Mindset & performance: connection and understanding

The second of my 3 part series on mindset and performance is on connection and understanding. Not on the topic, business area, or specialism in your field.

But human connection and understanding.

I remember one of my leadership at SWIFT ( Cate (Catriona) Kemp said something to me that has stuck.

‘Perception is reality’…

What did I take from this? Is that everyone lives in their own reality, you cannot control how someone else thinks. Only influence. Now not getting too ‘Inception’ like, but; I live in my reality, and exist in my reality, but you have your reality and a version of me may exist in your reality. But they may not and likely not be the same… who’s reality is right?

The answer really is no ones and everyone’s… still with me?

Ultimately perception, and reality come back to that topic of thought again. And the way I and you think, perceive, and feel, may alter the perception of me within others.

Now if you are still with me you might be asking why is this important? It is, because, in order to deliver against business objectives, you will likely have to involve many stakeholders, teams and individuals to get a job done. There is a great read by an author called Patrick Lencioni, who discusses the 5 dysfunctions of a team, and every team needs to start with trust in order to move to the next level.

Trust is an interesting topic in itself, but trust is a human feeling and in order to build trust, we must connect with the individual and influence their reality or demonstrate, that you are indeed trustworthy, and likewise that you can trust them.

This is the same at every level in an organisation. Behind every executive, VP, business owner, CEO or associate is a person. A human. With their own thoughts, emotions, perceptions and realities.

So how do we build those human connections, in order to build trust? There are a few things I have learnt over the years that I put into practise;

1)???Listening

This may seem pretty obvious but, really listening to your colleagues. Not just on the words they are speaking or typing, but trying to understand on a deeper level what the meaning is, and exploring that through questioning and understanding.

We are all guilty of it at some point, but how often are you in a meeting and people are on laptops, checking phones or having side conversation? How does that make you feel? We all love to think we are multi-taskers but in reality, we are not able to type an email, have a conversation and listen/connect all at the same time. So put down the phone, close the laptop and listen. But not just this, ask questions. Explore the answers to get a deeper understanding. There is a great system produced initially by Toyota on route cause analysis, by asking ‘why’ to the answer 5 times you are likely to come to the root cause. This doesn’t have to be an Alan Sugar style interview, but if you want to truly understand and connect, listen and ask questions.

2)???Come down your inference ladder

One of the most profound trainings I have been on was a ‘Quality of Mind’ course with Martin Palethorpe . One of the topics we discussed in this was your ladder of inference.

The Ladder of Inference is a model of the steps we use to make sense of situations in order to act. It helps us to think about our thinking and to coordinate our thinking with others. From a connection with others view, if I am high up on my inference ladder making assumptions about others, without understanding facts it is likely my assumptions are incorrect or not based on reality and only that of a story I have created in my mind.

Let me give you an example:

Let’s say I ask a team member to do a piece of work, and set a deadline. The deadline passes, the work isn’t complete. Now I might jump straight to conclusion, and suggest the individual is lazy, un-motivated and not good at their job. I might be angry as a result, and when it comes to discussing the situation, in my mind I am already high on my inference ladder, with a pre-baked idea of what did or didn’t happen and why.

Is this going to help resolve the situation? The answer is no. I might become accusatory, which in turn brings my colleague up their inference ladder, and when that happens it makes it very challenging to find a solution.

By coming down my inference ladder, and starting with the facts we can understand better and find a solution. Maybe they have some real challenges at home, with family, or they are struggling with an aspect of their lives we don’t know about.

Now this is not about being a pushover, or letting things go too easily. But about connecting with your colleagues or teams, to understand a situation and ensure it is managed in a way that provides greater and more meaningful outcomes for everyone. It might well be that the individual is lazy, and you will need to deal with that. But come down your inference ladder, connect and understand, find the truth and in the long run you will see a more positive outcome for all.

3)???Being present

The last point I want to touch on is being present. This isn’t just about being in the room, and not on the laptop. But truly being there in the moment. I am not suggesting we all need to meditate, practice mindfulness and the like…. But also, why not?

So what is being present? Being in the present moment, or the “here and now,” means that?we are aware and mindful of what is happening at this very moment. We are not distracted by ruminations on the past or worries about the future, but centered in the here and now.

This for me has been one of the biggest changes in my life, focussing on the here and now. I used to worry a lot, about things that hadn’t even happened yet, and likely would never happen. What if I don’t deliver this, or what will this person think? In fact we all probably have these feelings and thoughts (that word again!) at some point in our days and weeks.

The act of not being present and wrapped up in our thinking typically leads to stress. I still do it now, I will wake up at 3am and remember I didn’t send that email and spend the next hour worrying about it. But that really isn’t helpful. I wake up tired, more stressed with still no resolution in place. There could be an argument to suggest the reason I didn’t send the email in the first place, was because I was distracted and not in the present moment when I should have sent the email?

By the way, people can tell when you aren’t present. My wife does this with me, having a conversation over dinner, suggesting I am not really in the room, because I am thinking about the surf next week, or the terrible round of golf I had, or the meeting I have tomorrow. That act of not being present, can erode at your relationships, and being connected to those around you, which we discussed earlier in building trust.

In addition, being in the present is scientifically shown to reduce stress, and increase your energy levels (doesn’t that sound good!) by tuning out the noise and focussing on the important things. This translates perfectly into the work environment, by focussing on the task at hand and being present will lead to greater levels of performance.

Now everyone will have different ways of getting themselves into the present, whether it be meditating, mindfulness or similar. For me it was understanding how my mind works, and getting to know the cues and traits I have when I am not present, then hitting the reset button. Allowing me to be in the room, connect and deliver better work as a result. Give it a try and see what works for you.

To summarise the three points above, I go back to my earlier post here https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/mindset-performance-failure-final-lewis-ide/ And outline the thought model. If you want to change your outcomes, and have better relationships and understanding of your colleagues then change the thought. Come down your inference ladder, question, be present, remove distractions and I can guarantee you will find performance benefits as a consequence.