Forget overnight success. Do this instead
For those familiar with my work, you’ll know that I’m (strangely for a Brit!) a big baseball fan. The movie Major League in the late 1980s sparked my interest and I’ve followed it ever since.
As a Los Angeles Dodgers fan, I’m excited for the season ahead and eager to see whether their star player - Shohei Ohtani - can improve (again!) on last year’s incredible season.
He’s an extremely talented individual, however - like all talented people - he’s relentlessly self-improved for years. From a young age, he and his dad kept notes after each game on what went well and what could improve in his game. Then he worked hard to get incrementally better with each passing game.
Everyone can copy this approach. There’s nothing unique about it.
I did something similar myself. As a young manager, I was desperate to progress and learn the ropes from those more experienced than me. I invested in a Moleskine notebook (quite the investment when you don’t earn much money) and set about writing down what I observed.
Some of the behaviours and skills demonstrated by those above me were appalling at times. Passive aggressive, or just plain aggressive behaviour towards others; disrespect in meetings, talking behind people’s backs and so on. I made a note of all of these things. The back of the notebook was reserved for the ‘Don’t do this’ section.
The front was reserved for all of the good that I saw, and when you look for the good in people you can find it quite easily and be inspired by it.
For example, I observed how they would have difficult conversations, set expectations, elevate others, give feedback and so on. I would then summarise what I observed and distil it into a model or ‘process’ that I could follow.
Over time I improved these processes as I not only learned from my own experiences as a senior manager, but also as cultures, behaviours and generational attitudes evolved. I now teach these human skills as part of my Management Mastery programme.
Self-help books and viral ‘gurus’ like to preach overnight change and success (‘YOU JUST NEED A DIFFERENT MINDSET!!’); however, most people are overwhelmed by work or the noise surrounding it, so this advice isn’t helpful.
What’s more realistic is getting just slightly better every month, based on what you’ve observed or the feedback you’ve received. Remembering that by just getting 5% better at who you are and what you do every month, means that by the end of the year you’ll be (when compounded) 80% better than when you started it!
Incremental, rather than transformational evolution is much more achievable and sustainable.
