Cognitive clutter

Former Vietnam POW, author, fighter pilot, and businessman, Colonel Lee Ellis wrote that during captivity, “when the mind is free from clutter, it is amazing how memory and cognitive performance improve dramatically.”

In my experience, Lee could not be more correct, but the challenge in leading complex organizations is how to reduce the clutter. The noise of the information age has created a fog that can, at times, cause a leader to fear dementia. As a CEO, the continuous analysis of financial spreadsheets. multiple and simultaneous issues with all of their variables, consideration of the second/third order effects and potential outcomes associated with each course of action, and the care which one has to perform in crafting even the simplest correspondence can on any given day create a fog and memory lapses relative to the simplest of facts. Couple this with the absence of sufficient sleep and rest from the daily grind and you have a tired mind that does not function like a fresh one devoid of the clutter that Colonel Ellis describes.