The golden thread running through the landmark theories of leadership, strategy, performance, innovation and organisational design for the last 20 to 30 years is the relationship between change and the mind.

The success of radical innovation depends on “the constraints of established patterns of thought and action.” And this is where the problem lies. Our common sense view of how the mind works, especially in relation to disciplines like innovation, strategy, creativity and the like is at odds with the way experience is actually constructed.

The missing link in current models of personal and organisational development is the relationship between theory and practice. It can be argued that most of these frameworks are based on principles which implicitly operate from a taboo of subjectivity, and therefore do not adequately take into account the role of perception and emotion in designing experience. Moreover, we can draw the conclusion that unless business academics and corporate executives take into account the processes of Blind Vision and Blind Emotion they in fact collude in skilfully maintaining convergence.

The Traditional model of business leadership needs to turns its microscope round the other way and look at how organisations design their own experience. Real competitive advantage exists in transforming thought and creating new ideas

Until this is realised, in effect all external restructuring is really the equivalent of reshuffling the deckchairs on the Titanic. We need a new model of business strategy which breaks the taboo of subjectivity and sets out an organisational framework to enable new modes of thinking, talking and acting.

In an economy based on ideas and meaning, imagination is your competitive edge. If you seriously want to pursue groundbreaking advances in Innovation and Leadership then establishing a breakthrough scenario to take the conceptual and emotional high ground is not a nice to have, but a must.

“To its credit, the Catholic Church did formally acknowledge that it had badly mistreated Galileo Galilei, and that it had made a grave mistake when it forced him to recant, under threat of death, his belief that the Earth was not the centre of the universe. And it said so in a formal proclamation – in 1983.” (1)

An idea is by definition dangerous. It is dangerous because if it is worthy of its name it threatens the status quo. When new ideas are introduced into the board room or in fact any part of the organisation they are tried by the three principles of skilled unawareness: consensus, self-censure and compromise these are in turn held in place through fear, uncertainty and doubt, an emotional mechanism which hamstrings an organisation’s ability to function.

Skilled unawareness/Blind Emotion is the emotional matrix of afflictive emotions which holds Blind Vision in place. What we discover is that any information, conversation or action which threatens the status quo is ejected both privately in our own mental decision-making processes and socially in group/team processes. This is what Aries de Guess calls the organisation’s auto immune system.

The organisation rejects new information and skilfully seals it-self back up in its protective cocoon of convergence. It is also very important to understand that skilled unawareness/Blind Emotion runs across an organisation’s network of clients, advisors, and key stakeholders. This means that the generally accepted rules that define successful outcomes across Strategy, Communication and Performance are channelled into a set of internal tramlines that lead to commoditisation. The organisation’s collective awareness operates on blind, skilfully maintaining convergent thinking and emotions, whilst convinced that their strategic intention is otherwise.

Good management and good communication are bad for business. Designing Emotion, that is transforming this learned incapacity, the emotional and cognitive pre-established patterns that keep organisations and individuals in orbit around the status quo, is a pre requisite for creating great ideas.

1) Karl Albrecht, The Power of Minds at Work, Organisations Intelligence in action, Amacom, 2003 p125.