so
that anytime i think i’m in trouble
i immediately act like i don’t know what
you’re talking about
i didn’t know anything about that and
just like that
the wiring is in place the year i get my
driver’s license i get pulled over for
doing 78 miles per hour in a 55.
the officer walks up to my window and i
tell him hysterically
that it was impossible for me to know
that i was going that fast
i cried i actually believed myself
and that’s the point is i didn’t sit
there and decide
how to respond my hard wiring did
my brain went into its automatic mode of
hiding and i
had no say in the matter but it gets
worse
because that wiring it comes with us to
work
so now i’m 28. i’m a leader
i lead teams all across the u.s but when
things go badly
i dive behind the chair a staff member
comes and tells me
she has serious concerns about the way
we’re running some of our programs
and i just act like i don’t really know
about that doesn’t make sense
but actually i do no matter how
successful i am
i can’t be with making mistakes and i
never get
it’s because i’m desperately looking for
somewhere to hide
i used to treat people awfully
what i did i blamed my teams
that’s the kind of leader i could be
today
i have a choice i don’t treat people
like that anymore
our wiring to hide to lie
to fake it’s pervasive it runs you
and you don’t even know it your hard
wiring not you
is making decisions every day and you
have no say at all
i do an exercise with senior leaders i
put them
in an almost very embarrassing situation
almost
right before embarrassment happens i
have them stop
and they get to see for the first time
what their brains are doing they see
what they say to themselves
and they see what they do automatically
with
no chance of acting differently
in that moment one woman saw that when
she was 10 years old she was standing in
front of a class
and her teacher said to her you’re not
as smart as you think you are
39 years later she never spoke in
meetings and she didn’t know why
what she saw that day was her wiring
she had decided if she ever spoke up she
might get found out for being stupid
so she stayed quiet now this woman
speaks
and she let’s just say she
is not stupid
so let’s get a glimpse into how your
brain is running your life
with or without your permission so
wherever you are
i invite you to just gently close your
eyes
just close your eyes and just breathe
in and out just breathe
and start to notice the part of your
brain
that’s about judging what does it say to
you
it might sound like this is a pretty
dumb exercise
especially over video
it might sound like her voice is pretty
annoying
mine sounds like this room is freezing
just breathe and start to notice the
part of your brain
that’s about winning it might say
i could give this talk better or
i would have picked a better topic mine
says
i hope this is the most interesting ted
talk ever
just notice
notice that part of your brain that’s
about hiding
and about looking good it might sound
like
i hope i don’t look stupid with my eyes
closed
it might say if anyone asks i’ll say i
was just playing along
mine says what were you thinking telling
the whole world
what a crap manager you used to be
just notice
your brain is constantly talking to you
all day long it’s manufacturing things
it’s judging you and it’s judging other
people
it’s trying to win it’s making sure you
look good
that your faults are carefully hidden
and make darn sure you don’t look stupid
at work or in public
just notice that chatter in your brain
it never goes away
it’s looking at data
it’s making decisions
it’s coming with you to one-on-ones
it’s showing up at board meetings in
every organization
around the world
now open your eyes
now you’re starting to get a glimpse
into what’s happening
into who’s making decisions really
often when i run workshops like this
with senior leaders
i introduce myself the normal way i’m
lisa barrett
yale university i have an mba from
insead
became a partner at age 27 i’ve won tons
of awards
was a director at coursera set up a
venture capital fund
was a chief scientific advisor and
director of analysis at the uk ministry
of justice
and responsible for one of the largest
connected data projects in government
improving the ability to make decisions
for millions of people in fact probably
most of the country that’s who we say we
are right
our cv but what if we introduced
ourselves differently
like who am i really
for example one thing i
don’t normally share with people but
that did shape me is that i grew up in a
privileged family
and i remember taking some friends to my
grandparents house and the way that they
responded made me incredibly
embarrassed i never wanted to be seen
that way again
so i started acting like i didn’t have
much money i bought my clothes second
hand and by the time i was in my 30s i
didn’t feel comfortable spending money
on myself at all in fact i felt guilty
after i was hit by a car my boyfriend at
the time
begged me to get specialist medical care
and i told him
i couldn’t afford it
the way that i saw myself and hiding
from what i from how i grew up
it impacted how i treated myself and my
relationships with other people
it impacted everything
learning to be open about that has
allowed me to take better care of myself
it’s also allowed me to be proud of
myself and the decisions i’ve made in my
career
because i do care that everyone has
access to the kind of opportunities that
i
had growing up so the truth is
i am a successful business leader but
i’m also a human being
and when i introduce myself that way in
a room the whole room changes
even now maybe you can feel between us
we’re in a completely
different space from when we started
because the truth is underneath our
wiring
we all want to be seen
what does this have to do with data
everything do you know how difficult it
is for a senior leader to say that they
don’t have a clue what the blockchain is
that they don’t have any idea whether
it’s even relevant to their organization
or not
do you know how impossible it can feel
as a senior leader to be handed a
proposal
or a set of algorithms or a technical
product and be able to say
i don’t understand this our brains will
always tell us to hide that is how we
are wired
but it doesn’t have to be that way i
first saw this in very stark relief when
i worked alongside the guys who
literally built netflix
these guys are legendary and what i
noticed is they just kept asking really
simple questions
they would say things like how does it
work show me
or i don’t understand why are we doing
this
they would stop presentations and say
i’m sorry i just don’t get it
can you walk it through again can you do
it step by step
this is incredibly rare
leaders are not naturally inclined to
admit when we don’t get stuff
and i’m talking about decision makers
all over the world who are more likely
to pretend than to say
i don’t actually understand this massive
decision we’re making
these are people running major
corporations with vast amounts of
personal data who are investing heavily
in artificial intelligence these are
policy makers
who are writing the rules for how
privacy the exchange of information
the economy and personal rights will be
dictated in the future
these are the people running companies
and countries
around the world they’re all obsessed
with data
and they should be but they should get
very interested in the data
in their own heads because as i told you
at the beginning this is not something
you can just be told or read in a book
you won’t just start acting differently
you have to discover it for yourself
but when you discover something for
yourself like maybe you’ve started to
discover
something for yourself here today
you’ll always have that and the desire
to hide by the way
never goes away i consider myself to be
a sort of expert in these things and yet
i found myself
massively hiding at the beginning of
covid
i started a job in a new company with as
an exec
and as i got on zoom and met my
colleagues i realized there was
something
i really didn’t want them to know and
that’s that i don’t have children
because my brain was telling me how can
you be a real exec
if you don’t have kids did it impact my
ability to make good decisions you bet
it did
i was spending most of the time thinking
about not having that conversation than
paying attention to anything
that we were meant to be talking about
it really took something for me to tell
my colleagues not only that i don’t have
kids but this massive story had created
about it
but when i did it was hugely freeing and
the thing is
i want to be a great leader and great
leaders
have to constantly give up hiding
i don’t think the world wants more
leaders who are going to stand up and
pretend they’ve got it all figured out
that they have all the answers
i think the world wants people who are
going to stand up and say
i don’t know but we’ll figure it out
together
not hiding is so not normal
but it’s necessary for greatness and for
the type of leadership that makes any
kind of real difference with people
and for being fully alive and i know
that if you’re on the edge of this thing
if
you’ve been pretending for a long time
then this sounds terrifying
like what if you don’t have all the
answers
what if you have to put up your hand and
say i have been pretending
i don’t understand this stuff what if
you’re a senior leader you’re meant to
have it all figured out
and you really don’t
well welcome to the club
thank you for being bigger than the need
to hide
you