As promised, today we’re going to talk about PASSION. This is one of the various Ps that are needed to achieve a remarkable performance as explained in the book The Encore Effect. Stay tuned over the next few days of this miniseries to learn about the other “P” components.
In yesterday’s post, the author, Mark Sanborn, said, “Passion is the fuel that drives performance.” Today, he expands on a very important point about passion: “remarkable performance isn’t just about what we do; it’s also about how we do it.”
And he centers on an important point. “Life isn’t just about living our passions but about living passionately.” And while subtle when reading, this makes a world of difference once we understand it.
Sanborn explains, “In the everyday world, most of us don’t get to focus exclusively on doing those things we are passionate about. The solution? Do everything important with passion.”
No matter your role, if you infuse it with passion, creativity, and enthusiasm, you’ll guarantee increased value in the eyes of those around you. This, in turn, will generate opportunities and doors will open for you. “As a parent or spouse, as a volunteer in your church or community, as an employee making a sales call, teaching a class, or leading a company, bringing passion to what you do each day is an exercise in living fully and influencing others by your example.”
“The good news is that passion can be created and stoked. It’s up to you to do so.”
So, how can we develop and cultivate passion?
Sanborn suggests the following five things:
1. Study and learn. “You can go a long way toward becoming a passionate performer by buying the best books, subscribing to the best magazines and going to free university lectures [online]. […] Given the unlimited amounts of information available today, there is little justification for anyone not being a reader [hmmm, let me tell you about a blog that can help you with this… 😉 ] There is no shortage of ways to become an expert in your field—and grow more passionate in the process.”
2. Use small achievements or successes to fuel larger ones. “Remarkable performances are like losing weight. Which goal sounds more achievable—losing one pound per week for a year or losing fifty-two pounds? The result may be the same, but psychologically these goals are as different as night and day. Focus on achieving a remarkable performance today, then another one tomorrow.”
3. Look to other passionate people as role models. “Reach out to people you respect for their passion and performance. Start a group of like-minded people with similar goals. Avoid the people who act as ‘blockers.’ Remember, passion begets passion.”
4. Plug the leaks. “Examine those areas in your life where your resources (your time, talent, and skills) are not being put to the best use. […] Don’t spend time on things that diffuse your focus and do not advance your goals.”
In here, Sanborn tells the story of a student asking Albert Einstein how many feet were in a mile, and him saying he didn’t know. Upon seeing the student’s amazement, Einstein explained, “I make it a rule not to clutter my mind with simple information that I can find in a book in five minutes.”
5. Make passion part of your life. “Where the head goes, the heart will follow. You may not feel passionate, but when you decide you are going to become a passionate person, you will become one. If you act the part and succeed in the part, one day you will discover that you have become the part! If you deliberately and consciously act with passion, you will come to feel that passion.”
All remarkable performances require effort and energy, but they start with and continue to be fueled by passion all along.
As you know, I’m passionate about sharing the ideas I come across in the books I read (…barely noticeable, huh?). What are you passionate about? Let me know in the comments here.
And please come back tomorrow, as we will take a look at more of the “P” elements for remarkable performances in this miniseries.
ACTION
TODAY: Let’s plug the leaks today: find your sources of distraction and eliminate [or appease] them. For example, social media. If I don’t set limits for myself, I go in to read ONE tweet and I’ll still be there 2 hours later… ugh!… (#NotProud). While you don’t have to eliminate it, can you give yourself a set amount of time, timer-in-hand, so that you don’t get sucked into a time vortex? Can you silence or eliminate the notifications on your phone so that they don’t distract you until you are actually on your specified time for this? What other leaks are there in your life that you might be able to plug today?
FUTURE: Create the intention and commit to develop and cultivate passion in those areas of your life and business that are important for you. You will enjoy them more and become a remarkable performer at them.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
This miniseries on The Encore Effect has focused so far on explaining and understanding all about remarkable performances. But what do we need to make those performances happen?
According to the author, Mark Sanborn, the formula is simple:
P+D+A = RP
Where: P = Passion, D = Discipline, A = Action and RP = Remarkable Performance.
While this formula is not a panacea, it serves very well to convey the requisites needed to achieve a remarkable performance.
Let’s take a quick look at each:
Passion: “Encounters with passionate people are memorable,” says the author. “You are captivated not only by what they do but by the way they do it. You may not agree with them, but there’s no doubt that what they believe is important.”
Discipline: “Passion is the fuel that drives performance. But without discipline, passion is just loud talk and noise… When discipline is lacking, results are inconsistent and sporadic. It is discipline that enables us to do what needs to be done even when we are not at our best.”
Sanborn explains that discipline is the things that we do over and over again, “often behind the scenes, that ultimately result in remarkable performances.” For figuring this out, he suggests asking ourselves questions, such as:
How many times did I rehearse and refine my sales presentation before giving it?
How many books did I read (and re-read) about my industry/career/service/skills?
How much time do I spend each day in the gym and how many days each week, to keep myself physically fit?
How many thank-you notes and follow up e-mails do I send to important customers, clients, volunteers, or friends?
How much of my income do I invest in myself to further my vocations and my passion?
How much space do I make in my schedule to do the things that matter to me the most, whether developing my skills, spending time with my family, or giving back to my congregation or community?
