AUGUST 2015 / NO. 1
TAGS: TARUN KHANNA, DATA, INFORMATION, KNOWLEDGE, INTELLIGENCE, COMFORT ZONE, DECISION-MAKING
Contextual intelligence
“International executives need ‘contextual intelligence’, the ability to recognize the limits of their knowledge and adapt it to different environments”
The statement above was made by Tarun Khanna in Harvard Business Review in both September and November 2014. Context is the background in which a future event takes place, it is often real or perceived and includes factors such as geography, genders, industries, job roles, attitudes, beliefs, values, politics, cultures, symbols, organizational climate, the past, personal ethics and the preferred future. Intelligence is the ability to transform data into useful information, information into knowledge, and knowledge into intelligence. Contextual intelligence is a leadership competency and can be learned and used by any person, in any place, at any time. Contextually intelligent people have the perfect intuition of knowing how to ask the right questions, at the right time, to the right people.
Contextually intelligence-based questions include:
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Whose responsibility is this?
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How does this influence the anticipated or desired future?
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Who determines what is and what is not a success?
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Who has the power and how do they control information?
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Who is supposed to make this decision versus who actually makes this decision?
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Who are the recognized leaders?
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Who are the unrecognized leaders?
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Who are the followers and who do they follow?
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What roles need to be accomplished to get this done?
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What experiences can I relate to this?
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Whose experiences can I relate to this?
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What historical events led to this situation or required decision?
For practitioners in strategic competitive intelligence and strategy this means having the ability to recognize, assess and assimilate the various internal and external factors inherent in a given environment or circumstance by interpreting and by reacting appropriately to rapidly-changing surroundings. This separates leaders from non-leaders. Leaders who are multi-tasking thinkers who routinely go outside their comfort zones to acquire useful intelligence about the world in which they live, work and integrate this intelligence into their decision-making.
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable ones, and then starting on the first one”
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