Mindfulness- Foundations For The 7-Steps to Learning and Habit Change

Updated July 31st 2024

Are you living presently?
Or are you living focused on the next meeting, the next meal, the next email that needs to be responded to, and the next one and the next one? Are you living in the past, regretting what you have done or not done, or feeling angry at how you were treated by someone or how you didn’t make it to the gym, or ate that second croissant!

You are probably already well aware that mindfulness, one of the oldest practices in human history, has become one the newest ‘breakthroughs’ in managing thoughts and mental wellbeing in the workplace.

I started attempting to focus on living presently, using mindfulness and meditation a few years ago, (see more on this in this Irish Indo article) when approximately 20 years after being introduced to meditation and mindfulness, I finally was adult enough to start giving it a real go. The impetus was the realization that if I didn’t focus on the NOW, that life would pass me by and I’d have missed out on just experiencing rather then thinking about what was coming next.

This mindfulness lark is no easy habit to adopt! It involves being present in the here and now; when you’re eating, when you’re walking, when you’re speaking, basically in every moment. Personally, I find it challenging, as I often need to remind myself to focus entirely on the conversation at hand or savor the taste of a drink, deliberately experiencing every detail. In reality, like many others, I catch myself mindlessly juggling multiple activities throughout the day: hastily gobbling lunch between client sessions and meetings, and rushing around in a perpetual state of urgency. It’s a journey to break free from this habit and genuinely embrace mindfulness.

If it is so difficult to be mindful/ present in this moment, then why bother?

Well, there is empirical evidence that mindfulness:

reduces the physiological and psychological effects of stress
correlates with emotional intelligence
improves well-being and happiness
improves attention and emotional regulation

(see Keng, Smosku & Robins, 2011 for an extensive review of the empirical studies on the effect of mindfulness on psychological health)

Personally speaking, when I am being mindful, I feel more tuned in to the people I am with, the conversations we are having and the accompanying sensory information in the environment. I feel more grateful (which is in itself associated with reduced depression, more positive relationships, greater competence, resilience, self-acceptance, less stress, better sleep and much more!) and life feels much richer and more enjoyable.

Research also shows that people who focus on being mindful rather than focusing on the end goal or the future are more successful (e.g. Fishbach & Choi, 2012). Yes goals can help spark our initial interest, but then we must consistently focus and on the process rather than being overly focused on the end goal. It is much better for the outcome if we focus on the experience rather than the benefits. As Dr. Christian Jarrett (author of ‘Great Myths of The Brain’) said at the Learning Technologies Conference in Olympia, London I attended this week “Once you are doing it (e.g. exercise, work-based project), let your long-term future-based mission fade into the background.”

Living more mindfully is a must if you want to learn more effectively and change habits. As I mentioned earlier, it necessitates a shift in focus. Have you given it a try yet?

Exercise: Boost Your Brain’s Performance- Foundations for 7-Steps to Learning & Habit Change

Updated July 31st 2024

What do you start your morning with?
Written by our Guest Blogger Oliver Sifkovits (Msc, CSCS)

I start each morning with a 40-minute workout. Far away from the inconvenience of having to wake up early, putting on training gear, and dragging myself out into nature, it has become an essential part of my lifestyle. I want to be as productive as possible each day, and starting it with exercise is in my experience one of the best ways to achieve this.

“Mens sana in corpore sano”

….meaning if we look after the health of our body, the health of our mind will also improve.

In other words: put your trainers on, get active and boost your brain performance!

Indeed, research has shown that aerobically trained subjects improved executive task performance such as planning, task setting, reasoning, and focusing on goals after a 6-month intervention, which included moderate intensity endurance exercise (comparable to a long-distance run where you would just be struggling to speak with someone easily) performed for 40 minutes 3 times per week (Shay & Roth, 1992). This is supported by another study showing a strong relationship between aerobic fitness levels and performance in executive functioning tasks after 3 months of exercise (Smith et al., 2010).

Every day our minds are challenged in having to filter information which they deem important for their own survival. We are faced with all sorts of distractions. They test our ability to pay attention for long periods of time, to the limit. Exercise helps us to focus on what really matters to us by improving sustained attention (Colcombe et al., 2003) as well as information processing speed (Smith et al., 2010).

