“As companies continue to triage their way through this economic war, a growing chorus of cultural observers argue that recovery is contingent on the marriage of right-brain innovations with left-brain skill sets.” Marco R. della Cava, USA Today
“There’s an acceptance that as a century ago machines replaced muscle, today computers are turning traditional left-brain work, jobs where a series of steps leads to one answer, into a commodity that can be outsourced,” says Daniel Pink, whose 2005 book, A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future, recently was turned into the PBSLiving on the Right Side of the Brain. “Our children will no more be doing routine white-collar work than we were likely to inherit the blue-collar jobs of our grandfathers.” special
Pink says the shift to right-brain thinking already can be found in companies that welcome well-rounded employees, medical schools that push art studies and classrooms that encourage collaborative problem-solving. “We’re realizing that our economy is not about standardization,” he says.
It’s also no longer about job security, which makes taking the leap away from once-stable left-brain jobs less daunting, says Pamela Skillings, a New York-based career coach and author of Escape From Corporate America: A Practical Guide to Creating the Career of Your Dreams.
“Most of us are innately creative in some way,” says Skillings, who herself left a job in the financial sector to start her consulting business. “Many big companies are still about following rules and doing what’s been done in the past. But we want to be in situations where our free-thinking sides are being put to use.”
