Hi,
Just a quick note to say that you can read my new column in the next issue of Today's Golfer in the UK, out end of February 2009!
Go on, buy it... you know you want to!
Kieran.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Being a perfectionist is not perfection
So I’ve recently been talking to a lot of people of people who could really only be described by me and them as perfectionists. Now an individuals search for perfection is not a problem, in fact that desire and passion is a great thing but channelling that spirit in the right direction can sometimes be hard work.
Along with that perfectionism there is often an over sensitive self criticism which unchecked can often create a destructive mind set in the quest for perfection.
A good example of this perfectionism coming hand in hand with self criticism is professional sportsmen and in particular golfers. The list is endless, from Nick Faldo to current rising star Nick Dougherty, these guys share that search for perfection, and can often be seen as overly self critical. Of course this self criticism often takes on a negative form and can then impact performance.
What is important to remember is that in particular golf is a game of imperfection, in that it is not always about reaching perfection, but coping with pressure, adversity and consistency. When allowed to separate the natural perfectionism from self criticism a golfers game may be able to reach near level of perfection. Understanding that the game is not perfect and loving and embracing that fact is a great step to moving towards perfection. In fact it could be said that handling the imperfection is the key to finding a perfect game.
In a similar vain business and careers can be seen in a similar light. Many of the things we do in business may not be perfect or reach our own levels of perfection but the important lesson to learn and value is how you adapt, cope and handle the situation you are in rather than the end result.
Perfectionists often beat themselves up because the result hasn’t matched their own high standards and this self criticism can affect confidence, performance and to a certain extent expectations. But in business and sport, often it is not about perfection it is about “getting a result”.
Sport and in particular golf (but I could give you examples from football, rubgy, and many more) is littered with examples when it’s about getting the result rather than the way you play. This is not to say that a level of performance is not desirable, but at the end of the day the result is everything. Of course you could argue it’s not about if you win or loose but how you play the game, but we are talking about people whose perfectionism (there desire to perform perfectly) can affect the outcome achieved. This is about people whose quest for possibly unattainable levels can affect performance in business, careers or sport.
Let’s take the example of a job interview.
A perfectionist whose self criticism is incorrectly channelled would tend to look at the negative aspects of there own performance whilst ignoring the end result or failing to appreciate the situational factors affecting the result they desire. What is important is understanding what you can and can’t affect and ensuring that you are as prepared for the things you can affect and ignoring or at least not focusing on the things you cannot affect. When this is a performance situation such as completing a task, it is important to remember that it is the result that is the goal, and channelling your own quest for perfection towards outside factors is only likely to result in a drop in performance. Think of Doug Sanders in 1970 (google it if you are too young!) on the 18th green at St Andrews, was he influenced by outside factors or focused on things he could affect?
Along with that perfectionism there is often an over sensitive self criticism which unchecked can often create a destructive mind set in the quest for perfection.
A good example of this perfectionism coming hand in hand with self criticism is professional sportsmen and in particular golfers. The list is endless, from Nick Faldo to current rising star Nick Dougherty, these guys share that search for perfection, and can often be seen as overly self critical. Of course this self criticism often takes on a negative form and can then impact performance.
What is important to remember is that in particular golf is a game of imperfection, in that it is not always about reaching perfection, but coping with pressure, adversity and consistency. When allowed to separate the natural perfectionism from self criticism a golfers game may be able to reach near level of perfection. Understanding that the game is not perfect and loving and embracing that fact is a great step to moving towards perfection. In fact it could be said that handling the imperfection is the key to finding a perfect game.
In a similar vain business and careers can be seen in a similar light. Many of the things we do in business may not be perfect or reach our own levels of perfection but the important lesson to learn and value is how you adapt, cope and handle the situation you are in rather than the end result.
Perfectionists often beat themselves up because the result hasn’t matched their own high standards and this self criticism can affect confidence, performance and to a certain extent expectations. But in business and sport, often it is not about perfection it is about “getting a result”.
Sport and in particular golf (but I could give you examples from football, rubgy, and many more) is littered with examples when it’s about getting the result rather than the way you play. This is not to say that a level of performance is not desirable, but at the end of the day the result is everything. Of course you could argue it’s not about if you win or loose but how you play the game, but we are talking about people whose perfectionism (there desire to perform perfectly) can affect the outcome achieved. This is about people whose quest for possibly unattainable levels can affect performance in business, careers or sport.
