The Case of the Bonsai Manager - R. Gopalakrishnan

This is the perfect antidote for every manager who feels they are not achieving their full potential. Effective leadership is not just about hard facts but also about listening to, and using, your intuition. Using anecdotes from Nature and the world of management, R.Gopalakrishnan explores how you can be more intuitive, inclusive and humane. This was 49th of 2020.

The six simple messages of this book are:

• Intuition does exist and it is very important for the manager, especially at the more senior levels of leadership
• Analysis and intuition are not substitutes for each other, they are complementary.
• A manager can develop intuition through viewing issues holistically, with the 'surrounds' of the issues, and not in isolation. He should observe and learn from the peripherals of his vision, hearing, experiences and relationships.
• The manager's intuition is enhanced through varied experiences and relationships, contemplation and reflection
• A manager can develop his intuition by exploring and sensing beyond what is visible and audible.
• The leader needs to think about issues at the 'edges of the spectrum of the obvious'.

The book is organized in five sections:

• Section 1 is a discussion about analysis and intuition. It contains a relevant incident from author's experience.
• Section 2 is a pragmatic view about how the leader's intuition works.
• Section 3 is about building intuition through varied experiences and varied relationships.
• Section 4 is about building intuition through contemplation and reflection and
• Section 5 is about building intuition through sensing and perceiving beyond the obvious. 

Intuition complements analysis and is not a substitute; it does exist and increases in importance with seniority and larger responsibility. People with an intuition-driven mind are more interested in the possibilities than in the predictions, they like to listen to what comes from the unconscious, and they  emphasize vision and purpose and are less driven by process and routine. 

There is a sort of ‘email ID’ in the brain.  BRIM, standing for the Brain’s Remote Implicit Memory. The letter R in BRIM stands for ‘remote’. The part of the memory called the remote memory  stretches very deep into your psyche and childhood - your village, your grandfather’s house, the smells of mother’s cooking, and the stories that granny told you. This remote memory is very durable. That is why a person may forget what happened last week, but can recall early life events with clarity. The letter I in BRIM stands for 'implicit'.  In the implicit memory, you hold processes - such processes manifest themselves as skills and habits. BRIM is the common area between the remote and implicit memory in the brain. To develop strong intuition, this  email ID must be accessed for messages stored there. 

Both in Nature and in organizations, there arises two responses to an external threat: an adaptation to survive and a reallocation of resources. Accelerated evolution occurred in species with three characteristics:  one or a few members get and idea (innovation), then they share the idea with their colleagues (social propagation) and finally, they all try the idea out in different circumstances and location (mobility). If you do not expect to retire, you tend not to nurture talent. Scarce resources promote corporation.  Sense, listen and feel so that you can crack the code of change and rearrange the resources of the company to suit that code. 

A good leader must combine in him two important but competing and contrary qualities. One is to help create a vision, and energize, enthuse and empower his people to great heights of achievements and performance and the other is the architectural dimension. i.e. creating systems, structure and processes in the organization to ensure that the dreams and the views are  properly channeled and implemented. This is where the 'questioning' comes and contrarian viewpoint surface.  Enduring leaders are conscious about themselves as human beings, about their weaknesses, and about what can derail them. They have an eye of the fly. Society values efficiency more than effectiveness. One of the most satisfying things in life is a sense of purpose beyond oneself. This provides the values aspect of coping with turbulence. 

 "A bonsai manager limits him or herself from reaching his or her full potential."  It's impossible for people to reach full potential, as we put tape around ourselves. Become more self-aware, reflect on the experiences and learn from them. Each person is distinctive. Intuition is enhanced  through immersion, openness, contemplation and reflection (ImOpCoRe). The people who have demonstrated extraordinary intuition throughout history  (for example, Einstein, Mozarat and Salk) are people who demonstrated ImOPCoRe in abundant measure. 

To quote Einstein: "The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift. 

Self Help Work Book:

Thought No. 1: To develop your powers of Intuition, you must believe that intuition does exist and has some power. Non-Believers cannot develop their intuition.

Thought No. 2: Before you convert your belief into intuition, you realize that 'what you know that you know' is a small part of what you 'do not know that you know'.

Thought No. 3: If you seek methods that will quickly develop your intuition, be patient, programmed method do not add up to much with regard to developing intuition.

Thought No. 4: To learn how to be intuitive, you must prepare and be prepared. You must adopt certain techniques that help enhance intuition. 

Thought No. 5: Much of our academic training is programmed teaching with formal curriculum and target milestones. Our minds are enslaved to such a regimen. You have to liberate your mind from such a tyranny early on in the intuition journey. 

Thought No. 6: Intuition comes into the consciousness in a flash, for just a moment. It may not remain in the conscious, so you have to write it down when it flashes from the unscious. 

Thought No. 7: Recognizing patterns and imagining situations are both important aids to intuition. These can be practised. 

As Ratan Tata writes in the foreword; " This book is about effective leadership in today's uncertain times and addressing budding managers aspiring to become tomorrow's leaders.