My work with Eric has contributed significantly to the success we have experienced at Castle Contracting.
Performance Principles™
Performance Principles is an e-letter written by Eric Herrenkohl that focuses on creating the business you want by building the organization you need. This is copyrighted material. However, you can copy, reprint, or forward these newsletters in their entirety so long as any use is not for resale and the following copyright notice is included intact: Copyright © 2010, Eric Herrenkohl, Herrenkohl Consulting. All rights reserved. www.herrenkohlconsulting.com, 610-658-9790.
Albert Einstein and Persistence
Everyone knows that intelligence was key to Albert Einstein’s success. Equally important, however, was his persistence. Einstein toiled away as a low-level civil servant in the Swiss patent office. All the while, he was doggedly focused on trying to solve the grandest problems of theoretical physics. He wasn’t making much money and many of his friends from university had more prestigious jobs. But he stayed focused on solving these issues. And then one day in the spring of 1905, he had a breakthrough moment that resulted in the creation of the iconic equation E=mc2.
Performance Principle: Persistence is a foundational ability of effective people. As leaders we are responsible not only for setting the right goals but also for keeping people focused on these goals despite many distractions. From my own work in implementing manager and employee development programs, here are some tips on how to keep people focused:
- Keep the goals simple. When you are doing any kind of goal setting, boil the goals down to simple and easy-to-remember statements. A goal is a target. If you cannot remember a goal you cannot “see” the target for which you are aiming.
- Tap into people’s real motivations. When I work on developing managers and employees, I always assess what motivates people personally. Ultimately, people do what they want to do. Practically speaking, this means figuring out what motivates your people and figuring out how their motivations intersect with the goals you are setting.
- Follow Up. You have to follow up with people at least once per month if you want to see them make real progress toward the goals you have set. One of the reasons that I get hired to develop managers and staff is because I provide this ongoing follow up, and it makes a big difference.
- Celebrate Success. Goal oriented people and organizations often allow success to go uncelebrated because they have moved onto the next challenge. Don’t do that. Take the time to recognize and reward teams and individuals for achieving their goals. This serves two purposes. First, you reinforce effective behaviors in those being recognized. Second, you re-communicate to everyone else the importance of staying focused on the right goals.
- Update Your Goals. I recommend revisiting and revising your goals every 6 months. I have found this timeframe allows you to keep the goals relevant. And, it gives you yet another excuse to refocus your people on what is most important.
Mastering the Mundane
My wife worked for a terrific sales organization and had a great manager while she was there. After her training period ended and Kelly was ready to take on her own sales territory, her manager told her that she had a lot of potential and was going to be great at her job. Then her manager told her that for the first 6 months of her job, she wanted Kelly to do exactly what she told her to do. This included seemingly mundane items such as how to organize customer files, the right way to utilize her appointment calendar, even where to make notes to herself about returning calls.
To some, this might appear to be micro management. To Kelly’s manager, however, it was the best way to free her new sales rep to do the real work of the job – interacting effectively with customers.
Performance Principle: If you want your people to be effective, you must give them systems to quickly master the mundane. Good systems are proven ways to get the daily activities of a job done. There is no reason that each person should design his or her own system from scratch. Instead, you should give them systems for quickly mastering the basics, in order that they can focus on higher value activities such as serving customers and proactively managing projects.
If your organization is struggling with productivity and efficiency, consider having your most effective people document some basic processes for how getting things effectively. These processes become tools for coaching employees on the basics of their jobs. Remember, the purpose of these systems is not to squelch creativity – it is to focus people’s creative abilities on the most important and valuable activities.
Questions to Consider:
- When it comes to handling repetitive tasks, are people on your team recreating the wheel?
- Have you invested the time to standardize systems and processes for getting mundane tasks done with a high level of quality?
- Are you using systems to free your best people to achieve even better performance?
Hire Yourself as a Consultant
When I was considering starting my own consulting practice, I was nervous about making the jump. An entrepreneur friend asked me the following question: “Would you be willing to advise someone else on how to start their company?” Yes, I answered. Well, he said, if you are willing to advise someone else, hire yourself as a consultant and tell yourself what to do to get this business started.
While it sounds simple, I have found this piece of advice has stuck with me over the years. It is actually a mental trick I use to get some objectivity from the busyness and pressure of my daily work. If I look at my own business the way I look at a client’s business, I can remove myself from the emotions of the moment, identify what success looks like for me right now, and begin to identify the steps I need to take to turn this picture into a reality.
Performance Principle: Get objective about your business by hiring yourself as a consultant. What do you think about the current state of your business? What is working? What could be improved? What is the most important initiative you have right now? What is one project that is a certifiable loser on which you need to pull the plug?
If you look at your business dispassionately, the answers to these and other questions will begin to present themselves to you. And, once you consult with yourself, be a good client and act on your own advice!
Questions to Consider:
- If you were going to advise yourself on a current challenge or opportunity, what would you say?
