Why This Matters for Your Organisation

Every team has moments where communication stalls, decisions slow down, or people react in ways that surprise even themselves. Often, what looks like a performance issue or a personality clash is something more fundamental: the way our brains process information, emotion, and connection.

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor’s four-character brain model offers a practical, neuroscience-grounded framework for understanding these patterns. It gives individuals and teams a shared language for recognising what’s driving their responses, and the tools to choose a more effective one.

This resource synthesises the core framework and its most practical applications. Whether you’re leading a team through change, coaching individuals, or looking to strengthen your own decision-making, the techniques here are designed to be used immediately.

The Four Characters: A Practical Framework

Dr Taylor’s model maps four distinct patterns of thinking and feeling to the brain’s hemispheres. Each pattern, or “character”, serves a specific function. None is better or worse than the others; the goal is balance and intentional choice.

Character 1: The Planner (Left Thinking)

Function: Rational, analytical, detail-oriented

The Planner is your organiser. This character analyses, categorises, plans, and follows through. It thinks linearly, works with logic and language, and focuses on structure, order, and getting things done.

You’ll recognise the Planner when you’re:

• Making checklists or mapping out a project
• Weighing pros and cons before a decision
• Focused on timelines, deliverables, and detail

Strengths for your work:

• Professional execution and follow-through
• Planning and prioritisation
• Structure during complexity

“Without this character, life, starting with the drawers and the garage, would be chaotic.”

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor (Taylor, 2021)

Character 2: The Protector (Left Emotional)

Function: Emotional guard, holding lessons from past experienced

The Protector is your safety system. It stores past experiences, particularly painful ones, and uses them to keep you alert to risk. It’s the home of fight, flight, and freeze responses, and it activates when you feel threatened, anxious, or under pressure.

You’ll recognise the Protector when you’re:

• Feeling anxious about a potential risk or outcome
• Replaying a past mistake or difficult conversation
• Reacting more strongly than the situation warrants
• Tired, hungry, or physically run down, the Protector is more likely to take over when your physical state is compromised

Strengths for your work:

• Survival instincts and boundary-setting
• Learning from experience
• Emotional depth that drives growth

“Pain is a tool… designed to be a lesson, not a lifestyle.”

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor (Taylor, 2021)

A critical insight for leaders: The Protector is essential. Without it, we couldn’t learn or grow. The challenge isn’t to eliminate this character. It’s to build a healthy relationship between it and the other three (Taylor, 2021).

Character 3: The Explorer (Right Emotional)

Function: Creative, curious, open to possibility

The Explorer is your innovator. This character is playful, adventurous, spontaneous, and lives in the present moment. It thrives on new ideas, creative expression, and the energy of possibility.

You’ll recognise the Explorer when you’re:

• Brainstorming without self-censoring
• Feeling energised by a new idea or approach
• In a state of flow, fully absorbed in what you’re doing
• Trying something for the sheer interest of it

Strengths for your work:

• Creativity and innovation
• Energy and enthusiasm that lifts a team
• Willingness to experiment and take calculated risks

A note of balance: The Explorer’s spontaneity is powerful, but without the Planner’s structure, it can lead to impulsive decisions. The two work best together (Taylor, 2021).

Character 4: The Connector (Right Thinking)

Function: Present, expansive, integrative

The Connector is your strategic thinker and your source of calm. This character sees broader patterns, holds perspective, and connects you to a sense of purpose and meaning. It’s where compassion, wisdom, and deep presence live.

You’ll recognise the Connector when you’re:

• Seeing the bigger picture across a complex situation
• Feeling genuinely present and at ease
• Experiencing empathy or a deep sense of connection with others
• Making decisions from a place of clarity rather than pressure

Strengths for your work:

• Strategic thinking and long-term vision
• Calm leadership under pressure
• Building trust and genuine connection within teams

“Peace is just a thought away.”

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor (Taylor, 2021)

How the Characters Work Together

Dr Taylor describes the goal as a “democracy of four equal characters”, all four on your team, none permanently in charge (Taylor, 2021).

In practice, this means:

• Recognising which character is driving your response in any given moment
• Appreciating what that character brings. No character is a weakness
• Choosing which character best serves the situation

This is where the framework moves from interesting theory to practical capability.

The BRAIN Huddle: A Technique You Can Use Today

The BRAIN Huddle is the framework’s core practice: a structured pause that gives you the power to choose your response rather than reacting automatically (Venezky, 2023; Taylor, 2021).

The Five Steps

B: Breathe

Identify which character is most active right now. Notice your physical sensations, thought patterns, and emotional state, without judgement.

R: Recognise

Identify which character is most active right now. Notice your physical sensations, thought patterns, and emotional state, without judgement.

A: Appreciate

Acknowledge the value of whichever character has shown up. The Protector’s anxiety is trying to keep you safe. The Planner’s urgency is trying to get things done. Every character has a purpose.

I: Inquire

Ask yourself: “How would each of my four characters approach this situation?” Consider what each has to offer before you act.

N: Navigate

Choose which character, or combination, you want driving your response. Move forward from conscious choice rather than automatic reaction.