Let’s take the example of a job interview.
A perfectionist whose self criticism is incorrectly channelled would tend to look at the negative aspects of there own performance whilst ignoring the end result or failing to appreciate the situational factors affecting the result they desire. What is important is understanding what you can and can’t affect and ensuring that you are as prepared for the things you can affect and ignoring or at least not focusing on the things you cannot affect. When this is a performance situation such as completing a task, it is important to remember that it is the result that is the goal, and channelling your own quest for perfection towards outside factors is only likely to result in a drop in performance. Think of Doug Sanders in 1970 (google it if you are too young!) on the 18th green at St Andrews, was he influenced by outside factors or focused on things he could affect?
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Make your mistakes faster
Ok, so the first thing to say is that failure is just a word. Seriously, just a word, it’s something that we have made up, like every other word, and what is a word, it’s just a sound or representation that describes something, which symbolizes and communicates meaning.
But what can we learn, what are the real lessons of failing? I’m sure you’ve heard it all before, learn from your mistakes, take the positives from the negatives, etc. There are plenty of coaches and development teachers who will tell you that kind of thing.
But surely there’s more to it than that? Well I think there is a stronger psychological lesson we can learn and use to help us in our careers, businesses and lives in general. I want to take that a little further and see if we can find something a little more modern and actually useful.
It kind of worries me (and raises my suspicions about them) when I hear people say such things as “I’ve never failed” or “I always get what I want”. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for success and making things work, but I don’t believe that for most people success is obtained with no failure. The beauty of failure is the lessons learned and as we’ve already mentioned, these failures are about as rich a source of learning as you are going to get.
So, over the last decade of working and studying (and making mistakes, I’m not ashamed to admit it! Some of my failures have without doubt helped shaped the way I am today in a positive way.) I’ve learnt that often when you fail, and you stop or give up, that failure begins to embed itself deep inside you. Then of course that begins to affect your attitude, your outlook, your optimism, they are all affected, and you begin to exhibit what would be described as “learned helplessness” which is basically the mindset that says why bother? I’m not even going to try; I’m just going to fail again. You feel like you have no control over the situation.
On the other hand if you say “What just happened” or “What can I learn” and that becomes your focus you will begin to gain an insight into failure and the reasons behind it. Now this is not something that necessarily happens instantly but the idea of reframing that negative situation with some positive outlook or view will undoubtedly help to produce a more experienced, wise and rich character.
In fact I’d go so far as to say that regardless of the price (and I’m talking sensibly here, as in the grand scheme of things you are still able to pick yourself up and try again, you know... what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, etc.) of that insight it may well be worth it. So as long as you can take something away from that failure, that “Oh yeah, I get it” moment, then it’s worth failing, it’s a priceless lesson.
So there’s lesson one, point one, whatever you want to call it... learn the lesson of your failure and let that failure make you a richer person.
But of course that’s not the end of it, and how does failure help you succeed. Well if you look at any successful business man, say Sir Richard Branson (easy target, but serves the point) he has failed as much as he’s succeeded. But would he change the failures? I suspect not, and more over I suspect he would say that he was glad they happened then and not now, as obviously now it would cost him a lot more to fail than it would have done earlier on.
This sense of looking at failures as a positive learning experience is a key difference with unsuccessful people, who of course cannot get over that failure and do not learn lessons, so perhaps the only way in a broader sense to fail is by failing to learn from them.
So how can this be put into practice in a business situation? What are the practical implications of this?
Firstly, it’s fairly obvious to say that as humans and individuals we hate looking bad in front of others, but the key to making a failure a success is to fail fast!
By that I mean, if something if failing it is much better to stop it, fix it, end it, resolve it or whatever, the key is to recognise failure, intervene and move on.
Problem is, and especially in a corporate or business situation, when we screw something up or fail, our first instinct is often to hide it, or to sit on it, or even to try and fix it (when potentially we don’t even know what has gone wrong in the first place). Of course because you’re in a situation of something going wrong usually because you didn’t know how to do it correctly in the first place that attempt to fix may even compound the failure.
But how did this mentality arise? Possibly because in a business or corporate situation when things go wrong, people will see it as negative, they will attach blame, they will be made to feel like they are in trouble, they may even start looking for (or be made) scapegoats.
