Crafting intuition
The human animal goes by guessing. We can learn to guess better.
Out of every hundred people
those who always know better:
fifty-two.
Unsure of every step:
almost all the rest.
—Wisława Szymborska, from “A Word on Statistics” (translated by Joanna Trzeciak)
The more I learn about human cognition, the more I realize that conscious, deliberate thought is an accessory to action, not the primary agent. The vast majority of our sense-making and action-taking happens without our conscious attention. As philosopher David Hull puts it:
“The rule that human beings seem to follow is to engage the brain only when all else fails – and usually not even then.”
Our thinking brain shows up late to the party, when it’s invited at all. So it’s odd that most of our management discussion and development emphasizes conscious, deliberate thought. As organizational theorist Karl Weick (1983) described the issue in the workplace: “although the pace is exhausting and reflection allows people to regroup, it is not obvious that outcomes would improve substantially by the simple addition of more thought.”
This isn’t to say we don’t think consciously and deliberately. Rather, most of the process is unavailable to our conscious attention.
So, if that’s the case, how do you improve the quality and impact of your arts management practice? You actually practice in ways that build more resilient and robust intuition. Practice, here, doesn’t mean simply doing something over and over again. Rather, as any craftsperson will tell you, improvement requires purposeful practice – effort toward specific goals, with focus, attending to feedback, beyond your comfort zone (Ericsson and Pool 2016).
As a start, in your daily practice, don’t review any data or report without first making a guess about it. Individually, or even better in a team, share your guesses for last night’s ticket revenue or event attendance, for the results of the recent audience survey, for the reviews before they appear online, for the click-throughs on your recent email blast. Then you can look at the information to see whether you guessed well.
As another practice, build a habit of structured debriefs immediately following an activity or event. What happened? What did we notice? How did we notice it? What did we miss? What would we do differently? This can be particularly useful if there’s a seasoned expert in the conversation, although their intutions may be completely invisible to them.
It’s tempting in the workplace to “stop and think” and to explore by detached reflection. But once you realize that your conscious, deliberate brain is the sidecar not the steering wheel, you can improve your impact in ways that matter.
From the ArtsManaged Field Guide
Function of the Week: People Operations
People Operations involves designing and driving systems and practices that attract, engage, retain, and develop people within the enterprise (also called human resources).
Framework of the Week: Levels of Mastery
The Dreyfus brothers' "Five-Stage Model of Adult Skill Acquisition" describes milestones on the journey from novice to expert. These Levels of Mastery can provide a useful lens on learning for yourself and your team.
Photo by Pixabay
Sources
Ericsson, Anders, and Robert Pool. 2016. Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Hull, David L. 2001. Science and Selection: Essays on Biological Evolution and the Philosophy of Science. Cambridge Studies in Philosophy and Biology. Cambridge, U.K. ; Cambridge University Press.
Weick, Karl E. 1983. “Managerial Thought in the Context of Action.” In The Executive Mind: New Insights on Managerial Thought and Action, edited by Suresh Srivastva, 1st ed., 221–42. The Jossey-Bass Management Series & The Jossey-Bass Social and Behavioral Science Series. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.