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Good afternoon.
Let me take you
into the laboratory
and show you something
amazing about how
to activate the human brain
to help it find solutions
to challenges.
A research participant
is escorted into a room.
In there, we test the
person's mood and problem
solving abilities using
standard measures.
Next, we present them with
a news article to read.
And much like the news that you
see and read every single day,
it only focuses on the problem.
So there's an example.
Hunger in America and how a
new report found that many US
cities are grappling
with rising food
insecurities and homelessness.
So this article
presents one statistic
after another
about this problem.
Next, the person is tested again
on mood and creative problem
solving abilities.
So that's the control group.
Now onto the experimental group.
The only difference in the
design is the news article.
It goes on to present actual
or potential solutions
to the problem.
So in the case of
hunger in America,
there are five
solutions, five actions
you can take right now in your
community to help solve hunger,
like donating to a local
food bank or fundraising.
And again, we test their
mood and creative problem
solving abilities.
In this study that I conducted
with Arianna Huffington
and researcher Sean Achor, after
we ran 250 people through this,
we were shocked by the
difference between the two
groups in both how they felt and
their creative problem solving
abilities.
When you present someone with
problems that they can solve
and solutions that they can
actually take themselves
right now, they're
creative problem
solving abilities on unrelated
subsequent task increase
by on average as much as 20%.
So what that shows us is that
we remind the brain that in one
domain there's a path forward.
You can actually import
that empowered mindset
to another domain.
They also reported feeling
better, 19% less agitated,
23% less uptight.
So what that tells us
is that for managers
who are trying to lead their
teams through tough times,
you actually can talk about
the negative in a way that
maintains engagement and a
solutions focused response
to problems.
Common wisdom suggests that in
order to create great change,
we need to focus on all
that's broken and fix it.
But we're seeing
that that's actually
about to change when it comes
to our companies and the media.
See, research in the fields
of a positive psychology
and neuroscientist
are providing us
with a compelling
case that shows
us there's a more productive
path, and it's twofold.
It's highlighting
current progress
and also focusing on
solutions that you can
take in response to problems.
It's getting the brain to focus
on successes and solutions.
In the midst of problems, you're
not spending time complaining,
but you're actually focusing
on what you can do about it.
The thing is though,
right now on the news,
that is not what's happening.
It's something that
I know all too well.
So I was originally
a computer engineer,
writing code at this dot
com that I worked for,
dreaming about
being a network news
anchor broadcasting
from New York City.
And I sent 150 tapes around the
country to land that first job.
Guys, guess how
many calls I got?
One, and I was so grateful.
Bienvenidas, El Paso.
I've packed my bags for Texas.
I was so thrilled to be there.
Now the exciting
part of this story
though is what would normally
take someone about a decade
to go from Chicago or-- while
I was in El Paso to Chicago
to New York, I was
able to actually make
that jump in three years.
I credit my meteoric
rise to hard hitting
investigative pieces.
I know you all saw them.
Bed bugs takeover mattresses
across Chicago land.
Skin eating fish, ladies
make for better pedicure
and my biting interview
with the Dalai Lama.
Oh, wait, actually I should
say, it was Dolly the llama.
There we go.
There see is.
No, but I tell you
about this timeline
because when I made it here
to CBS News in New York,
I was still full of
hope and optimism
about the good, the
work that we could
do using our reaching
resources, except that my two
national news programs were
full of negative stories.
I knew there was a better way
that we could cover the news,
a way that actually
empower people
and help move them forward
in a positive direction.
And that's what led me to
study Positive Psychology
under Dr. Martin Seligman at
the University of Pennsylvania.
And so this is
what I came to see,
but more importantly
what we can do about it.
The media's obsession
with all that's broken
is holding back
collective progress.
And it's negatively affecting
our health and happiness.
In a previous study
that I also did
with Arianna Huffington
and Sean Achor,
we found that just three minutes
of negative news in the morning
can lead to a 27% higher
likelihood of you reporting
your day as unhappy six
to eight hours later.
What that means is that
negative mood and mindset sticks
with us through our time at work
and at time with our families.
Now I know some people
say, well, you know,
what, news it's not
going to change,
because negativity and
sensationalism sell.
But actually, what
we're seeing is
that there is a different
viewpoint that's
coming out of the research.
So I know that here
at Google-- and there
are many organizations like
it where your bread and butter
is advertising-- a
compelling body of research
from the fields of
advertising research
and others are finding that
negative content negatively
impacts key
advertising measures,
like likelihood to
purchase or feelings
towards the brand of the
product advertised alongside it.
So of course, if I
just saw on the news
that the apocalypse
is coming, I'm
not going to buy a
new unarmored Lincoln
from Matthew McConaughey.