So by encouraging a situation where people are comfortable to admit mistakes or talk about or address problems they have, it can only be good for everyone. The sooner the screw up is found, the cheaper it is! So the quicker you can develop a mind set or culture where finding a failure the quickest is a win, the better.
For managers and organisations – Encourage a culture where spotting failures is a win, and I’m talking business failures (system, operational, etc) not pointing the finger at people.
For individuals – Embrace failure and learn from it, the lessons learnt almost always out way the price paid in the long run.
But what can we learn, what are the real lessons of failing? I’m sure you’ve heard it all before, learn from your mistakes, take the positives from the negatives, etc. There are plenty of coaches and development teachers who will tell you that kind of thing.
But surely there’s more to it than that? Well I think there is a stronger psychological lesson we can learn and use to help us in our careers, businesses and lives in general. I want to take that a little further and see if we can find something a little more modern and actually useful.
It kind of worries me (and raises my suspicions about them) when I hear people say such things as “I’ve never failed” or “I always get what I want”. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for success and making things work, but I don’t believe that for most people success is obtained with no failure. The beauty of failure is the lessons learned and as we’ve already mentioned, these failures are about as rich a source of learning as you are going to get.
So, over the last decade of working and studying (and making mistakes, I’m not ashamed to admit it! Some of my failures have without doubt helped shaped the way I am today in a positive way.) I’ve learnt that often when you fail, and you stop or give up, that failure begins to embed itself deep inside you. Then of course that begins to affect your attitude, your outlook, your optimism, they are all affected, and you begin to exhibit what would be described as “learned helplessness” which is basically the mindset that says why bother? I’m not even going to try; I’m just going to fail again. You feel like you have no control over the situation.
On the other hand if you say “What just happened” or “What can I learn” and that becomes your focus you will begin to gain an insight into failure and the reasons behind it. Now this is not something that necessarily happens instantly but the idea of reframing that negative situation with some positive outlook or view will undoubtedly help to produce a more experienced, wise and rich character.
In fact I’d go so far as to say that regardless of the price (and I’m talking sensibly here, as in the grand scheme of things you are still able to pick yourself up and try again, you know... what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, etc.) of that insight it may well be worth it. So as long as you can take something away from that failure, that “Oh yeah, I get it” moment, then it’s worth failing, it’s a priceless lesson.
So there’s lesson one, point one, whatever you want to call it... learn the lesson of your failure and let that failure make you a richer person.
But of course that’s not the end of it, and how does failure help you succeed. Well if you look at any successful business man, say Sir Richard Branson (easy target, but serves the point) he has failed as much as he’s succeeded. But would he change the failures? I suspect not, and more over I suspect he would say that he was glad they happened then and not now, as obviously now it would cost him a lot more to fail than it would have done earlier on.
This sense of looking at failures as a positive learning experience is a key difference with unsuccessful people, who of course cannot get over that failure and do not learn lessons, so perhaps the only way in a broader sense to fail is by failing to learn from them.
So how can this be put into practice in a business situation? What are the practical implications of this?
Firstly, it’s fairly obvious to say that as humans and individuals we hate looking bad in front of others, but the key to making a failure a success is to fail fast!
By that I mean, if something if failing it is much better to stop it, fix it, end it, resolve it or whatever, the key is to recognise failure, intervene and move on.
Problem is, and especially in a corporate or business situation, when we screw something up or fail, our first instinct is often to hide it, or to sit on it, or even to try and fix it (when potentially we don’t even know what has gone wrong in the first place). Of course because you’re in a situation of something going wrong usually because you didn’t know how to do it correctly in the first place that attempt to fix may even compound the failure.
But how did this mentality arise? Possibly because in a business or corporate situation when things go wrong, people will see it as negative, they will attach blame, they will be made to feel like they are in trouble, they may even start looking for (or be made) scapegoats.
So by encouraging a situation where people are comfortable to admit mistakes or talk about or address problems they have, it can only be good for everyone. The sooner the screw up is found, the cheaper it is! So the quicker you can develop a mind set or culture where finding a failure the quickest is a win, the better.
For managers and organisations – Encourage a culture where spotting failures is a win, and I’m talking business failures (system, operational, etc) not pointing the finger at people.
For individuals – Embrace failure and learn from it, the lessons learnt almost always out way the price paid in the long run.
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