We all have intuition – a gut feeling, a hunch or sometimes business instinct.
It is a hallmark of how human beings think and behave. Though we are often
exhorted to be cool and rational, to rely on hard data and logic, it is
impossible to function without gut feelings when making decisions. Intuition
presents itself to us in an instant, quite unbidden – a neurological alarm
bell, if you like – and its effects can be life-changing.
If we can distinguish this intuitive feeling from fears, biases or wishful
thinking it can be a potent, sometimes life-saving, force. A small child has
a high temperature: nothing unusual about that. But a parent may have a gut
feeling, take action – and discover meningitis, just in time.
It is also very relevant in the world of business. From research in the UK and
the US, we know that 90 per cent of managers use intuition, in areas such as
hiring and firing, new product development and business strategy; with two
thirds saying that intuition led to better decisions.
There are many famous examples of commercial intuition. Sir Richard Branson
claims in his autobiography that he makes up his mind about people and
business proposals, and whether they excite him or not, within 30 seconds
(not always effectively: witness Virgin Cola), and for entrepreneurs in the
long run intuition seems to pay dividends.
Ray Kroc, the founder of the McDonald’s chain, has said that he followed his
funny-bone instinct when deciding to borrow $2.7 million in 1960, against
his lawyer’s advice, to buy out the fast-food franchise that he had started.
However, what my own research has proven, is that the unpremeditated,
effortless spark of creativity does not arrive in an unprepared mind. It is
the outcome of extensive learning and experience – a precondition for
accurate intuition.
The capability to intuit occupies the threshold between our thoughts and
feelings. Modern brain-imaging techniques such as MRI, allied to emerging
insights from cognitive neuroscience, are beginning to identify specific
brain regions that are implicated in intuitive judgment – so we are
beginning to understand where in the brain it happens. Patients with damage
to the part of the brain’s frontal lobe called the ventro-medial prefrontal
cortex, which integrates feelings into decision-making, become quite unable
to make effective decisions.
Modern cognitive science provides compelling evidence that most thought is
unconscious, governed by mental processes that are inaccessible to conscious
awareness: linguist George Lakoff and philosophy professor Mark Johnson
describe conscious thought as the tip of an enormous iceberg, with 95 per
cent of our thinking being unconscious thought.
Intuition, underscored by insight and intelligence, is at the crossroads of
thinking and feeling. It has been described as a coalescence of ancestral
instincts and adaptive behaviours. Intuitions are not the same as basic
instincts, which are biological reflexive “knee-jerk” reactions.
Novices in fields such as medicine cannot exercise informed intuition, because
they do not have the knowledge to fall back on. Experienced doctors tend to
respond to clinical judgments based on previous experiences they have
encountered with patients in the past.
However, these “grooves” in our thinking etched by past experience cannot be
followed blindly, in medical matters or business. Spontaneous intuitions
have to be subjected to correction, confirmation and revision.
For example, an experienced fire-fighting team leader will be able to detect a
change in a routine blaze, to know intuitively when a floor might collapse.
They could recognise patterns, and instantly perceive any changes and be
alert to the gut feeling their unconscious mind “posts” into conscious
awareness.
The engine room of informed intuition is expertise: and “intuitive muscle
power” is vital in influencing judgment in life-or-death situations. So
intuition is at its best when based on expertise and used in complex,
dynamic and uncertain situations – such as a totally new product or service.
In business, it would be crazy to use it in complex accountancy matters –
although an experienced accountant can get from a quick glance at a balance
sheet a sense of whether it feels right. Informed intuition is, in the words
of Herbert Simon, a Nobel laureate, “analysis frozen into habit”, but this
is not enough – they are charged (positively or negatively) with feelings.
Intuitive judgments have to be married to analysis for effective
decision-making.
Recent research suggests, paradoxically, that more complex judgments (such as
choosing a place to live, or a flatmate) can, provided we don’t let thinking
get in the way, be left to unconscious mental processes, with long-term
happy results.
Can we develop our intuition to make better use of our gut feelings?
Yes, in a number of ways. We can build up the intuitive “muscle power” through
practice. Intense, deliberate and focused “workouts” (such as the practice
that a virtuoso musician puts in) with expert guidance on hand.
Successful decision-makers blend informed intuition with rational analysis and
are able to switch cognitive (mental) gears from intuition to analysis and
vice versa, deftly and adroitly. Senior executives are more likely to use
intuition than middle and lower-level managers, for example – in fact, use
of intuition is one factor that distinguishes expert practitioners from
novices.
Contrary to popular belief, developing informed intuitive judgment through
intense practice is part of the acquisition of one’s professional expertise.
(Stereotypically, we think women, both inside and outside the workplace, are
more intuitive than men. Research is mixed on this. Women might be more
intuitive socially, but this is as likely to be because of upbringing, where
girls are expected to be more socially sensitive than boys, as purely down
to hard wiring.)
Besides practice, there are other ways you can discern whether to trust your
gut. Seeking feedback on your intuition is essential; you might not know
that you are consistently making bad intuitive decisions. Ask your
subordinates, or peers, whether they think the decisions you are making are
the right ones. If not, you need to learn to listen to those around you, and
watch how other experts do it, and start to take tentative steps again.
Learning to quieten the incessant “voice in the head” that we all have is also
important. Our rational mind is constantly talking to us, and it can drown
our intuitive feelings. By noticing its presence, you can learn to
distinguish it from your gut.
A good way to differentiate between the two is to take a two-minute walk
around the block, or step outside and take a few deep breaths.
It is no coincidence, perhaps, that the word intuition comes from the Latin intueri
– meaning to look inside, or to contemplate. Take the time to do this, and
your gut will make its presence felt.
Those special moments
— Johnny Depp said it was love at first sight when he met his long-term
partner Vanessa Paradis for the first time: “You have this feeling – I can’t
really explain what it was, but I had it when I met Vanessa. I saw her
across a room and I thought: ‘What’s happening to me?’ I had no way of
knowing how great a person she was.”
— The most famous case of intuition in action in the world of sport
occurred in the 1950 Monaco Grand Prix, when the great Argentinian driver
Juan Fangio braked in the second lap – avoiding a serious accident out of
sight around the next bend.
— Howard Schultz described physically shaking when he came up with the
idea for Starbucks: “Like deciding to jump off the side of a building with
no net.”
— Stravinsky said of Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring): “I
had a fleeting vision which came to me as a complete surprise. I had only my
ear to help me. I ‘heard’ and wrote what I heard.”
— Jonas Salk discovered the polio vaccine after spotting an incongruity
in a medical lecture at college. “The light went on at that point,” he said.
“Intuition tells the thinking mind where to look next.”
Eugene Sadler-Smith is professor of management development and
organisational behaviour at the University of Surrey. His book, Inside
Intuition, (£24.99, Routledge), is published on September 27.