- What perspective would you provide to yourself?
- What caution would you give?
- What encouragement would you provide?
Knowing What You Do Not Know
Research has demonstrated that people can become more pessimistic about their abilities just as their skills in that area are increasing.
For example, a group of students was asked to rate their logical reasoning skills. They were then given skills training in logical reasoning and again asked to rate their skills. Often, these same students were more pessimistic about their abilities after their actual skills had increased! An unintended consequence of the training was that the students recognized their own flawed logical reasoning in the past. As a result, they felt more pessimistic about their abilities even though they had improved their skills (see article reference below).
More simply said, ignorance is bliss. When you try something new, you don’t know what you don’t know. However, as you gain experience and become more effective, you begin to see your own weaknesses. If you have been developing your skills in a particular area, you may well hit a point where your confidence decreases just as your skills are increasing. Don’t stop! Don’t allow your emotions to halt your efforts. Your problem is that you have an adolescent ability, and adolescents are moody and mercurial. If you push through your uncertainty, and keep using and developing your skills, your adolescent skills will develop into adult competencies – and you will reap the rewards.
Performance Principle: When you learn, you increasingly know what you do not know – and this can hurt your confidence. If you have been developing some skill or ability, don’t be surprised if your confidence takes a dip after you have reached an initial level of competence. You are better today than you were, and you will keep getting better. The only thing that has changed is that now, you know what you don’t know.
Questions to Consider:
- Have you considered giving up on mastering a skill that you have been working on for a while?
- Are you being fair with yourself about the amount of progress you have made?
- Are you willing to push through a temporary lack of confidence in order to achieve true mastery of this skill?
Getting Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable
I have a favorite quote from Lou Pinella, currently the manager of major league baseball team the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. He once said of a player, “That guy will never be a tough competitor. He can’t get comfortable with being uncomfortable.”
One of the leading reasons that people do not get better at what they do – whatever it is that they do – is they are not willing to be uncomfortable in order to get better. Individuals and organizations must learn new skills and competencies in order to improve. And learning – real learning – is always uncomfortable at first.
Living with discomfort in the pursuit of excellence is a trait that can be developed. Most people are not born being cool under pressure. They learn how to handle pressure and allow pressure to make them more effective.
Performance Principle: Getting better feels uncomfortable. We all tend to look at other people and assume that success has come easily to them. With few exceptions, success does not come easily to anyone. In order to get better, accept the fact that successful results are the fruit of intentionally living with discomfort.
Questions to Consider:
- Are you ok with being uncomfortable in the process of getting better?
- Can you accept that champions intentionally put themselves in uncomfortable situations in order to improve?
- Instead of resisting discomfort, can you accept it in pursuit of a bigger goal?
One Year of Experience Three Times
Before starting my company I worked as a “headhunter.” Weekly, I would meet with all the other recruiters in our office to discuss which candidates would be presented to our clients for interviews. The Managing Partner asked a great question in these sessions that has stuck with me for years: “Does that person have three years of experience, or one year of experience three times?”
Performance Principle: Strive to be continually learning and developing. The best job candidates had three (or five, or fifteen, or twenty-five) years of progressive experience. They may have started out as entry-level personnel, but several years later they were leading projects and interacting heavily with clients.
This recruiting principle applies to leadership as well. Are you and your team contributing more to your company than you did a year ago? Or are you just repeating your first year or two over and over again? If you are not increasing in value, your paycheck is increasingly becoming an expense, rather than an investment, to your company.
Questions to Consider:
- Do you have a development plan in place for every person in your organization?
- Is each person focused on getting better at something that is important to the organization?
- Does every person on your team know:
- What they are doing well?
- Where they need to improve?
- How they should go about improving?
Motivate People by Pursuing Excellence
Zeke Jones is a three-time NCAA wrestling champion from West Virginia. The only major blemish on his college record came as a sophomore, when he lost in the first round of the national championship after having won 46 matches straight.
As a result of that loss he learned a lesson that has guided him ever since. “If you come to the national tournament just to win, you will lose. If you come to the national tournament to dominate in the pursuit of excellence, then you wrestle your best.”
Performance Principle: Your organization is more likely to win in the pursuit of excellence rather than in the pursuit of victory alone. If you want to beat your competition, aim for something bigger than winning – aim for true excellence in what you do. If you prepare only to win, you risk ending up trying not to lose.
Champions unleash their best performances by focusing on beating the competition in the pursuit of a perfect performance. A wrestler seeks to dominate his opponent in pursuit of the perfect match. A salesperson seeks to out-produce others in her organization in pursuit of sales excellence; a leader seeks influence and power as a means to propel his team to greatness.
In addition, people have a hunger to be a part of excellence. Excellence is a long-term, sustainable goal that brings forth great performance.
Questions to Consider:
- Do your people believe they can dominate the competition in pursuit of excellence?
- What does true excellence look like in your field?
- How can you draw your people into a pursuit of personal and team excellence?