With high demands placed on our ability to focus comes the challenge to store information in the human „hardware“. As we know, from the blog a few months ago about one of the 7 steps to learning and habit Change (www.adaptastraining.com/4-memory), recalling what we learn during the day at a later stage is essential for continuous progress, since it allows us to put one „knowledge brick“ on the other to create a „building of sophistication“.

Who would have thought that exercise can be the cement holding the bricks together? In a 3-month aerobic exercise intervention, subjects showed high increases in celebral blood volume and thus memory in the dentate gyrus, an area of the brain which is responsible for short-term memory (Colcombe et al., 2009).

I always say that becoming successful is easier than remaining successful, and this is no different with storing and recalling information. Having a well-functioning short-term memory gets you to a certain point – the next step is having the ability to store information long-term. A crucial role is played in long-term memory by the hippocampus.

Additionally, did you know that the size of the hippocampus reduces with age? (and hence memory loss!). Research demonstrates that long-term (1 year) aerobic exercise increases hippocampus size (Erickson et al., 2010), and blood flow in this area (Chapman et al., 2013), as well as a significant decline in its mass reduction by an equivalent of 1-2 years (Erickson et al., 2010).

Are you looking to rocket your mental performance now and in the long-term? If the answer is yes, working out at moderate intensity for 40 minutes 3 times per week is a minimum requirement for you.

Commit to it. There is no single reason not to do it.
Be patient. Good things take time.
You will reap the benefits.
You will be grateful to yourself for having made the commitment!

Oliver Sifkovits (Msc, CSCS) is a Performance Enhancement Specialist, Personal Trainer, as well as 4th belt holder in Capoeira. He has provided Strength and Conditioning service to athletes from various sports, levels, and age groups, including footballers from Hertha BSC Academy, World Cruiserweight Boxing Champion Pablo Hernandez, as well as multiple Austrian Racketlon Champion Michael Dickert. His approach is designed around improving body-mind-spirit performance and health in individuals.

Sleep: Energy That Lasts All Day Long- Foundations for 7-Steps to Learning & Habit Change

Updated July 31st 2024

Recently I have been experiencing something great; energy that lasts all day long without any daytime slumps!

What is the difference? A combination of good nutrition, exercise a few times per week and sleep.

However, I had the experience recently of feeling like I couldn’t string a full sentence together, to the point where I had to put an end to a phone conversation half way through. And all because, I hadn’t slept due to a lovely bout of food poisoning.

As we saw in recent blogs, courtesy of Oliver Sifkovits, focusing on what we eat can make all the difference to how we perform. Sleep is another physiological lever that can contribute to, and detract from how we perform.

There is a compelling body of evidence that ties our performance, be it professional or personal, to adequate levels of sleep. Chronic sleep loss negatively affects focus, memory and cognition, impacting productivity and relationships, and overall well-being.

Not getting the correct amount of sleep is linked to heart disease, obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, depression, and psychosis. It also causes unethical behavior (see Shane O’Mara).

How many times have you taken dodgy short-cuts when you are tired? The brain of the sleep-deprived person has to work harder than that of non-sleep-deprived person to accomplish any given task. Imagine what information your brain is excluding paying attention to when it is tired and the decisions it is having you make?!

Research shows that young adults (under 30 years) perform poorer than their older counterparts (50-60 years) following periods of sleep deprivation – whilst at the same time more confidently and inaccurately overestimating their abilities. Where does this show up in organisations and decisions being made?

Furthermore, we are less adept at reading social cues and responding appropriately inter-personally when affected by sleep loss. Our ability to accurately detect emotions tied to threat (angry faces) and reward (happy faces), becomes blunted, when sleep deprived. Also, sleep-deprived people fail to recall pleasant memories, yet recall gloomy memories just fine, and so sleep affects our positivity and happiness.

Additionally, recent neuro-scientific research points to the role of sleep in memory consolidation. Studies have shown that hippocampal neurons activated during learning tasks are reactivated during slow wave sleep, reinforcing the neural network and consolidating the learning. In a study requiring participants to learn routes through unfamiliar streets, performance, as measured by error rates in the task, was significantly lower for those who had benefited from sleep. Other studies focusing on sleep loss provide clear evidence for lower academic performance caused by reductions in both declarative and procedural memory, suggesting that the prefrontal cortex is highly sensitive to sleep deprivation. So, regular good quality sleep is a precursor for memory and learning.

