by Doug Gray | Nov 13, 2012 | Business, change, Coaching, exercise, Leadership, Managers, safety, strengths
Reason #9. Rock climbing.
I love to lead climb.
In my 20s I spent several months rock climbing the best cliffs in the United States. For 3 months I lived in a car with several friends, and we travelled to Boulder, CO and Devils Tower, WY. We ate granola. And macaroni and cheese. While studying guidebooks. Or talking with lanky climbers from all over the world.
Boulder Canyon and Eldorado Canyons were meccas for serious climbers. As a lead climber, my partner and I started on the bottom and climbed all day, until we summited on a ledge. Then we rappelled back down, or hiked down. Every afternoon the thunderstorms terrified us. Every climb had terrifying sections. At Devils Tower we did overhanging aid climbs that required swinging traverses. Just like James Bond on the Eiger in Switzerland. We learned to mitigate risks.
When moving on vertical rock, you have 4 potential points of contact. If two feet and one hand are enough, then you can move the other hand. Climbers learn to distribute weight evenly. To select resting places. To control energy exertion. To keep your hands below your heart to reduce fatigue. To ignore fear.
After days or weeks, your hands develop callouses. After many first ascents, your confidence increases. So you try something harder.
And then you fall.
My most terrifying fall was about 40′ late one afternoon. I had felt invincible. Then the crack thinned out. I could not find any placement. My legs shook. I could not climb back down. And my last piece of protection (climbing hardware) was about 20′ below me. Because I had felt so confident… I had climbed higher than I should have.
I recall pausing. There was a choice. And I chose to fall. I still recall that instant, some 30+ years later.
So I tumbled 20′ to the climbing hardware, then another 20′ below that, until my partner saved my life. We were hundreds of feet above the canyon floor.
That instant of choice reminds me that we can choose to be safe, or not.
Just like adults on a job site. Or adults sorting through career choices. Or adults considering a risky move.
What are some reasons why you care about safety?
by Doug Gray | Nov 13, 2012 | Business, Coaching, Leadership, Managers, Personal Development, safety, strengths, Success
Reason #11. Graduate School.
When doing my graduate research at Dartmouth College I was obsessed with risk-taking behavior. Key questions included: Why do we intentionally embrace a known risk? What causes us to embrace more risk in academics or business or interpersonal choices? How do we encourage constructive risk tolerance, risky shift, and risk taking behavior?
At the time I was teaching high school English in a boarding school in New Hampshire. Like every faculty member, I was required to embrace the “triple threat” requirements as a teacher, dorm parent, and a coach. I supervised a dormitory house with 12 9th grade boys. I coached soccer and x-c skiing. I taught rock climbing, whitewater canoeing, winter camping, outdoor adventures. I ran a January program that was designed to “foster risk taking” in academics and socially constructive outdoor adventures, which included a 3-day mandatory winter camping expedition called “Sophomore Wilderness.” And I met a lovely woman that I was not supposed to date– because she was on the faculty. And we dated. Got engaged. Then married, on Lake Winnepausaukee. Some 23 + years ago. Like the students and other faculty, I embraced risk.
My research required that I develop an assessment of adolescent risk taking behavior. Based upon recent related research and validated approaches. Then test the questions on hundreds of adolescents at summer camps, and at two independent high schools.
I found that adolescents described self-esteem in multi-dimensions (such as physical, social, academic, etc.) But adolescents did not discriminate between types of risk in that way. They only discriminated between socially constructive risks (helping others, talking to a teacher, etc) or socially destructive risks (taking drugs, sexual activity, etc.)
Some 25+ years later I remain fascinated by several facts:
1. Adults act like those adolescents. Adults discriminate between socially constructive and socially non-constructive risks.
2. That instant between a stimulus/trigger and a response/action defines our career success.
3. Coaches/consultants can help adults determine what is safe or risky, and what is productive or not.
4. I remain continually surprised and puzzled by that opening question: Why do people intentionally embrace a known risk?
