Dreaming Big
Using Subconscious Insights for Corporate Innovation
Leading minds have attributed their genius to dreams
Dreams have long been celebrated as catalysts for innovation, with history showing us that they can indeed drive success. From the Theory of Relativity to popular culture phenomena like Twilight, dreams have played a role in creating masterpieces and pioneering business ideas. Whether it’s Mary Shelley’s nightmare that birthed Frankenstein or Larry Page’s dream that led to the foundation of Google, the potential of our subconscious is undeniable.
“When a really good dream shows up, grab it!” — Larry Page
Throughout history, the most fortunate dreamers have turned their night-time visions into ground-breaking achievements. It’s no wonder that many of us are eager to tap into this wellspring of creativity to drive our own business success.
Strong scientific evidence links dreams to innovation
Science has proven a link between dreaming and innovation. And given us a way to control it. In the last few decades neuroscience techniques have advanced rapidly. Now we an delve objectively into the sleeping brain. The link between dreaming and innovation has become a little clearer.
Ten years ago, researchers noticed something strange about project managers in high-tech organizations. Some of them had particularly creative and emotionally charged dreams. Employees who dreamed seemed to deliver better business innovation. Correlations like this one always demand careful unpicking. The researchers couldn’t be sure that it was the dreams themselves that were causing the innovation.
There was no evidence that the project managers were receiving nighttime direction on how to build software. The scientists instead offered a more cautious explanation. People who are open to new experiences and less directive in their approach to life, dream more often. This kind of manger is also more likely to allow their teams space to experiment. It was this flexibility that resulted in the commercial innovation.
Indeed, we’ve known for a long time that the personality trait of openness is a critical determinant in how someone dreams. Nevertheless, it was a bold step forwards to tie the intimate life of our dreams to business outcomes.
Innovation can be directed through targeted dreaming
Fast forward to 2023. Psychologists are now even able to plant creativity-driving dreams in sleeping brains. In May, Harvard Medical School researchers discovered a way to nudge sleepers into dreaming about a specific topic. They exploited the drowsy point right before sleep onset (known as N1). Their new protocol finally gave us control over our dreams’ delivery of creativity.
The scientists played sleepers a voice saying, “Remember to think of a tree.” This worked. On average, 70.3% of the dream reports included a tree. Critically, upon waking, creativity in tree-related tasks improved. Dream practitioners and psychologists, including those at the Centre for Organizational Dreaming, are expanding and tailoring this approach to business problems.
“Dreams never give up on us. They are with us every night urging us to face the issues that restrict and discourage us, or that limit our inventiveness”- Montague Ullman
With these advances, the prospect of leveraging dreams for business problem-solving and innovation is more within reach than ever. While we may not always recreate the monumental eureka moments of the past, like the discovery of the structure of DNA, the potential for dreams to spark meaningful innovation is clear.