Studies of sleep distinguish between acute sleep deprivation, defined as short bouts (24- 72 hours) of complete sleep loss, and chronic partial sleep restriction, defined as continued periods of less than normal quantity of sleep (for example 3-5 hours sleep when the individual’s ‘normal’ pattern is 7-8 hours). Performance in cognitive tasks shows a consistent deterioration in both acute and chronic forms of sleep deprivation. However recovery from chronic partial sleep loss is slower.

According to renowned sleep researcher Daniel Kripke, consistently getting between 6.5 and 7.5 hours of sleep per night not only contributes to longevity but also enhances happiness and productivity. Deviating from this optimal range can lead to various unnoticed issues, affecting our overall well-being. It is imperative that we pay closer attention to our sleep habits and consider whether they are supporting or hindering our learning, habit formation, and overall performance and happiness.

Eating Yourself Smart: Part 2 – Foundations for 7-Steps to Learning and Habit Change

Updated July 28th 2023

Give me the spark to speak with others!
As mentioned in Part 1 of the ‘Eating Yourself Smart’ blogs, communication in the form of messages is required for a city to survive and grow. These messages are represented by so called neurotransmitters in the brain – they contain the information which determines what will happen next in the body. Someone has to produce those messages – and that’s what amino acids do. Since we all create messages to communicate with others, we can all deem ourselves as amino acids in this fictive world.
For example, there are people with the name ‘pyroglutamate’, and they produce messages titled ‘acetylcholine’. These messages contain the information for the brain to become mentally sharper, concentrate for longer, increase its speed of reflexes, and improve its memory skills (Holford, 2009).

Another amino acid of high relevance for boosting your intelligence is tyrosine. It is the substance that produces dopamine (Holford, 2009) – a neurotransmitter that can be described as the “learning amplifier molecule”. In other words: eating sufficient amounts of poultry, fish, beans and/or peanuts will strengthen neural pathways in your brain and will thus enhance learning.

We are all aware of the importance of having leaders in an organisation – people who initiate processes. Vitamins, minerals, and trace elements are no different – they spark metabolic reactions in the brain. In a study with 615 school children, non-verbal IQ scores increased by an average of 4.5 points after taking a multivitamin and mineral complex – including Vitamin C, Zinc, folic acid, and several B-Vitamins – for 3 months (Schoenthaler et al, 1991). Some of the subjects even improved their scores by an impressive 20 points! These results are supported by a further study with 60 schoolchildren showing similar improvements in IQ-scores (Benton & Roberts, 1988).

One important thing I would like to point out is the deceptive character of the term “recommended daily allowance” (RDA), which describes the “daily dietary intake level of a nutrient considered sufficient by the Food and Nutrition Board to meet the requirements of 97.5% of healthy individuals in each life-stage and sex group” (U.S. National Academy of Sciences: Institute of Medicine, Food and Nutrition Board; 2001).

In a study carried out with 200 school children, only the group which supplemented 20mg of zinc each day over 3 months significantly improved memory functioning and the ability to pay attention for long periods of time. In contrast to this, the group taking 10mg a day did not show any significant changes in the tested parameters (Penland, 2005). Compare this to the RDA for a child aged 9-13, the value is 8mg for both males and females (U.S. National Academy of Sciences: Institute of Medicine, Food and Nutrition Board; 2001). This example clearly shows that the daily intake of the vital substance zinc needs to be higher than the one commonly suggested in order make you smarter. Furthermore, the studies above demonstrate that you can’t start early enough with your attempt to become Jane super-brain or Bart super-smart one day.

Isn’t it ironic that we take our car to a service on a regular basis for it to work perfectly, yet we don’t pay the same amount of attention to our body and brain? Isn’t our brain controlling our behaviour like puppet players controlling their toys? And is “We are what we continuously do” in fact also applicable to our eating habits? If you have answered all of these questions with a “yes”, you have just made the first step towards more effective learning and outsmarting the best of the rest.

Oliver Sifkovits (Msc, CSCS) is a Performance Enhancement Specialist, Personal Trainer, as well as 4^th belt holder in Capoeira. He has provided Strength and Conditioning service to athletes from various sports, levels, and age groups, including footballers from Hertha BSC Academy, World Cruiserweight Boxing Champion Pablo Hernandez, as well as multiple Austrian Racketlon Champion Michael Dickert. His approach is designed around improving body-mind-spirit performance and health in individuals.

