Setting The Right Focus.

There is a good reason why most organizations focus on results. They are easy to measure. After all, as the saying goes: what gets measured gets done! Business results reflect viability and profitability. But they miss the most important element in the equation.

The tough part is to measure HOW results are achieved. Because they involve the human attitude and behavior: motivation, engagement, power of collaboration, trust, inspiration, empowerment, creativity, open-mindedness etc.!

Being result-focused ignores attitude and behavior, but those are crucial to create a high performance culture and to ensure long-term business success.

When the focus is on results, the attention on HOW automatically decreases and the solution space is narrowed down. The door to doubt, potential failure, frustration and even blaming are wide open, eventually impacting attitude and behavior negatively.

This might work for short-term success based on reactive responses. But it does not foster sustainability in organizational culture. To achieve long-term success, it is important to understand WHY and HOW results are achieved (root causes).

PAIN & GAIN (What) + REFLECTION (Why/How) equals PROGRESS [Ray Dalio]

Additionally, you cannot control or enforce results. However, you have full control over your actions and therefore you impact the outcome.

Better, smarter actions will lead to better, smarter results. Or, as Albert Einstein said it:

“If you want different results, do not do the same things!”

Aiming for Excellence

Excellent teams achieve greatness because they have the mental strength to remain calm and focused on the HOW: on what they can influence - their actions - even under extreme situations.

Imagine you’re behind (or even) in a basketball game and a few seconds are left to play. In such moment, focusing on “how to make the last shot that can flip the game” is all that matters. Risk of failure? Absolutely! But it’s worth the try. This is what is being discussed in the time-out (around 30-75 sec depending on the league).

Basketball Coach John Wooden, who won 10 NCAA national championships in a 12 year period (thereof 7 in a row) wrote:

“Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable of”

So therefore, focus on your actions and perform to the best of your capabilities and great results become a consequence of a deeply rooted thought process.?

Comment

I'm interested in your feedback - please leave your comments.

?#therightfocus #leadership #focus #teamperformance #highperformanceculture #openmindedness?