Episode 11: Iain McGilchrist and The Divided Brain
- Georgina Brown (hershe)
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
What Inclusion Looks Like When Both Hemispheres Are In the Room
If your organisational culture had a brain, which hemisphere would be running the meeting?
Left: analytical, language-loving, detail-oriented—but blind to context?
Or right: relational, embodied, holistic—but easily dismissed as “soft skills”?
Enter: Dr Iain McGilchrist—psychiatrist, philosopher, and renegade neuroscientist.
In his groundbreaking work The Master and His Emissary, McGilchrist explores a radical truth:
It’s not what the brain does—it’s how it does it that shapes our world.
For inclusion, equity, and culture change, this insight is golden.
Because the truth is: many of our organisations are left-hemisphere heavy—run by logic, metrics, silos, and efficiency.
Meanwhile, right-hemisphere gifts—empathy, connection, intuition, systems thinking—get side-lined, underfunded, or politely ignored.
At BARDO Inclusive, we say it loud:It’s time to get both hemispheres in the room.Because real inclusion isn’t just a checklist—it’s a shift in consciousness.
The Science Bit: One Brain, Two Ways of Knowing
Quick refresher:
Yes, the brain has two hemispheres.
No, it’s not that “left = logic, right = art” oversimplified cliché.
McGilchrist’s work goes deeper. He shows that each hemisphere attends to the world differently:
Left Hemisphere:
Narrow focus
Abstract, symbolic, and decontextualised
Seeks certainty, control, categorisation
Useful for task management and detail
But often misses the whole picture
Right Hemisphere:
Broad, open awareness
Embodied, contextual, relational
Holds paradox, nuance, emotion
Sees connections and interdependencies
Crucial for meaning, ethics, and trust
Here’s the twist: the right hemisphere is actually primary.
It takes in the world first, whole and rich.
The left then breaks it down, labels it, and gives it order.
But when organisations over-rely on left-brain thinking (hello, endless KPIs and Excel-shaped logic), we lose sight of people, context, and complexity.
We mistake the map for the territory.
And we call it strategy.
How McGilchrist Supports the NIMM
The Neuro-Inclusive Maturity Model (NIMM) was built to bring both hemispheres into organisational life.
McGilchrist’s lens illuminates every domain:
Neuroscience-Informed – understanding how hemispheric dominance shapes culture
Mindset-Shifting – moving from certainty and control to curiosity and complexity
Trust-Building – valuing relationship, story, and embodied presence
Bias-Disrupting – resisting over-categorisation and simplistic identity thinking
System-Aware – recognising the whole, not just parts
When we favour only what can be measured, we often sideline what actually matters.
When we suppress ambiguity, we lose the ability to relate.
When we reward speed over sensemaking, we ignore the deeper rhythms of change.
Inclusion work demands more than data.
It demands attention, presence, pattern-recognition, and care.
All right-hemisphere strengths.
Real Inclusion Requires Whole-Brain Culture
The left hemisphere loves checklists.
The right hemisphere asks: “But what’s the story here?”
The left loves roles and titles.
The right says: “How are we actually relating in this moment?”
Most inclusion strategies live in the left hemisphere, neatly mapped out, benchmarked, project-managed.
But they often fail because they ignore what the right hemisphere knows:
That people aren’t problems to be fixed.
They’re worlds to be felt, heard, and understood.
This isn’t anti-logic. It’s integration.
Leadership that can toggle, gracefully, between analysis and empathy, abstraction and embodiment, structure and story.
That’s the sweet spot of inclusion.
Try This: A Whole-Brain Micro-Practice for Your Next Team Dialogue
Set up a discussion using two rounds of “brain-based framing.”
Left Hemisphere Round
Prompt: “What’s the issue or task we need to address today?
”Let people share their analysis, ideas, or concerns.
Right Hemisphere Round
Prompt: “How are we feeling about this? What’s the human story here?”
Ask people to tune into the emotional landscape, systemic implications, or the bigger picture.
Hold both rounds with equal time and weight.
Notice what insights only emerged after the second round.
This isn't just good facilitation. It's good brain hygiene.
Want More McGilchrist? Start Here:
The Master and His Emissary – the foundational text (intellectually dense, but brilliant)
The Matter with Things – his magnum opus, deep dive into consciousness, science, and the sacred
The Divided Brain and the Search for Meaning (video lecture) – great introduction to his ideas
His interviews on podcasts like Rebel Wisdom and On Being – expansive and poetic
Reflect:
Where in your organisation does the left hemisphere dominate the conversation?
What wisdom might emerge if you gave more space to context, emotion, and embodied knowing?
What would it mean to treat inclusion as relationship, not resolution?
Next Up in the Series:
Episode 12: Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett and the Myth of the Emotional Brain: Rethinking Emotional Intelligence, One Construct at a Time
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