Eating Yourself Smart: Part 1 – Foundations for 7-Steps to Learning and Habit Change

Updated July 28th 2023

In our previous blog, we promised to supply the main ingredients that create a foundation for the 7 Steps to learning and habit change. These are:

Nutrition
Exercise
Sleep
Mindfulness
Blasting Limiting Beliefs and Emotions

Let’s start with our guest blogger Oliver Sifkovits on the topic of Nutrition.
Why roads between reception desks matter:

Would you like to be able to think quicker, concentrate better and for longer, increase your IQ, as well as have a sharp memory? In short – would you like be more intelligent? I’ve always found that the simplest solutions are the best ones, and this clearly applies to the topic of this blog: research compellingly shows that providing your brain with the right nutrients can rocket its performance to the sky.

Let’s look at our brain as a vivid city in which different parts and people serve a purpose. 60% of our most important organ consists of fats. These are the reception desks of the city which receive information. The more reception desks there are, the more information can be distributed within the city, right? It is therefore essential to eat sufficient Omega 3 & 6 fats so that the messages travelling between our brain cells actually find a place to dock on to.

Also, imagine the reception desks to be extremely busy workplaces: computers require maintenance, printing paper needs to be replenished, and pens need to be replaced when they stop writing. It is no different with fatty acids: since our brain is active non-stop during day and night, it’s optimized functioning is dependant on regular (and by that I mean daily) intake of these substances.

Studies show that sufficient intake thereof can enhance long-term memory (Glen et al., 1985, 1987 & 1990; Skinner et al., 1989). Fish such as mackerel, herring, salmon and fresh tuna, as well as eggs will give you Omega 3 fats, while flax seed represent an option for vegetarians. Primrose and borage oil are Omega 6 – rich sources.

What does travelling from South to North Dublin have to do with nutrition for the mind? The answer is simple: In order for information to find its way to different reception desks in the city, roads are required. The equivalent to this would be the so-called phospholipids in the brain: they allow for smooth nerve signal transmission between cells. One of them is called phosphatidylserine, which has been shown to improve memory, learning, vocabulary skills, concentration, as well as mental alertness (Crook et al., 1991).

You will find this type of nutrient in organ meats and in the form of a supplement. Vegetarian options are soy beans and white beans.

Dimethylethanolamine – short DMAE – are further building blocks of roads in the city. It has been shown to stop mind wandering, improve concentration, promote learning (Holford, 2009), as well as enhance memory, attention, and associative thinking (Dimpfel et al., 1996). Egg yolks, sardines, and organ meat all contain this substance, whereas vegetarian capsules are also available.

So far you have learned about the importance of building a structure in the brain that allows cells to communicate effectively. Look out for the next blog, which will be about the “human” side of nutrition for the mind: communicating and initiating intelligence.

Thank you for reading, we would really love if your liked our blog that you would share it among your social media platforms. Remember, sharing is caring and we Care! 🙂

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #7 Two-Way Street, Positive or Negative thoughts, you choose!

Updated July 28th 2023

Mindset is a two-way street
Did you wake up today feeling good about yourself, looking forward to the day and life in general? Or did you wake up thinking ‘here we go again’, ‘I hate the traffic’ ‘I hate my boss’ etc?

How you feel about yourself and your life, whether you are negative, unhappy, de-motivated or on the other hand positive, happy, motivated has an impact on your ability to learn and change habits.

When we feel good; thinking, making decisions and taking action in pursuing goals require less effort.

If you have read step no.4 ‘Memory’ in our series of 7 Steps to Learning blogs, you will know how important memory is for creating habit change.

When we feel positive we are more likely to be able to pull on good memories. When we feel negative, things couldn’t get much worse for our memory; Not only are we more likely to access more negative memories, but these negative memories get in the way of accessing positive memories which in turn can interfere with getting that dopamine flowing!

Brain plasticity is a two-way street. We can drive brain change positively or negatively.

