Positive Deviance is a great movement that works wonderfully in synch with Solutions Focus and Appreciative Inquiry, which I use extensively. It’s particularly wonderful to see the social and environmental ills it helps. This is particularly close to the first two of my Improvement Questions: Goals? What works already?
Browsing Tags appreciative inquiry
Do you want to be more popular?
What is everyone’s favorite topic – their own successes.
Help others feel good
Do you want to be more popular? Sincerely look for and acknowledging other’s real strengths, accomplishments and insights.
The best leaders (described as Level 5 Leaders in “Good to Great“) surround themselves with others who have superior skill sets, abilities and talents. Then they encourage them to do their work. These are the kind of leaders that people will go the extra 10 miles for.
Look for what is best about your spouse. Share that in a sincerely appreciative way.
Look for the talents in your children – let them know as well.
Appreciate out loud what you like about your friends – become more popular.
Just keep it real. Sincerity is key to lasting relationships.
And do it for yourself as well. Acknowledge your strengths, build on them, celebrate them. (for those that are modest — when we celebrate others strengths first most people are willing to give us credit for ours as well.
If enough people do this, the culture of your company/family/circle of friends becomes more fun, more effective and safer to try new things.
Improvisational Leadership – positive influence for everything
powerful & positive
I just led a two-day course on Improvisational Leadership. Not only was it a blast, I learned a lot from the students as well.
Some of the key lessons that the students talked about were:
- the improvisational tools can be layered on almost any management approach to add even more value
- any culture can increase its capability to improvise in ever-changing situations… and the more leadership models and rewards positive and risk-taking and adaptation, the faster the organization can improvise
- the “yes and” approach can help make any relationship better – even with oneself
- one of the side benefits of using improvisational leaders
hip techniques is being more approachable and popular
Please join in on the posts talking about improvisational culture and what you think that looks like.
Priming: Focusing on a clear goal guides positive behaviors
The Power of Focus: The human brain can only take in so much data at once.
Focus on your end goal
What we unconsciously or purposely focus on ends up limiting our ability to see other things. So what happens when we choose to look mostly at negatives or limitations? What happens when we focus mostly on success? Choosing to focus on solutions primes our brain to see opportunities that we may have otherwise missed. Words prime us by creating mental images and feeling states. Negative words such as “stop”, “avoid” and “don’t” try to negate them. The brain immediately sends out emotion biochemicals in response to imagery – creating feeling states within milliseconds. Plus, the brain does not know how to negate a mental image.
E.g., when we say to a child, “No, do not go into the swimming pool,” the child’s mental image is going into the swimming pool.
When we focus on a clear goal, our mind automatically starts looking for ways to get there. Make that goal a positive one that energizes you.
Knowing your purpose and principles protects against manipulation
Be clear about your purpose.
- in life.
- in your job.
- in your family.
Why do you do it? How do you know you’re successful? How do you feel when you’re successful?
What are your core principles?
What 3-5 qualities are so important to you that you will adhere to them even if it loses you money (in the short term)? E.g., integrity, achievement, caring, teamwork, protecting others (or the environment), seeking joy, etc.
When you are CLEAR about your purpose and your core principles you can stay on track when others try to manipulate you.
Seth Godin has a great blog posting “Who is easily manipulated?” that helps you know what not to do.
What is your purpose — in one word or one sentence? Share with us, or at least remind yourself regularly.
The power of culture to drive business success
This article share’s DaVita’s very inspiring case study. It’s a great story of how focusing on culture makes everyone more successful. It’s also a great example of positive influence in action.
Influence your mood – enjoy life more
Choose to feel more joy - influence it
Feel better more of the time. Influence yourself with imagery.
The images we have in our minds directly influence what neurochemicals (hormones) are released into our body. This is scientifically proven. When we have images of fearful things in our minds it triggers the release neurochemicals that literally make us feel bad. When we have images of good things it triggers the release of neurochemicals that make us feel good. If we’re in danger, the fear responses are helpful. If we’re not, they’re unnecessary stress and to be honest, a real downer.
I use images of past successes, of soothing nature, of great relationships to influence my mood. What do you use?
Improvisational Leadership – the “yes and” approach
Yes and…
The art of accepting reality and building upon and adapting to it… rather than fighting, denying or complaining about it.
What changes are happening in your life that are out of your control? What would be better for you to accept and adapt to quickly? What areas would you be more successful in if you were even better at accepting and improvising a positive response.
When we disagree with someone’s idea, approach, beliefs we often respond negatively. Sometimes that’s helpful, usually it’s not. If we can affirm (yes) to what we DO like and then build (and) in a mutually beneficial direction we build motivation and openness.
Yesterday I had the pleasure of presenting “Improvisational Leadership” one of my favorite trainings. “yes and” is the capstone of the training. Every time I talk about it I feel my own skills improve as well. It’s one of the joys of teaching what you love.
Soon I plan to start posting video clips of these concepts in action or being taught. I hope that helps make much more sense of it all.
I’d be delighted to receive examples from readers about where you use “yes and” to influence your world more positively.
Best DNA: Be more of the best of who you are
We can’t actually be anything we want. I’ll never be an astronaut because I get dizzy and claustrophobic. Instead I’ll put my energy into
being the best of who I am. It feels completely natural and exciting for me to stand in front crowds of people helping them learn, making them laugh, helping them connecting to each other in positive ways. I love who I am in that moment — I love being me. So I “amp up” these qualities of mine and be the best of who I am whenever I can. It makes life so much richer.
Each of us have native strengths and passions that when we use them fully make us feel wonderfully alive. When we find the strengths and passions that also help us make a living we are on a path of fulfillment, achievement and increasing power.
1) What are your strengths and passions?
2) What do you do that makes you feel fully alive?
3) How can you “amp up” those strengths in your life to be even more fulfilled, successful and vibrant?
4) What are people willing to reward you for doing?
Find out what lies at the intersection of all three of these areas. That’s your Best DNA for work, or for volunteer work, or whatever area you want the rewards in.
How would you answer these questions for your employees … spouse … children?
If you want help answering the strengths questions, the book “Go Put Your Strengths to Work” and other works by Marcus Buckingham can be very helpful. (note: The author has absolutely no connection to Buckingham, only respect for his work.)
Later in 2012 Matchbox Group (matchboxgroup.com) will be putting out a self-assessment process for discovering your own Best DNA, along with tips on what to do to enhance that and make your life more successful and fulfilling.
Go on improvement road trips!
Improving yourself, relationships, or your organization is like a journey. We’ve all heard this many times I’m sure.
What if we look at improvement as a ROAD TRIP?
Fun…
Adventurous…
Exploratory…
Half planned and half improvised…
Where the journey is as exciting as the destination…
I’ve gone on many road trips
- developing myself
- growing my career
- helping organizations improve their cultures
- coaching individuals and teams to success
The best road trips are the ones where I knew it was an adventure while I was on it.
This recession is a detour, an unsought for part of all of our road trips. How can we adventure as much of it as possible?
Make your life an adventure. Go on improvement road trips.