Read Your Brain and Business: The Neuroscience of Great Leaders for Free Online Page A

Does that matter? To answer this question, they used a technique called “backward masking” to probe the brain.
    Background information: Backward masking is a procedure whereby images of emotions are presented to subjects as they lie in a scanner, but they are presented too quickly to be picked up by the conscious human brain (for 10–30 milliseconds). In addition, another image is presented shortly thereafter for long enough so that people know that they can see it. The human brain needs an image to last for more than 30 ms for the conscious brain to pick it up. We need at least that amount of time for the conscious brain to make an imprint. But what about the unconscious brain?
    The finding: Experimenters found that when fearful facial expressions were shown so that people did not know they had seen them, the amygdala still activated. 10 – 13 That is, the amygdala was able to pick up the fear signal unconsciously without the conscious brain knowing anything about it.
    Conclusion: When you surround yourself with fear talk all day, even if you are not consciously listening to it—the news, negative colleagues, minute-to-minute stock market updates—your amygdala is still on overdrive.
    In Jack B.’s case, there were a number of unconscious factors that kept his “unconscious fear wheel” spinning. His wife, who became progressively annoyed by him as he did not bring in any money while he was trying to figure his life out, would often be annoyed around him. Even when he was not paying attention to her, his amygdala would have picked this up. Also, he would sometimes try to get his kids ready for school in the morning with the TV on, with news aboutcrashes, bailouts, the recession, and the dismantled economy. Although he did not pay attention to this, all these factors added up to increase the amygdala activation. As long as the news had between 10–30 ms to register in his brain, that was enough to dominate his unconscious emotional processor. With so much fear and threat bombarding his brain, it did not stand a chance at processing other emotions. They had to wait in line. The power of this registration is illustrated by the following experiment as well.
     
    Concept 3
     
    Aside from picking up fear signals outside of conscious awareness, the amygdala has been shown to activate in people with cortical blindness as well. Cortical blindness occurs when a person is blind and cannot see because the seeing part of the brain (the occipital cortex) is damaged. Even in these blind people, the amygdala will activate to fear. 14
    Conclusion: Your emotional brain is endowed with a supersensitive fear detector. It does not need your thinking brain to even be involved. This is both an advantage and disadvantage. If you “sense” that something wrong is happening, don’t discount this just because you can’t identify what it is. As long as you are constantly taking in cues from your environment, pay attention to what your brain tells you.
    In Jack B.’s case, this meant that he did not have to be looking at something to have it register in his brain. If any part of a fearful image, even in his peripheral vision, got through his pupils and into his brain, that was enough.
    So how exactly is fear affecting your thinking and decision making?
     
    Concept 4
     
    Experiments have shown that the amygdala, when it is impacted by fear, is not the only part of the brain that is affected. This is because the amygdala is connected to multiple brain regions. One of these regions is the frontal lobe, where many important (business)decisions are processed. If the amygdala is activated, this activation affects various regions in the frontal lobe (the prefrontal cortex) and, therefore, affects decision making.
    Conclusion: To lead effectively, leaders need to have sufficient access to their own emotions without disrupting their attention to things at hand. Leaders need to recognize that when they are vulnerable to fear and anxiety, they