If you have read Maureen Gaffney’s book ‘Flourish’ you will have come across the 5:1 ratio. We need 5 positives for every 1 negative in our thoughts, experiences, and feelings in order to thrive and flourish in life. As Maureen says, “If the balance remains at 3:1, three positives to one negative, you have achieved the minimum platform needed just to stay well and manage your life in an average way. If the ratio falls below 3:1, and stays down, however, you are tipped into a downward spiral from which it is hard to escape. This is when someone becomes depressed; when a relationship enters a new, destructive state; or when a team or an organisation becomes dysfunctional.”

Unwanted bad habits continue because the brain has hard-wired itself through years of repeated behaviour. We must literally tell our brain what we really want, and not what we don’t want! As discussed in earlier blogs; to create change, we must literally rewire the brain!

It’s up to you which way you want to wire it, towards the negative or towards the positive; towards the ‘I can’t do’ vs. ‘I can do’, towards the “I am a victim of circumstances’ vs. ‘I am the master of my own universe’.

In every moment of every day, we have a choice. We often just don’t realise it, because our unconscious and our older parts of our brains exert so much control over how we behave.

Consider, in this moment, consciously, what do you have to be grateful for? Are you healthy? Do you have a job? Do you ever get to go out for dinner or to go on holidays? If you have any or all of these, you have more than many hundreds of thousands of people around the world and more than many in your own village, town, and city.

Research in Positive Psychology repeatedly finds that those who remind themselves every day what they are grateful for are happier and more positive. So if you are going to do nothing else to support your mission of making some changes, start by doing this. I personally list off three things in my head, that I am grateful for every morning, as soon as I wake up. It’s a nice and ultimately powerful way to start the day. Do it every morning for a few weeks and smile at the same time (even if it pains you to do so) and let us know what positive changes you have seen in your life.

This brings us to the end of our 7 Steps to Learning blogs. However, as the great Mel Blanc wrote in his account of the making of Bugs Bunny, ‘That’s Not All Folks!’. There are 5 ingredients necessary to support these 7 steps. If you are looking to create real and lasting change, keep posted for more….

Seasons Greetings to you all and we look forward to an amazing 2015 helping you put these 7 Steps into practice. Happy Holidays from all at Adaptas.

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #6 FEEDBACK – Everyone needs Feedback!

“It takes 21 days to change a habit!”
How many times have we all heard this?

Jeremy Dean (Making Habits, Breaking Habits: Why We Do Things, Why We Don’t, and How to Make Any Change Stick) has collated research around habit change, and found that it takes on average 66 days (not 21 days!) to change a habit, with people often taking beyond 230 days of repetition to change habits long-term!

As discussed in the ‘REPETITION’ step of the 7 steps to learning a few weeks ago, we know that the brain forms a model of the brain connections that contribute to a good try. Repetition strengthens the connections between neurons engaged at the same time. Additionally, we know from the ‘MEMORY’ step, that the more we can create meaningful, emotional and elaborated opportunities to practice the more likely long-term learning is to occur i.e. emotional connections create more permanent memories.

Be it 18, 21, 65 or 265 days it takes to create change, let’s call a spade a spade…it is difficult to commit to practicing in order to embed change! Not only must the brain receive feedback on good versus bad tries. We NEED feedback from others on good versus bad tries…we need feedback and support to know it’s working! FEEDBACK on performance and acknowledgement from others encourages us to repeat.

It’s about recognising what needs to change, then doing it repetitively, and getting feedback, especially with a focus on how improvement is being noticed by others. We all like to be told we are doing a good job! Constant monitoring of progress by oneself, one’s peers and one’s superiors is tantamount to long lasting change.

In my experience, most people in management positions just don’t have or prioritise putting the time in to do this. People remember how they feel. If you make them feel good for attempting to make changes, they are much more likely to succeed. People must see results – one of the jobs of a manager should be to support and coach.

We need to be reminded that it is working, even when we ‘fall of the wagon’. We must track behaviours, and get feedback on how that behaviour is being noticed by others and how it is impacting on others.

It is important therefore, to work with people over a period of time. If that means writing reminders to check in with your colleagues on the change they are looking to make, do it…you might be still checking in with them on that change they were looking to make in 6 months time, but accountability and repetitiveness lead to new habit forming. It may take 21 days, it may take many many more. But imagine the difference it will make!

Thank you for reading. We’d love your Feedback. Leave a comment or share on your social pages.

