The Art of Discovering Possibilities

And Where it Meets the Science of Cultivating Exceptional Performance

Dear Reader,

Welcome to this week's edition of "Elevations."?

Every year, at about this time, I ask the CEOs I work with, "What is the most important thing you must accomplish before the end of the year?"

In the Lower Hudson Valley, where I live, we see the first hints of autumn with a few leaves just beginning to change. It's a pretense of much bigger things to follow. How spectacular those changes will be depends on many things, none of which we can control. It's a lot like leadership: it's unpredictable, and we are left finding ways to make the best of what we get. And then I have to rake up the leaves that cover my lawn!

Effective leadership, driven by inspiration, helps others to discover possibilities and drive exceptional performance rather than seeking to manage or control behavior. Leadership is an art fueled by inspiration and creativity, while management is a science applied to processes and things. Exceptional leaders cultivate values, aspirations, and ideals in people to unlock their motivation, leading to high performance that produces significant accomplishments.

The Art of?Discovering Possibilities?

And Where it Meets the Science of Cultivating Exceptional Performance

There is a stark difference between leaders who succeed at bringing out the best performance in others and those who fail. In her book “Multipliers,” Liz Wizeman suggests that leaders are either?multipliers?or?diminishers.?While I agree with her principle concept, I see things slightly differently. Diminishers look to manage people to control their behaviors, while leaders cultivate the discovery of possibilities that drive exceptional organizational performance. It’s a matter of leading as opposed to managing people.

Leadership is an art. Like the visual or performing arts, leadership is nuanced by feelings, perceptions, perspective, and creative intelligence. Management, when appropriately applied to things, not people, is science. You successfully manage things with proven, repeatable processes and produce consistent outcomes and measurable results. Performance is the product of how well things are managed.?

Human performance is inversely, and therefore, adversely affected by attempts to manage people’s behavior. This is because human performance is a function of inspiration. People work harder and more effectively when they feel motivated to do so. The problem with trying to manage people is that we cannot cause people to become motivated. Motivation is the result of external circumstances.?The power of motivation forms and is entirely determined by those we hope might be motivated to act per our desires. How they behave is always their choice. Those we “manage” to coerce will never perform as well as those who choose to be inspired. The best we can ever do is provide the stimuli that might spark that inspiration that fuels their motivation, determination, and the conscientiousness that drives high performance in people.?

Leadership fundamentally comes down to influence. It is how you influence the future by influencing those who create that future in ways that serve your cause, whether that is business, war, or politics. ?

Influence can be positive or negative. By helping people to become effective leaders, my job is to improve their fundamental ability to influence people in ways that align the organization’s needs with the desires and competencies of those responsible for actually doing the work. This kind of performance must be cultivated.

Cultivation is a science. There are proven, repeatable processes that improve yield. It’s crucial to understand that leaders cultivate the things that cause people to become inspired to perform. You cannot cultivate people, but ideals, values, and purpose can be cultivated in individuals and groups of people.?

Establishing aspirational objectives that lead to meaningful accomplishments cultivates these qualities in people. The more challenging the journey, the greater the sense of satisfaction we experience when we turn possibility into reality by reaching our destination. Aspiration causes people to see what is possible and determine that it must be necessary. This is the ultimate source of motivation.

A leader’s work is like scientific discovery.?You illustrate what’s possible and then demonstrate why it is necessary to others.?Leaders plant the seeds of possibility that others turn into reality, where that reality amounts to being a high-performance organization.

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You can access over 150 other pieces on business leadership and related topics at the ALPS BLOG at ALPSLeadership.com .

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