Aug 2013

Harvard Business Review on

Your Brain
at Work
What a new approach to neuroscience can
teach us about management.
- b y Ada m Wa y t z a n d M a l i a M a s a n

Venkatesh babu Sampath

Venkatesh
babu Sampath
Enrolment # : 6010091010567

ICFAI University Enrolment

IS-V, Phase#- II: 6010091010567
on 13th Sept 2016
ICFAI University IS-III, Phase - I on 15th Sept 2014

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Work

Neural Networks of Brain

Unlock the secrets of leadership and marketing from the brain.
Thinking and Behavior dont map onto brain regions one-to-one.
Networks of brain regions activate in concurrent patterns.
Concepts crucial to managers are :
How to enable creative thinking
How to structure rewards
The role of emotion in decision making
The opportunities and pitfalls of multitasking

Neuroscientists have discovered as many as 15 neural networks and sub networks.

The four networks described in this slide are widely accepted as core neural networks, and their
roles are starting to be well understood along with their implications for managers.

Venkatesh Babu Sampath (6010091010567) HBR on Your Brain at

Work

The Default Network

How to unlock break through Innovation
Default Network is referred as task negative network because its engaged when people arent
concentrating on a task.
This network is also responsible for one of the most prized abilities: Transcendence.

Activates:
When people are awake but not focused on external stimuli or any specific goal.

What it controls:
Introspective thought and the ability to envision the past, the future, or alternative realities.

Crucial for understanding:

Creative thinking and breakthrough innovation

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The Reward Network

How to Structure Incentives
A fair environment is a reward to people regardless of their standing.
When people feel left out of strategy sessions despite being qualified to participate, they become
de-motivated.

Activates:
In response to stimuli that induce enjoymentsuch as food and water, money, and praise.

What it controls:
Perceptions of pleasure and displeasure.

Crucial for understanding:

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The Affect Network

How to use Gut Instinct
Hunches are extremely useful in helping us bypass complex and laborious analysis. But we cant
always trust them.
The brain may ascribe a feeling to a situation that is similar to a previous event but in fact not the
same.

Activates:
When people experience emotions.
What it controls:
Autonomic and endocrine responses (alterations in blood pressure, heart rate, body temperature) that
the
brain interprets as feelings.

Venkatesh Babu Sampath (6010091010567) HBR on Your Brain at

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The Control Network

How to Create Achievable Goals
If we believe it will help us to get a promotion, we can choose to work in a remote and dreary corner of
the world away from loved ones.
Other animal react to only immediate needs, we can pursue loftier goals.
Control network aligns our brain activity and our behaviors with our goals.
I t helps to deal with our many competing goals.
Email, meetings, texts, tweets, phone calls, news-unstructured, continuous, fractured nature of modern
work is a tremendous burden on the control network and consumes a huge amount of the brains
energy.

Activates:
When people weigh long-term consequences, check their impulses, and selectively focus their attention.

What it controls:

Venkatesh Babu Sampath (6010091010567) HBR on Your Brain at

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