Performance or Attitude?

Should one look for Performance, or Attitude? Which matters more - and how does one decide?

This is something that always had/has me intrigued and so I decided to look for answers...

While one school of thought believes that the end justifies the means – and therefore hardcore results, Performance, is all that should matter. Others rate Attitude much higher, even if the desired results have fallen short.

The debate on this can keep going on, with both sides making compelling arguments – and the interesting thing is that both would be right in their own way!

Performance is relatively easier to assess, as one can get data, see results or observe outcomes.?Attitude is a little trickier, because it lies beneath the surface, at the core of a person.

Performance tends to be a bit more obvious and could also be objectively assessed. Attitude can be subtle and assessment of it, could be rather subjective.

I'm guessing every startup founder (or even a CxO of a large company, for that matter) at some point, has faced this dilemma.

Thought-leaders have thrown some light on this, albeit not directly!

Simon Sinek opened our minds to the concept of The Golden Circle, in his famous 2009 “Start with Why ” TED talk.

He spoke about most people & organizations very easily knew WHAT it is that they do, produce or sell. Some even knew HOW they went about it. But very few could truly articulate (or even realize!) WHY they did what they did. And the WHY, is what resonates with people.

Then, a few years back, James Clear came along and told us that if we wanted to succeed, we needed to change our Habits and gave us insightful tips on how to go about this, in his No. 1 bestseller, Atomic Habits .

One of his insights mentions how habits can be changed when they have a deeper link to WHO we are, at our core.

He speaks about OUTCOMES, PROCESSES and IDENTITY and how, outcome-based habits are less likely to succeed, while identity-based ones have a greater chance of succeeding.?

For instance, when declining to smoke (if that’s the change desired), you could say, “I’m trying to quit smoking”, or, alternately you could say, “I’m not a smoker.”

The objective in both cases is to quit smoking, but it will happen more effectively if one considers oneself a non-smoker (an IDENTITY), as opposed to just quitting smoking (an OUTCOME).

What is interesting is how the insights from both these thought leaders have very similar visual representations - three concentric circles - with one at the center (core) being the more critical/effective one!

See the diagram depicting The Golden Circle by Simon Sinek and The Three Layers of Behavioral Change by James Clear

The Golden Circle encourages us to start with the WHY - the inner most circle (red, in the diagram), then talk about the HOW (in blue), and wrap it up with the WHAT (in green).

The Three Layers of Behavioral Change, on the right, says that IDENTITY-based habit change (in red) is the most effective, followed by improving and implementing PROCESSES and systems (in blue), and finally, OUTCOME based (in green) changes, which have the least impact, of these three.

In both, the outer circle is the more obvious one – especially to the external world, while the inner most one, is the least obvious, but most effective for a lasting impact.

Coming back to my challenge...

Performance seems to be like the WHAT, the OUTCOME - relatively easier to assess, and also easier to objectively quantify.

Attitude the other hand is like the WHY, the IDENTITY – a little more difficult to assess, and also slightly subjective.

Depending on the situation we would need to look at one or the other, or even both!?

But what's more important is that we recognize the similarities and differences in each approach and use each wisely.

Well, that's it from me! Thank you, Mr. Simon Sinek and Mr. James Clear!

Penning down (does anyone still say this?) my thoughts gave ME a bit more clarity. Not sure if it helped you!

But wait.. have YOU faced this in your journey??How did you resolve it??

Maybe you have an altogether different (better?) view which may help to get a better (different!) understanding!

Head for the comments below - and, yes, thanks for reading!!