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #5 REPETITION| Repeat, Repeat, Repeat!

Updated July 28th 2023

We are what we repeatedly do.
A common thing I hear from people I am working with is something along the lines of ‘I’m too old to change’ or ‘I’m too old to learn anything new’, or ‘The damage has been done, it’s too late for me’ or ‘ you can’t teach an old dog new tricks’!

In the 4th step of the 7 steps i.e. ‘Memory’, a few weeks ago, we learned that incoming data is held in short term, or working, memory and will be quickly lost if not consolidated. How well we encode a memory is critical to how effectively we will be able to recall it at a future point. And this my friends, is regardless of what age we are!

As Alfred Edward Perlman says; “Learning is what most adults will do for a living in the 21st century”.

Storage of information takes place in SEVERAL neurons at the same time. You have to give your neurons the chance to repetitively communicate with each other so that the learning sticks.

Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies show the important role of the neurotransmitter, dopamine, in the learning process.

Dopamine is the brain’s chemical reward and is triggered in response to positive feedback during the learning process. When we eat in response to hunger, feel the warmth of the sun, or receive a smile for an action taken, the brain releases a short dopamine burst to signal its pleasure and give us a quick reward for gaining it. This dopamine reward mechanism serves to reinforce the neural connections in the associated network, strengthening it with each repetition of the thought or behaviour that caused it. This is the biological process that embeds learning.

In other words, we have to repeat, repeat, repeat, because initial changes are only temporary. Stronger and faster connections between neurons form through repetition and the feedback about the outcome of the try, versus what the brain wants.

The challenge for us is to actually repeat, because sometimes we just didn’t grasp the learning the first time, and sometimes we just don’t think we can prioritise repeating new behaviours because other things take precedence i.e. just getting through all the things we need to do every day.

Ultimately, it comes back to how badly you want something. As per the first step ‘Imagine’, have you imagined what you want the outcome to be? Or if you are managing other people, have you assisted them in imagining what they desire the outcome to be; how it will benefit them; how things will be different? People will only repeat new behaviours if they can clearly see the personal gain or benefit.

One of the jobs of a manager, in my opinion, (for everyone’s gain), is to keep noticing, and to continuously support and coach to encourage repetition. I’m also a great believer in some type of buddy or peer system, where people are held accountable to doing what they need to do to make the learning stick, i.e. repeat, repeat, repeat.

One of my favorite sayings is “Amateurs practice until they know it, Professionals train until they OWN it!” Clinton Swaine.

You can teach an old dog new tricks…just follow the 7 Steps to Learning 😉

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #4 MEMORY – Encoding, sorting & retrieving information.

Updated July 28th 2023

Memory is crucial for learning.
“Memory is a process of encoding, sorting and retrieving information” (Carlson, Martin & Buskist, 2004).
The brain creates predictive models about where it thinks it is going, models about performance during an attempt and models that reflect cumulative learning of those attempts to create the desired outcome. The actions that are attempted and those that resulted in better performance must be remembered. Otherwise learning cannot occur.

Theorists of memory agree that there are various stages of memory; 1) short term memory (STM) or working memory and 2) Long term memory (LTM).

Atkinson and Shiffrin’s multi-store memory model (1968) states that we take information from the external environment through our sensory organs (e.g. eyes, ears, skin etc.). This information gets moved to the STM where it stays for a short time (i.e. less than one minute; STM has a limited capacity and duration). Only with rehearsal can information be moved to the LTM. Peterson and Peterson (1959) found that the more time information goes unrehearsed in the STM the more difficult it is for participants to retrieve this information.

“Short term memory is the set of processes that we use to hold and rehearse information that occupies our current awareness” (Robinson-Riegler & Robinson-Riegler, 2008).

LTM consists of:

Declarative (explicit) memory: Knowledge of facts and events.
Procedural (non-declarative, implicit) memory: Knowledge of how to do things.
Skills and abilities.
Conditioning and subconscious responses.

Other than rehearsal, there are other ways to help the encoding of information from the STM to the LTM. For example, mnemonic devices are “special techniques or strategies consciously used to improve memory – make use of information already stored in LTM to make memorisation an easier task” (Brunswick & Buskist, 2004).

