Did you watch Saturday morning cartoons as a kid? If so, how good is your memory? What Saturday morning cartoon character wore a hat like this one?
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| My new hat – just like the one I used to see on Saturday morning. |
How confident are you in your answer (or how confident were you before I asked you how confident you are)?
Did you guess Elmer Fudd? If so, you are in good company. Most of the people to whom I show this picture make that guess. Most of them are also quite confident in their memory.
By now you’ve probably guessed that Elmer Fudd did not wear that hat (click here to see Elmer Fudd’s hat) You might be surprised to see that the ear flaps aren’t even down (if it even has ear flaps – it’s hard to tell). That’s interesting because many of the people I talk with say that the ear flaps are the most vivid part of their memory.
So, why do we associated that hat with Elmer Fudd? How come you were probably able to close your eyes and see it on his head? And, why is that memory so strong?
In “The Invisible Gorilla”, Daniel Simons and Chris Chabris argue that our memories are not simple recordings of events. Rather, they are a combination of three things:
1) the actual event.
2) your thinking and planning prior to the event
3) your reflection on that event.
Often, as we try to process an event, our expectations of what SHOULD HAVE happened begin to creep in.
We add associations to things that typically occur at the same time or are thematically related to the original event (e.g., when reflecting on a meeting about employee performance ratings it’s possible that we will also remember talking about their promotions or development needs since often those conversations take place at the same time).
This is what is happening with the hat. Our memory is that Elmer Fudd’s character was a hunter. The plaid, furry ear-flapped cap is iconic of hunters. As a result, our brains combine the two into a single memory. The result: we have a fond vivid memory of Elmer Fudd wearing that hat.
So what does this have to do with leadership? Often leaders get frustrated when people don’t follow their directions or when a group doesn’t seem to “get it” after a presentation or discussion.
Very often the problem is that they didn’t get the message in the first place. Although your memory of the discussion or presentation may seem vivid, it is often flawed. It might include how you practiced giving the message. It might include a reconstruction of the conversation drawing upon past conversations or interactions of a similar nature. It might even include follow on conversations that occurred days or even weeks after the initial conversation.
So the next time you aren’t getting the results you expected pause and step back. Take a lesson from my friend Madeleine Van Hecke, author of the book “Blind Spots”. Madeleine suggests that we teach ourselves to shift from “furious to curious”. When you start to feel angry, reframe the problem. Ask yourself how the misunderstanding could have occurred. Ask what other memories might be seeping into the memory of the actual event. Ask what others might have heard and how their memories might have been altered. And, when you run out of questions, talk to the people around you to find the answers.
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Brad Kolar is the President of Kolar Associates, a leadership consulting and workforce productivity consulting firm. He can be reached at brad.kolar@kolarassociates.com.
