Do you and your staff have an ‘old’ brain or a ‘young’ brain? Tim Drake will help you find out.
Think carefully, because how you answer this important question could be one of the most significant predictors of how well you and your organisation can operate. The Book’s Brain Age Test, in Chapter 1, gives a clear indication of where people are now. In this fast-moving, fast-changing world, it is important that the culture of a company is vital, relevant and innovative. Carrying on as before, and having employees whose Brain Age is getting older is a recipe for decline.
A ‘young’ brain is the antidote to ageing and You Can Be As Young As You Think, by Tim Drake shows you exactly you how you and your colleagues can get one. At their most basic, organisations are collections of individuals. Moreover, competition is about my individuals against your individuals. It follows that an individual's thinking is highly critical to business success. Managers who think optimally will benefit the company competitively by making decisions and deploying such assets as the business possesses in a way which maximises stakeholder value and guarantees enterprise longevity.
Managers who think imperfectly will compromise the overall enterprise mission. Put another way, an organisation is only as good as the creativity, energy, openness, courage and teamwork of the talent in employs. These qualities have their expression in a person's YQ™ (Youth Quotient).
By opening the eyes of management and employees to the possibility and danger of ageing mindsets, Tim Drake's book helps shift the culture of an organisation towards vibrant, positive Young Brained thinking. This cultural shift is even more important today when cost cutting and process reengineering have run their course. What is needed now, is a way to release the latent talent of the human resources that a business possesses.
What is holding companies back today is the Old Brained (low YQ™) thinking of its staff (risk averse, institutionalised, negative and uncreative). Increasing the YQ™ of the organisation by improving the Young Brained thinking of its leaders and its teams will have huge positive effects.
The benefits are clear. Young Brained employees are: up with the trends; don't resist, rather they welcome, change; are informed workers and communicate naturally; are always on, ready for action; work well in teams; for example, they are less likely to be sexist, racist etc; are savvy and take quick, intuitive decisions; are not tied to tradition so work well as innovators; are up-beat and energetic, no matter what their age; are technological natives; are always learning and developing; welcome mobility and expanding their horizons; are fun to be with and are lucky!
Old Brained companies fail sooner or later - Kodak, GM, EMI. They react to change poorly and the negative corporate cultures means they recruit and retain other Old Brains. Morale is poor and much activity concerns political infighting, protecting silos and back protection. By contrast, Young Brain companies are challenger brands and know how to exploit 'blue oceans'. They are vibrant cultures, full of ambitious people finding a meaning in their life through their work.
Young Brained Companies: understand implicitly the society around them and adapt to the new realities; show flexibility in face of change; tune in to demands and opportunities; recruit Young Brained staff; (win the war for talent and the war for commitment); design and deliver Young Brained products; attract Young Brained customers; and are sustainable because they look to the future.