When to Use It

• Before important conversations, especially when you anticipate tension
• When you notice reactivity, a sign the Protector has taken the wheel
• During decision-making, to ensure you’re drawing on the right character for the task
• As a daily practice. Morning, midday, and evening check-ins build the skill quickly

Start with low-stakes moments. The BRAIN Huddle is a skill that strengthens with repetition. Build confidence in calm situations first, then apply it when the pressure is on.

Practical Applications

For Leaders and Managers

Navigating change and uncertainty
Change often activates the Protector, in you and in your team. Recognising this pattern helps you lead with empathy rather than frustration. When your team resists a new initiative, consider that their Protectors may be working hard to manage uncertainty. Meeting that with Connector energy (calm, present, empathetic) rather than Planner energy (logic, timelines, expectations) can shift the dynamic.

Improving team communication
When two people’s Protectors are both active (in a heated meeting, a tense email exchange, or a difficult feedback conversation), escalation is almost inevitable. One person choosing to shift to a different character can change the entire interaction. The BRAIN Huddle gives you that choice point.

Balancing strategic and operational thinking
Leaders often default to either the Planner (detail, execution, control) or the Connector (vision, meaning, relationships). The most effective leadership draws on both, and knows when to bring in the Explorer’s creativity or the Protector’s hard-won lessons.

For Teams

Building a shared language

When a team understands the four characters, conversations about working styles, stress responses, and collaboration preferences become easier and less personal. “My Protector is active right now” is a more productive statement than an unexplained withdrawal or a defensive reaction.

Matching the right energy to the task

• Planning and execution: Planner energy: structured, detailed, sequential
• Brainstorming and innovation: Explorer energy: open, playful, uncritical
• Strategy and integration: Connector energy: broad, pattern-seeking, calm
• Risk assessment and reflection: Protector energy: cautious, experience-informed

For Individuals

Emotional regulation
When the Protector takes over (anxiety, rumination, reactivity), the BRAIN Huddle offers a practical way to interrupt the cycle. Recognise the Protector, thank it for the warning, and consciously invite the Connector’s calm or the Planner’s structured problem-solving.

Building self-awareness
Tracking which character shows up in different situations reveals patterns: which character dominates at work, which one you default to under pressure, and which one you rarely access. That awareness is the starting point for growth.

Physical state matters
One of the framework’s most practical insights: when you’re tired, hungry, or physically run down, the Protector is far more likely to take over. Self-care isn’t indulgent. It directly affects your ability to choose your response (Venezky, 2023).

Getting Started: A Four-Week Guide

Week 1: Name and Recognise

Give each of your four characters a name: Dr Taylor’s names, the functional names (Planner, Protector, Explorer, Connector), or your own. The name creates psychological distance and makes recognition easier.

Spend the week noticing which character is active throughout your day. Pay attention to physical sensations, thought patterns, and emotional states.

Week 2: Practise the BRAIN Huddle

Use the BRAIN Huddle three times a day in low-stakes situations: before starting work, at lunch, and in the evening. Build the habit before applying it under pressure.

Week 3: Apply Under Pressure

Start using the BRAIN Huddle in moderate-stakes situations: before meetings, during decisions, in conversations where you’d normally react rather than respond.

Week 4: Reflect and Refine

Review your patterns:

• Which character dominated this week?
• When did you successfully choose a different response?
• What’s becoming easier?
• Where do you want to focus next?

Ongoing Practice

Continue daily BRAIN Huddles. Expand the practice into your relationships and leadership. Share the framework with your team if appropriate. The goal is a sustainable practice. Not perfection, but consistent, intentional choice-making.

The Neuroscience Behind the Framework

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor is a Harvard-trained neuroanatomist whose personal experience of a stroke, and subsequent recovery, gave her a unique window into how the brain’s hemispheres function. Her TED talk on the experience has been viewed over 27 million times.

The four-character model is grounded in research on hemispheric lateralisation: the brain’s left and right hemispheres processing information in fundamentally different ways. The model maps these differences into four functional patterns: left-thinking, left-emotional, right-emotional, and right-thinking.

Dr Taylor’s framework also aligns with established psychological theory. She explicitly connects the four characters to Carl Jung’s foundational concepts: the Persona (Character 1), the Shadow (Character 2), the Anima/Animus (Character 3), and the Self (Character 4) (Taylor, 2021). This grounding in both neuroscience and psychology gives the model practical credibility across professional and personal applications.

Related frameworks that complement this model include Polyvagal Theory (Stephen Porges), which maps the body’s safety and threat responses, and Internal Family Systems, which works with internal “parts” in a therapeutic context.

References

Taylor, J. B. (2021). Whole Brain Living: The Anatomy of Choice and the Four Characters That Drive Our Life. Hay House.

Taylor, J. B. (2009). My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey. Penguin Books.

Taylor, J. B. (n.d.). Dr Jill’s 4 characters. Retrieved from drjilltaylor.com

Venesky, D. (2023). Practical exercise: The BRAIN Huddle. Sparkling Leaders. Retrieved from sparklingleaders.com

Taylor, J. B. (2008). My stroke of insight [TED talk]. TED Conferences. Retrieved from ted.com