These devices do not simplify or lessen information, they create a more detailed version of the information in such a way that the information is easier to retrieve at a later time. This is possible because of the way in which the information is elaborated upon. The information is strung together in a meaningful way.

Most approaches to training soft skills in people are missing an approach that enables learners to elaborate on what they are learning in the classroom. In my experience, the solutions are as follows:

A) Learning must be ‘applied’ in the training room, i.e. create more meaningful, emotional and elaborated opportunities to practice while in the training room, to engage both hearts and minds.

B) In line with the 70:20:10 rule, make sure that people get the opportunity to apply and practice in the context of work. In his excellent book, ‘The Learning Challenge’ (2014), Nigel Paine refers to ‘at the moment of need’ and ‘just in time’ learning, and quotes Nick Shackleton-Jones approach to learning ‘for people who care’. Here people care deeply about learning something because they have been challenged and want to/ need to solve the problem, and therefore are motivated to learn.

For a case study of the approach taken by Nick Shakleton-Jones (Director of Online and Informal Learning, BP) see Nigel’s book. You might see Adaptas mentioned there too ;-).

Ultimately, there is no point in sending a person to attend a training if they are not going to be able to apply their learning immediately (either actively in the training or ‘on the job’), because it will not get stored in their Long-Term Memory, unless they get a chance to use the information supplied immediately.

Plain and simple, we all forget what we have learned unless it is dynamic, motivating, emotionally stimulating and useful in the here and now!

Click here for more Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #2 MOTIVATION | The Power of Knowing ‘WHY’

Updated July 28th 2023

MOTIVATION – For change, we need to be clear on our ‘Why?’
We recently published the 1st of our 7-Steps to Learning. We received a great response to our IMAGINATION blog, where we explained that ‘neurons that fire together, wire together’, so to continue as promised, outlined below is the 2nd Step – MOTIVATION.

MOTIVATION is a key factor in brain plasticity: It can be looked at as a cycle where thoughts influence behaviours and behaviours then drive performance; an inner drive to behave or act in a certain manner. It is the driving force that causes the change from desire to trying to achieve in life. If you are going to commit to making changes in your life, then it requires dedication and practice to create lasting change. Understand your motivation and you’ll understand the process that arouses, sustains and regulates your behaviour.

In Step 5, you will see that repetition is the key to making stronger connections. Repetition will only occur if people are motivated. People need to see a personal need, or a reason for them in making the change. For change, we need to be clear on our ‘Why?’.

People must think about two things in answering this question. Emotionally, what we can gain, by creating this new behaviour, and what do we stand to lose by not creating it? Performance impacts thoughts.

Our role as educators and learning leaders is to help people to become aware of what is not working for them or where the gaps exist, why they want and need to change (emotionally and logically) and where that will take them in their life and career. If someone does not want to learn, no change will take place.

The question then is, what is stopping them from wanting to learn? I refer back to point Step1: Have they been given the opportunity or given themselves the opportunity to IMAGINE & dream big?!

Click here for more Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning

The Adaptas 7-Steps to Learning: #1 IMAGINE

Updated July 27th 2023

Have you ever considered yourself and your learners as potential addicts?

Have you ever heard of the neurotransmitter Dopamine? Dopamine is a chemical released when people are doing something they enjoy. Dopamine consolidates new circuits and causes addiction.
Addiction is a plastic change in the brain.

Imagine for a moment, if you could turn all the people you are looking to develop into ‘learning addicts’. They are so addicted to learning, they cannot wait to apply everything they have learnt so that they can come back and learn more. The impact of the “learnings” would then ripple across the organisation, affecting the bottom line, as your training budgets would expand twofold, threefold and more. Wouldn’t that be something? From my perspective, we should be looking to turn everyone into addicts who enjoy learning and thus consolidate new neural pathways, which in turn leave people wanting more. We all know how challenging it can be to change an existing habit.

