Focus
Listen to the question . . . pause and reflect . . . answer . . . stop talking
It was 2011. I was sitting in a bland, windowless room in New Orleans, waiting to be legally deposed. I didn’t know anyone there. The corporate attorney sitting next to me was representing my employer, not me. That day, I was surrounded by foes.
Your Brain at Work
David Rock is a business consultant who connects brain science with human performance. He wrote Your Brain at Work to provide “the most useful discoveries about the brain in simple language for people at work.”[1] He gives practical advice on prioritizing work activities, engaging in tricky conversations, and providing feedback, connecting normal brain functioning to how we act and react. His teaching style is easy to follow, using an ongoing narrative of two professionals as they encountered common workplace struggles. I recommend the book for its concise collection of self-management tips.
Rock gives terminology and context to some lessons I have instinctually learned. For example, his description of relatedness and the brain chemistry when sensing friend or foe is helpful to this introvert.[2] I am very cautious when it comes to interpersonal relations. It is one thing to be self-aware of my bias for keeping distance. Rock provides the concrete tool of reappraisal to navigate the emotional landscape.[3] By seeing my own thinking, a foe might turn into a friend.
The book has lots of other practical tips. Buy a bigger computer monitor. Hide your email window. Let the other person be right to diffuse issues of status and autonomy. Pattern and perfect routine tasks to conserve mental energy. The right level of stress makes me productive. I already knew these things. Now I have words to describe, say, the inverted U and why I don’t finish projects when I’m under too little or too much stress.
Foes
Back to the windowless room. I didn’t need David Rock to tell me to watch my back. I was testifying on one of the largest environmental disasters in history.[4] Tens of billions of dollars were at stake. In a deposition, whatever I say becomes an open record. My aim was to answer the questions, no more and no less.
I had to assume that everyone was a foe. Looking for friends would take energy away from my focus of clear, concise, and direct answers. We went through several of the attorneys rapidly. They were in the room to determine if I was a foe to their clients. Then, it was time for questioning by an attorney representing the states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. I had been warned about him. He made some pleasant opening remarks. David Rock later told me that this was a ploy to get my brain to release oxytocin, to turn a foe into a friend.[5] I didn’t change my gaze from the same two-inch spot on the table.
Listen to the question . . . pause and reflect . . . answer . . . stop talking
In my preparation, I learned to get into a rhythm for answering questions. This was meant to work on my mindfulness, to stick with what I knew and not embellish. I now understand that the pattern was getting embedded into my basal ganglia.[6] My stage—the metaphor Rock uses for the prefrontal cortex—was freed up to understand and recall. Nothing else was getting on the stage.
Depositions are all about playing defense. I don’t want to give the foe an opening, a new piece of evidence, or a different line of questioning. We went through the usual warm-up. The attorney asked me about my background, qualifications and position with the company. He had no idea that I spent seven years working for an expert witness. I certainly wasn’t going to offer that information.
Listen to the question . . . pause and reflect . . . answer . . . stop talking
His line of questioning moved to a report that one of my employees wrote. Regarding a conservative design assumption, Steve had written that the engineering team should use it because “I’ve seen it happen.” The attorney began hammering me over why Steve’s advice had been ignored, raising his voice a little higher each time he spoke.
Expectations
I’ve learned to begin new ventures with low expectations, often joking that I’d rather have them exceeded than be disappointed. David Rock put science to my observation. He noted that “unexpected rewards release more dopamine than expected ones.”[7] Conversely, unmet expectations generate a response that reduces prefrontal functioning. Rock’s suggestion is to practice setting lower expectations. I like this guy!
Listen to the question . . .pause and reflect . . . wait for it
The plaintiff’s attorney should have read Your Brain at Work. His line of questioning had raised his expectations sky high. As he built to a crescendo, both in words and volume, you could see the adrenaline flowing (I know, wrong organ. Work with me here). I have no idea what other actors were on his prefrontal stage, but it was crowded. He was losing his composure. In contrast, I was locked in. The next two minutes were crucial, and I had plenty of energy in the tank. For the first time, I raised my gaze to size up my foe.
The attorney pounded the table for effect. He pleaded at the top of his lungs, “Why didn’t they heed Steve’s advice? He knew it was possible! He’d seen it happen!”
Listen … Now
“Sir,” I began, “You are confusing the facts. You are using Steve’s report to address internal pressure requirements. The design load Steve advocated was for external pressure. The project designed for it.” I then began dictating a chapter and verse description of everything that was done right. Dopamine all around.
The attorney was left with unmet expectations. He first objected to my testimony. He then asked the court official how much time was left in his allotment. Unable to restart his prefrontal cortex, he then asked if he could reserve his remaining time for a later date and quietly left the room.
There is more to the story, but that can wait.
[1] David Rock, Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long (New York, NY: Harper Business, 2009), vii.
[2] Rock, Your Brain at Work, 159-163.
[3] Rock, Your Brain at Work, 164.
[4] Understandably, my narrative will be vague on the details. The incident was a tragedy.
[5] Rock, Your Brain at Work, 166.
[6] Rock, Your Brain at Work, 40.
[7] Rock, Your Brain at Work, 145.
About the Author
Rich
4 responses to “Focus”
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Rich, as I understand the basal ganglia (I only learned it this week) and pattern recognition, your pause, wait, answer, and stop rhthym would also show up in other places. Have you kept that pattern? Do you notice it?
Robert, I have not necessarily used that pattern but I use the technique. That fourth part, ‘stop talking,’ reminds me of Camacho’s timeless WAIT—why am I still talking.[1]
For example, I have used a slightly different pattern when teaching seminars using an English-to-Spanish translator. For that situation, it was say a phrase . . . pause . . . listen for a longer translation . . . look at a student (repeat). With that pattern, I was not concerned with paying attention to the translation and could limit the stage to my train of thought and the subtle facial expression signs of understanding or confusion. When the translation segment was shorter than my phrase, System 1 kicked in to tell me that the pattern was broken and I needed to reassess.
[1] Tom Camacho, ‘Mining for Gold: Developing Kingdom Leaders through Coaching,’ (Nottingham: IVP, 2019), 62.
Rich, I am looking forward to the sequel to complete the story! Rock’s Friend/Foe leaves my heart balanced on a teeter-totter. I want to lean toward a viewing and unknown person as a friend in the absence of data pointing otherwise, but agree with his assessment that we lean toward a foe. Even in the absence of information that suggests that. In your experience, why do you think that is?
Interesting. I won’t pretend to be an expert on a topic that I have spent days thinking about. Rock says “people you don’t know tend to be classified as foe until proven otherwise.”[1] I am recalling that Kahneman was more neutral when describing the rapid System 1 judgment on assessing threats, though he did say we were born fearing spiders.[2]
I am tempted to say that personality and experience impact the bias toward friend or foe. When I wander into familiar settings like my church, I am not on edge while sizing up every stranger I see. When I’m walking an unfamiliar street thousands of miles from home, my radar is tuned differently. I am also an introverted loner, so the sample size is too small to generalize.
[1] David Rock, Your Brain at Work, 162.
[2] Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 1st pbk. ed (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013), 22.