What do you think?
by Doug Gray | Feb 26, 2012 | book review, Business, change, Coaching, Leadership, Managers, Personal Development, Resources, Success
Book Review of Drive; The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (2009) Daniel Pink
(Daniel Pink has gained momentum from his earlier bestsellers, Free Agent Nation and A Whole New Mind. He is still on that thread of applying scientific knowledge/research to common application in business, education, community, which leads to sales/a broad readership.)
Drive explains that when thinking about motivating others, there is a gap between “what science knows and what business does.” I like that phrase because it immediately states the conflict, and opportunity, and focus of the book.
Psychologists, and researchers in organizational development, know what works when motivating others. For instance, external reinforcements do work to motivate people doing routine tasks that do not require complex thinking. However, as our knowledge workers evolve from 70% routine work to 70% complex/ heuristic work, we “need an upgrade.” The carrot and stick approach is limited. In fact, external reinforcements can lead to unethical behavior, short term decision making, crush innovation or creativity or initiative, and can cloud accountability metrics because of inconsistent practices.
So, what does work? Self-directed workers require environments where we/they balance three essential elements: 1) Autonomy, the desire to direct our own lives, 2) Mastery, the urge to get better at something that matters, and 3) Purpose, the desire to do something in the service of something larger than ourselves.
I imagined a descriptive model such as three overlapping columns in a 3-D bar graph. A worker may be high in autonomy (loosely managed or very experienced in one way of doing tasks), yet low in purpose (without vision from managers or lacking career development hope.) Consequently, no amount of skills training or micro-managing will be an effective motivator, because that person would not care to master a task. There seems to be a minimal necessary requirement/ threshold for self directed workers to feel autonomy/ mastery/ purpose.
The application of this model is in its infancy. He cites dozens of examples, such as performance incentives that need to be tied to ROWE, return on work expected, rather than hours at a cubicle.
Pink distinguishes between Type X (external reinforcement for routine tasks) and Type I (internal reward/ satisfaction for doing purposeful work that develops mastery and rewards autonomy.) He wants us to move from Type X to Type I. The good news is that Type I behavior can be developed. Also, Type I behavior leads to stronger performance, greater health and wellness, and higher self efficacy and well being.
1) Autonomy. Management needs to foster autonomous workers who have autonomy over time, task, team and technique. Companies that foster autonomy greatly outperform their competitors. Examples include 10% innovation time for projects, at Google, IBM, etc.
2) Mastery. Results from engagement. When workers are “in flow” time passes without great challenge. In fact, mastery has a) a unique mindset that one can improve one’s abilities, b) mastery is painful and requires deliberate practice, and c) mastery is impossible to attain, therefore both frustrating and attractive.
3) Purpose. Alongside profit maximization, the baby boomers are defining “Purpose maximization” in the workplace. Companies are using a) goals to use profits to support a purpose (such a triple win proposals and social investing), b) careful diction/ plural pronouns to emphasize the impact of us/we, and c) new norms and policies that encourage purposeful endeavors (sabbaticals, cross functional action learning sets, collaborative initiatives…)
Pink has an easy style, with enough examples that the pages fly by.
At the end of the book he has clever approaches to engage readers into discussions. For instance, “Twenty Conversation Starters to Keep You Thinking and Talking” and “The Type I Reading List: Fifteen Essential Books” in an annotated bibliography. The result is that this book becomes one among other conversations, with other authors and readers and thinkers. The reader is engaged. In fact, the structure models self-directed workers by assuming one is autonomous (capable of independent thought), has mastery (desire to improve) and purpose (ability to apply these ideas to one’s own world.)
In short, one of the most important books I can recall reading in many years.
Takeaways:
- Builds upon shift in psychological services from illness toward health. Extension of positivism. Huge opportunity for consultants and business leaders.