Meanwhile, when you
place positive content
alongside an advertisement,
that actually
increases those key measures.
So people feel better
about the product
that they're watching
the advertisement about.
There was a study done just
down the road here at Stanford
University published in
the Journal of Advertising
that found that if
you expose someone
to positive content ahead
of an advertisement,
they feel 24% more likely
to purchase that product
than had they been exposed
to negative content.
Why did I become interested
in the first place?
Well, because news
organizations are
largely dependent on
advertising revenue.
So this is an
incentive to create
more of the kind
of content that can
fuel advertising effectiveness.
So that's my economic
argument to news executives,
but really to me this is
just a means to an end.
And the end is that we
changed the narrative
on the news that actually fuels
collective progress instead
of holding us all back.
You see a barrage of
negative news story
feeds us this is lie that
behavior doesn't matter.
Think about it.
Problem, problem,
problem, problem,
no discussion of solutions.
There are millions of things in
this world beyond our control.
The problem is when
our brain starts
to believe that all things
are beyond our control.
And that impacts how we
approach our work and our time
with our families.
Think about it.
At work, this can happen too if
our company culture is overrun
with negativity, finger
pointing, gossip,
and other things that
we have to deal with.
If you're launching
a new product
and through that
whole process we're
focused so much on the
stresses and to-dos
that we forget about
the pre-orders coming in
or the investment
that's been secured,
we can literally decimate
employee engagement
and shareholder confidence.
And so the more that we
can reorient our brain
towards the fueling parts of our
reality by what we talk about,
by the way we communicate
with the people around us,
research shows that
actually fuels performance,
because it puts a brain
in a positive state.
And that, in turn, has been
connected to many performance
measures.
Just some examples,
research shows
that optimistic empowered
sales professionals
outsell their pessimistic
counterparts 37%.
A follow-up study found that
it was by as much as 56%.
This was done at MetLife at
the University of Pennsylvania.
Optimistic sales
professionals, they
have stuff to
complain about, right?
Yeah.
Except, they're more
focused on making the money,
hitting their goals,
they don't have time
to waste on complaining.
Meanwhile, managers
who get their team
to start focusing on all
that they're doing right
have been able to improve the
entire team's productivity
by 31% in just three weeks.
The more that we
focus on the positive,
on the fueling parts
of our reality,
and the solutions when
we're facing problems,
the more we fuel
the human brain.
So now in my work with
companies around the globe,
I help individuals
and business teams
make the habit of
doing all this easier.
So we've seen incredible
results in our work
with nationwide
brokerage services,
a wholly-owned subsidiary
of Nationwide Insurance.
They instituted something
called the morning cuddle
or actually I should say--
sorry it's the morning huddle.
I'm sure they'd
love a cuddle too.
But it's actually
called the huddle.
I'm not there for the morning,
but-- so the morning huddle is
something where
they get their sales
professionals off
the phones-- which
is how they make
their sales-- and they
get them to meet first
thing in the morning
to talk about two things.
They talk about successes
from the past 24 to 48 hours
that they might not
have heard about.
And then they also give
a chance for anyone
who needs a little extra
support that day to speak up
so their colleagues can rally
around them and offer help.
Well, guess what?
The results have
been remarkable.
Sales skyrocketed.
The new insurance application
rate increased by 237%.
Revenues have gone up by
50% in an 18 month period,
not a small 50.
This is hundreds of
millions of dollars.
I worked with a school district
in Washington state called
Sunnyside School
District or High School,
and they were facing an
abysmal graduation rate, 41%.
So this economically
depressed area
was dealing with many problems
and failing on many fronts.
Instead of complaining
about it, they
took this two-pronged approach.
They decided to celebrate
even the tiniest
successes from schools and from
their teachers and students.
And then they
stopped complaining
and focused on all
the actions they
could take to raise
scores and improve grades.
Well, they were able to
raise our graduation rate up
from 41% to 92% in eight years.
And they're not done yet.
So if we want to
change work, we have
to talk about what's working.
If we want to solve
our biggest challenges,
we've got to talk
about what's to come.
So when we get caught in our
businesses and organizations
in this negative vortex, we can
use the same solutions focused
formula to get better results.
In the meantime, the
news media as a whole
needs to make a great shift away
from talking about all that's
broken to start talking
about what's working
and what's to come.
And so journalists,
leaders, parents,
and all the other people who
choose on a regular basis
to focus on the positive,
you are the true leaders
as we move forward
into the future.
And so my hope is that we can
focus on all the successes
and solutions in
a way that reminds
our brain that our
behavior matters
and that we can make a
difference in the face
of challenges to create the
results that we're looking for.
Thank you.
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