I recently spoke at The 2014 Learning Technologies Conference in London. Following that talk, they asked me to write an article for their Inside Learning & Technologies & Skills Magazine which was published this June. In this speech I outlined 7-Steps or areas that need to be considered and applied in learning to make it addictive, to enable people to learn and for neural changes to take place in the brain that have lasting impact. Over the coming months I am going to outline these 7-STEPS here. They all overlap as you will see:

1) IMAGINE

Neurons that fire together wire together: The brain strengthens connections between things that happen in real time and predictions of possible outcomes. The brain blends what happens and the predictions together. The expected outcome and the reality of the outcome; the brain weaves its own explanation of reality that is the basis of new skills. Therefore, people need to get clear on what the benefits of changing their behaviour will be. We need to help people think bigger for themselves. My experience of many approaches to working with changing people’s behaviour, is that the time is just not put into this. We’ve got to allow people to dream, to IMAGINE and to see all the possible outcomes. Otherwise, there is very little chance they will commit.

We look forward to sending you the 2nd-Step in this 7-Step process. We are currently delivering an interactive workshop to teams and groups in organisations to actively assist them in applying these 7-Steps. Get in touch if you’d like us to talk you through what we can do for your organisation.

Communication In The Workplace – Not An Easy Task

Updated 11th July 2023

Communication is complicated. Perhaps because we do it so easily and often, we generally do not appreciate just how complicated a process communication is. Without even considering the non-verbal elements of communication, just speaking on its own requires the speaker to perform two cognitively demanding tasks simultaneously: conceptualizing the information to be conveyed, while also formulating a verbal message that is capable of conveying it. The number and complexity of the factors that must be taken into account is dauntingly large (Levelt, 1989).

The level of awareness we need to have to be clear communicators is not something we talk about in everyday life. We take it for granted. The first time many people really start thinking about the complexities in communication is if they attend counselling, or a personal development course or a staff training on communication in the workplace or customer service. People generally leave these courses or events with very little change having taken place in the level of positive and worthwhile communication in the workplace and beyond.

Consider this: The meaning of even the most banal utterance is grounded in a set of fixed assumptions about what the communicators know, believe, feel and think. People experience the world from different vantage points, and each individual’s experience is unique to the particular vantage points he or she occupies. The vantage point all depends on so many factors including, background, experience, knowledge, education, gender to name only a few! To accommodate conflict or variation in perspective, communicators must take each other’s perspectives into account when they speak. As the social psychologist Roger Brown put it, effective communication “… requires that the point of view of the auditor be realistically imagined” (Brown, 1965).

However, the content of another person’s point of view is not always obvious. In his classic studies of childhood egocentrism, the Swiss developmental psychologist, Jean Piaget, demonstrated that the ability to take on another person’s perspectives represents a major milestone in the child’s intellectual development. Young children are unable to detach themselves from their own point of view, and, in effect, seem to assume that the world appears to others as it does to them (Piaget &Inhelder, 1956). This reduces their effectiveness as communicators (Krauss & Glucksberg, 1977). Although adults do better, they are far from perfect, and like children their judgments of others’ perspectives tend to be biased by their own points of view. Under time pressure or when preoccupied, adults are likely to formulate messages that neglect their addressees’ perspectives (Keysar, Barr & Horton, 1998). Moreover, adults perspective-taking efforts display an egocentric bias similar to that found in children.

Furthermore, we rarely are given the opportunity to be told or to receive feedback graciously regarding how our communication is effecting others around us. People may get irritated with us, but even then they are unclear half the time what it is you did that rubbed them up the wrong way. How often do employees wane in their productivity because of lack of comprehension of the task at hand, often because the communicator (their colleague or team lead) has failed to take their perspective. How often do clients and customers just walk away because you didn’t take their perspective on board? Most of the time they won’t tell you either. In fact, they just won’t come back.

Did you know that any conversational speech is produced at a rate of about 2.5 words per second, often in noisy environments and with less than-perfect articulation. Production and comprehension could pose formidable problems for two individuals. Yet participants typically come away from conversations believing they have communicated successfully, and objective evidence probably would indicate that they have. But as stated already it is not this simple, and other people rarely provide us with useful feedback to let us know what we did wrong and what we might do better next time!

Communications skills training is perhaps the most important thing an organisation must consider if it wants its people and its customers to avoid many mistakes that are made in seemingly simple interactions. Getting communication in the workplace correct is inherently difficult as we are not taught elsewhere to be aware of the intricacies of communication and do not appreciate how complicated a process it actually is.

If you would like to have the people in your organisation become more aware of how their communication style is serving or not serving them, contact us and we can discuss how we can help you.

Mindfulness- Foundations For The 7-Steps to Learning and Habit Change