How to Use Your Intuition for Better Business Outcomes

How do you make your business decisions? Do you process everything through your logical mind, or do you go with your gut?

It’s an intriguing dilemma, so let’s consult an expert. Swinburne University’s Professor Emeritus Murray Gillin has made a career of studying entrepreneurship. Having set up the world’s first masters degree in entrepreneurship and innovation in 1989, he has since seen many of his students become multi-millionaires.

So what’s Professor Gillin’s take on it – logic or gut instinct? The professor is convinced that successful entrepreneurs are guided by a deeper force, a level of intuition that allows them to predict future outcomes. He believes that business needs to be seen as a holistic enterprise; it’s not just about producing a product and selling it.

Professor Gillen is so convinced that intuition plays a central role that he’s embarked on a study to prove it. His research paper is titled, Before Cognition: The Active Contribution of the Heart/ANS to Intuitive Decision Making as Measured on Repeat Entrepreneurs. Won’t that be interesting.

Assessing my own journey – both my initial experiences that got me into this mess wonderful adventure, and my experiences and lessons since – I think he’s right on the money.

I’m blogging about it now because in the last few months I’ve had many lessons around trusting my own intuition, and have been reflecting on it a lot lately. My lessons have actually been occurring all the way along, I’ve only just learnt how to really make sense of them.  I realise now that had I listened to my own inner voice at the time I would have saved myself a lot of trouble, time and money. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

As with all startups, some of the decisions I’ve had to make have been very difficult. Recently I was faced with a choice between options, and the choice my gut was voting for appeared like it would put me back at square one, so it was a tough call. But the alarm bells were so strong I couldn’t ignore them, and it was of course the right decision. It didn’t actually put me back at square one at all and I’ve since had a number of breakthroughs.

When every alarm bell in your system is going off it’s a bit of a no-brainer really, but unfortunately we’re not always hit over the head like that. If we’re not accustomed to listening to our inner voice, or our gut, then the feelings, or the “sense” can be easy to miss or ignore.

It’s vital to get to know your own “inner terrain”, and tune into RadioYOU.

Here’s some of my lessons to date that may be food for thought:

The starving entrepreneur: This is when you’re most vulnerable. When you’re eager (or desperate) for things to start working it’s so easy to get caught up in not wanting to say no to an opportunity. Deborah Morandin from Squiggly Training says it best: “Say ‘no’ to the good so you can say ‘yes’ to the best.”

When you’re really eager for a break, you must question if it truly is a good choice for you. Does your logical mind just want to grab at it because it’s the only choice currently available? Or because you feel bad about turning down an opportunity? Bear in mind that your logical mind is a control freak and often a traitor, so learn to make it serve you, not the other way around, and practice tuning out from it. Ask yourself: Am I truly happy with this choice? And, does it truly resonate with my brand and my vision? In essence: Will this choice help steer me to where I want to go? Getting the right answer requires honesty and courage.

The wrong deal/person/scenario: I say “wrong” as opposed to “bad” because not every person or scenario that is wrong for you is necessarily bad. It’s just bad for you.Most of these will sound really obvious, but it’s incredible how we will ignore our own feelings and go with what our logical mind comes up with, or what we want to believe. This can be a really destructive way to operate. At best it means we’ll take the long, expensive route to where we are going.

• If you think someone is trying to extract an unreasonable amount of money from you – more often than not they are (even if you’re not familiar with the protocols for that industry).
• If you think someone is fibbing to you, guess what – you’re right. Don’t brush over this, no matter how good the deal/offer/scenario looks – if you move ahead, you are well and truly setting yourself up for trouble.
• If you feel pressured, then BINGO, you’re being pressured. Despite a natural tendency to cave into this, this is exactly the time to back away. If they have to have an answer/money/(insert whatever) from you RIGHT NOW, then get out of there FAST.
• If someone makes you feel uncomfortable, uneasy, or any other negative emotional or physical response this is not a good sign – regardless of what your logical mind is telling you. Keep in mind that this doesn’t mean they are necessarily dishonest or bad in any way, it just means that whatever they are offering is not right for you.
• If it seems like they’re saying “all the right things” to butter you up and make you believe they are just so in tune with your vision – you can just about bet your bottom dollar that it’s all crap. The ones to trust will ask you lots of questions and won’t pretend to have their head around your concept in 10 minutes flat.

When alarm bells are going off, pay attention to them. There is no such thing as an inner false alarm. When it goes off it’s the real deal, and you better get out of that building – fast.

Idea Generation: Well, this is one topic that fascinates me. I’m currently drafting a post on this one alone, so I won’t go too much into it here. But what I will say is that in terms of generating ideas (both big and small) turning the task over to your subconscious is where it’s at. There’s no question about that, the trick is in how to do it.

Brand Identity: The further along the track I get, the more convinced I am that to create or “manifest” your brand in your vision (the one that lies within you which has no words, no form, just that sense of “knowing”) you need to start feeling it. Yep, that’s right, feeling it. I believe that to manifest your brand in its best form, you must tune in to feeling your vision. When you can really feel your vision, the answers will start coming to you.

I’m currently experimenting with this and finding it a fascinating process and experience. I’m also finding it’s not an easy thing to do. Your first hurdle will be to quiet your logical mind – which, if you haven’t noticed, never shuts up! A big mistake that new entrepreneurs are prone to making is constantly being tense, and quite often in a state of panic. That’s lethal because it shuts everything down. You’re really sending yourself up a creek without a paddle when you operate like this (and I speak from experience here!!). If you want to give this feeling thing a go, you’ll need to relax into it. And persevere – any new approach is difficult at first.

Here’s another very effective technique. Creative Questions has come up with the technique of feeding your mind creative questions framed in a positive context. Their theory is that we are always asking ourselves questions (usually in a negative context). Whether they’re positive or negative questions your brain will search for answers and respond in kind. Negative question = negative answer. So when you reframe your questions into positive ones you give yourself a fighting chance to come up with powerful answers. They have a deck of cards you can use, and you can also create your own questions.

In future, when you’re faced with a decision, be still. Tune in and learn to listen to your inner voice – it’s surprisingly wise and accurate.

Have fun!
Danielle