HIRE A DYSLEXIC
July 24, 2008 – 3:42 amHow do you go from being a rebellious kid who always had trouble in school to an entrepreneur with one of the most recognizable brands in the world? I am going to take a leap of my own here and suggest an unlikely answer: Maybe Branson’s dyslexia helped him. Dyslexia is a huge liability when it comes to what you are supposed to learn in school: reading, writing, and arithmetic. But it is a major asset when it comes to what most schools (or corporations, for that matter) do not value highly: creative thinking. Dyslexics have a tendency to excel at such things as art, architecture, drama, and music. Tell them to sit down and read a 500-page novel cover to cover, out loud—and they will cringe. Ask them to express themselves creatively—and they may soar.
Although the stereotyped perception is that dyslexia is a matter of reversing numbers and letters, the reality is far more complex and far more interesting. Dyslexia is deeply rooted in the actual way the brain functions, in the way one processes information. Scientists now believe that the disorder is characterized by out-of-place neurons wandering around the brain, causing a “cascade of connectional differences,” wiring regions of the brain not normally connected.8 Most of us think in a linear fashion. A leads to B leads to C. The way dyslexics think, A leads to M or R or Z. They are practically incapable of linear thinking, unless they really work at it. It does not come naturally.
Leonardo da Vinci. Albert Einstein. Rodin. Agatha Christie. W. B. Yeats. Winston Churchill. Nelson Rockefeller. All are now thought to have had dyslexia. So do Charles Schwab, John Chambers (president and CEO of Cisco Systems), Paul Orfalea (founder of Kinko’s), and Craig McCaw (the cellular industry pioneer). And on and on.
A disproportionate number of CEOs? In a recent cover story in Fortune magazine, Sally Shaywitz, a leading dyslexia neuroscientist at Yale University, put it this way: “Dyslexics are over-represented in the top ranks of people who are unusually insightful, who bring a new perspective, who think out of the box” (see Note 8).
Taken from : “Leap” A Revolution in Creative Business Strategy
