Development (1 of 4) – Personal

This article is focused on strategic relationship managers: individuals responsible for the establishment, development and management of long-term value-creating relationships (e.g., strategic alliances and partnerships).

This is the first in a series of four articles on the development of business relationships, especially strategic alliances and partnerships. As with any meaningful development, it all starts with the individual, it starts within the person.

It starts with you!

Our personal success depends on our development in three areas: (a) knowledge, (b) skills, and (c) attitude & mindset. Knowledge is the easiest to assess and change; it is also the least important (accounting for less than 15% of one's success). Attitude & mindset are most important and the most difficult to assess and change (accounting for 55-85% of one's success). Skills fall in between the two other areas in terms of our ability to assess and change, as well as in its importance (accounting for less than 30% of one's success). (See the note at end of this article for references.)

If we are going to affect change in ourselves, it is best to focus on the most important and highest-payoff area – attitude & mindset. The fact that this is also the area with the greatest challenge should not dissuade us. We are drawn to difficult challenges; otherwise, we wouldn’t be strategic business relationship managers.

In alliance work, knowledge and skills are critically important, but we should not let these important areas distract us from the most impactful area of personal development. Tables 1, 2 and 3 below list alliance-specific knowledge, skills, and attitudes & mindsets, in that order. This ordering is chosen to illustrate how two causal areas (obtaining knowledge or developing skills) can be good distractions that stand in the way of our greatness (improving attitude & mindset). These lists are incomplete and do not apply to all alliance managers all the time. There is no prioritization implied within any of these lists.

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KNOWLEDGE – facts, information, familiarity, vocabulary, truth – causes <15% of personal success. Below is a list of some of the things we need to know as strategic alliance managers.

Table 1 – Business relationship knowledge.
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SKILLS – use of knowledge, abilities, methodologies, competencies – causes <30% of personal success. Below is a list of some of the things we need to be able to do as strategic alliance managers.

Table 2 – Business relationship skills.
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ATTITUDE & MINDSET– perspective, beliefs, sense of self and world; based on personal identity – causes 55-85% of personal success. Below is a list of some of the things we need to be as strategic alliance managers.

Table 3 – Business relationship attitudes & mindsets.
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As we look through the prior three lists it is obvious that if we expect to achieve great success we have to focus on the areas of greatest impact. Simplicity can help us focus. We do need to simplify, but as is often the case, we first have to go through a bit more complexity before we can arrive at a clear and effective focus.

Figure 1 - focus first and foremost on attitude & mindset.
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A great way to meld personal success with alliance success is to use the three areas of personal development as a framework for developing our alliance (discussed in the next article Development (2 of 4) – Relationship). For each area of alliance development (e.g., strategy and business planning) we ask ourselves and management the following questions:

• What attitude & mindset do I need to adopt and embrace? (the most important of these three questions)
• What skills do I need to develop? (important)
• What knowledge do I need to acquire? (in general, the least important question)

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We are developing training focused on bringing practical spirituality into the world of business, specifically into business relationships. In time, this training will be available on-line. Let me know if you are interested.

Also, check out some of the whitepapers written over the past couple of decades on being an alliance manager, confrontation, simplicity, self-obsolescence and being transformational.

I can help you transform your business relationships.

If you find the ideas I share with you to be of value, consider remuneration.

Love,

Joe Kittel
simple ideas at work(TM)
www.spibr.org 
[email protected]

The other modules in this series:

• Development (2 of 4) – Relationship
• Development (3 of 4) – Personal AND Relationship
• Development (4 of 4) – Simplify, Prioritize, Focus

Note:  The percentages of impact on personal success (for knowledge – 15%, skills – 35%, and attitude & mindset – 55-85%) come from personnel training at Hewlett-Packard and the Society for Human Resource Management (www.shrm.org), ref: The Psychology of Success by Dobbins, Richard, Pettman, and Barrie O; SHRM says 85% of our success is dependent upon our attitude & mindset.