- Reinforces huge need for coaching that develops unique strengths. Could be connected to StrengthFinder assessment
- Complex model that needs a simple application in order to gain momentum in an organization…
- When I emailed Daniel Pink, he replied quickly and that impressed me…
On 2.26.12 I just re-read the book for several reasons.
1. Our daughter is taking AP Psychology and Drive is required reading. That fact says something about the reach of his book within 2 years. She is tasked with implementing a capstone project at her independent high school. I am curious what shea nd her fronds develop.
2. In the March, 2012 Inc magazine there is a related reference to “The Motivation Matrix” which cites research and a forthcoming book by Noam Wasserman at Harvard, which extends some of Pink’s concepts to explore why entrepreneurs start businesses, and what they (we ) want… very provocative.
Anyone know of any related assessments being used in the field?
by Doug Gray | Dec 9, 2011 | change, exercise, family, Leadership, Managers, Meetings, money, Personal Development, strengths, Success
Recently our high school-aged daughter asked, “Daddy, you talk to people all day long about their success. If you can make it simple, what are the two keys to success?”
If she was quizzing me, then I failed. Perhaps because I did not expect the question, perhaps because I wanted to say something special to her.
I said something trite: Focus on your strengths. Persist. Follow your passions. Build a great team. But sadly, like most of us, perhaps, I just could not find the words. Frankly, I struck out.
Then yesterday someone made it simple. Now I can answer her…
What are the 2 keys to success?
1. Attention, and 2. Support.
Just as we attend to an infant and support their growth, we create gardens of success. Every successful person talks about those who gave them attention. Their mentors. Their elders. Their coaches. Those who listened well, believed in them, supported them. After repeated actions toward a desirable goal, those people thrived and eventually felt successful.
This morning I shared this idea with someone. She doodled a circle, then drew an exclamation point, bold, in the center of the circle, to represent “attention,” then she gave it legs to represent “support,” then gave it an arrow to represent a future success. That image works!
******************
The same pattern occurs in a coaching engagement. When I first meet someone they may be uncertain of the process, unclear about why they are receiving the attention. A common fear is that coaching is a process of “fixing behavioral gaps or deficiencies.” As if we could dunk people into a “flea and tick bath” and they emerge cleaned, ready for the next challenge. Instead, people decide if they like the attention, if they can use the support, and if they want to develop their strengths. That choice is the key to success.
So, key coaching questions may include, “Who do you need to give more attention to?” Or, “How can you support someone’s strengths?”
Time to go… I now have an answer for my daughter.
What are you going to do?
by Doug Gray | Dec 9, 2011 | Business, Employment, Leadership, Managers, strengths, Success
I hate the phrase “soft skills.”
Yesterday, I was at a project site, working with 10 people in 10 hours, and each person had concerns related to CORE business skills. Nothing ”soft” at all.
Their concerns included: conflict management, communication, delegation, listening, feedback, role clarity, alignment, engagement, motivating others, self-motivation, maximizing productivity of others, career development, managing work and family and health….
These are CORE Skills. Essential to their success. And there is nothing “soft” about developing these skills.
Perhaps it is time to rename skill development into two columns: Core skills (essential to business, hard to quantify) and technical skills (secondary to success, easy to quantify.)
- Consider what is taught in MBA programs? Or your training department?
- Consider what is tied to your employee incentives? Or promotions?
- Consider what has determined your success to date?
- Consider what will likely determine your future success?
My hunch is that your answers to questions 1 and 2 included technical skills. Easy to train, easy to measure, easy to track, yet secondary to your success.
Yesterday, one of my clients talked about his “Success Team.” He listed 4 influential people, and 3 were on site. I urged him to develop at least 6 people on his Success Team. And if he did not know the names of his target Success Team members, I urged him to select “the smartest person in the U.S. who wants this project to succeed.” He wrote down that phrase, and he will find the people soon.
Thankfully, we can each develop our core business skills when we ask for help.
One of my coaches says, “Individuals do not succeed, despite what history books and company records state. Teams succeed.”
So, how are you developing your core business success skills?
Who are you asking for help?
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