Thoughts on people, teams, organizations, communities, effectiveness and success
People want to be successful, which is usually a combination of being effective (doing the right thing) and efficient (doing things well), putting folks down a path to achieving favorable results.
Sometimes – as counterintuitive as it seems – that means doing less, not more.
Optimal performance (think weight training, writing a dissertation, running a business) is a combination of intense work and intermittent breaks.… Read the rest
We love easy solutions: take a pill and lose weight; go to the right schools and become a zillionaire; hire the right “A” player new talent while clearing out the “C” deadwood and make your business a great success.
But life (mostly) is not that way. As Ronald Reagan said, “It’s simple, but not simplistic.”
And here’s the hoax – the canard; the idea that if you just hire those “A Players” – people like the Legion of Super Heroes (pictured right) – the folks in the top 10% of their roles – and “release” the untrainable B and C players to their future career path you’ll have stocked the right talent to have your company become a success.… Read the rest
The myth that talent leads to achievement took another hit to credibility this week. The San Francisco Giants – a crew of “misfits and outcasts” – brought the ultimate symbol of North American professional baseball achievement and winning in the form of a World Series pennant back to the City by the Bay.
Talent, it turns out again, is overrated.… Read the rest
Thomas Edison noted “The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are first, hard work, second, stick-to-itiveness, and third, common sense.”
Carol Dweck, Anders Ericsson, and Angela Duckworth have the first two qualities well-covered, I’ll take a crack at the third.
“Common sense,” it’s been said (C. E. Stowe) “is the knack of seeing things as they are, and doing things as they ought to be done.”… Read the rest
Albert Einstein noted “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
So what’s up with the craving for the sweet smell of success people that people are determined to avoid the taint of failure?
Biotech CEO Robert Johnson told me that when he did business development at Lilly he was paid to bring deals forward for the firm to consider.… Read the rest
There is a secret to your success.
It’s on page 9 of the Sunday, February 9, 2010 print edition of the San Francisco Chronicle’s article about American professional football player Jerry Rice.
It’s the same secret that Malcolm Gladwell covered in Outliers, when he reported on the work of K. Anders Ericsson.
It’s the same secret that the research that Stanford professor Carol Dweck uncovered and reported on in her book MindSet in which she identifies two types of approaches: a “fixed mindset” and a “growth mindset.”… Read the rest