Action: The most important thing, the author cautions, is not to confuse activity with action. “You can think the right thoughts all day long, but even if those thoughts make you feel good, nothing happens until you take action. […] Activity is effort without effect. Action is what achieves a desired outcome.”
Sanborn mentions that “some people hide behind activity and use it as an excuse to absolve themselves of responsibility (‘I’m so busy!’).” But it’s precisely that busyness that leads to lots of activity but no specific action to move forward.
The author closes by pointing out that “remarkable performers focus on the outcome they’re striving to achieve and say no to any activity that would divert their efforts. They know exactly where they are going, and they focus on how to get there.”
Come back tomorrow to read a bit more about passion. I’ve reserved a whole post for it, given that passion is the fuel for powering remarkable performances.
ACTION
TODAY: Sanborn suggests, “to discover what you are passionate about, ask yourself: What would I like to spend the rest of my life doing?” And says, “How you answer that question will lead you to your true passion.” Take a moment today to answer that question.
FUTURE: Look at your performances and see where they have had or have lacked passion, discipline, and action. Going forward, determine to have these three components whenever you need to do a remarkable performance. Commit to incorporating the three elements into, both, the preparations and the performance itself.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
Yesterday we learned about remarkable performances to achieve the encore effect. Today we are going to look at the five traits of remarkable performances.
In The Encore Effect, Mark Sanborn talks about the importance of establishing an encore brand, whether personal or organizational. He defines a brand as “a promise for the future based on past performance.”
As such, an encore brand is one that has performed remarkably in the past and, based on that, we can anticipate that it will, likely, continue to perform the same way. Here are the five traits that encore brands exhibit:
1. Commitment: “Commitment is the price you are willing to pay to get remarkable results. Performance, on the other hand, reveals the price you have paid already. When we deliver a remarkable performance, we are saying in effect, ‘There is no other place or person I would rather spend my commitment on than you.’ And when we deliver a poor performance, we convey the opposite message—that we’d rather spend our commitment elsewhere.”
We all have to set boundaries on our engagements and commitments on a daily basis. However, “the challenge,” says Sanborn, “is to commit ourselves to the things that matter to us the most.”
2. Professionalism: “Your problems and opportunities become those of the professionals, who do their best even when they don’t have time or feel at their best. […] When you realize you are in the hands of a professional, you can relax. You know that your concerns will be addressed and that the professional will take care of you. And that is the feeling of confidence that you want to inspire in others.”
3. Skills: “Making the difficult look easy is a sign of mastery in any profession. […] To do anything adequately requires basic skills. The encore performer has gone far beyond the rudimentary to hone his or her skills to a high level. Encore performers demonstrate that they know how to do what they do, that they’ve practiced and perfected what they do, and that they still have a commitment to becoming better.”
“Are you able to spot opportunities that others can’t? Remarkable performers don’t wait for problems and opportunities to come to them—they actively look for problems and opportunities.”
4. Values: “Values are those beliefs that a person holds most dear. Over time, that which we hold most dear becomes what we are known for. […] Every performer is known for something.”
5. Character: Sanborn defines integrity as, “the distance between your lips and your life.” And he says, “your performance is a visible sign of your integrity and character. […] Integrity, sincerity, honesty, and transparency are all character traits of remarkable performers [whose] commitment drives them to become the very best of who they are. Remarkable performers have consistent values.”
These are the five traits that, in Sanborn’s opinion, are shared by those who excel: remarkable performers. These are the people who attract our attention and gain our trust. The author points out that, “[we] recognize a remarkable performance when it occurs, but [we] also recognize what it means about the performer.”
Finally, Sanborn invites us to examine our win-loss record of performance in our career and personal life: “each one of us has complete control over what we do to keep our ‘fans’ coming back for more.”
And on that note, please come back tomorrow for more, as we will look at the role that passion plays in achieving the encore effect.
ACTION
TODAY: Remarkable performers, according to the author, “think about things that are not being done efficiently or profitably or well in your workplace or industry or community.” Can you come up with suggestions or solutions to a problem that you see?
FUTURE: The author suggests, “Think about how your own life values affect your life, your job, and your interactions with others. Are your values reflected in your actions? If not, what can you do differently?” Over time you will see that “your brand [becomes] a composite of the values you act on every day.”
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
“It’s not what we know in life that matters most, but what we do with what we know.”
“Every day is game day,” says Mark Sanborn in The Encore Effect.“Every interaction is an opportunity to give a remarkable performance. The thing is, whether we realize it or not, we all perform for others in one way or another.”
Sanborn continues, “Performance counts. If you want to win the loyalty of your customers, coworkers, boss, and other constituents, you need to turn in a consistently strong performance. And if you want to wow them, you need to turn in a remarkable performance.”
But don’t mistake a remarkable performance to be necessarily a grandiose thing, the kind that you read about in the newspaper. Most remarkable performances never make the front page. To illustrate this, the author shares the story of a school bus driver whose coworkers teased a lot for not wearing a coat on a freezing day. The driver smiled and took it in stride. When a school administrator asked him why he was not wearing a coat, the driver explained that one of the students didn’t have a coat that day, so he gave his own to the student.
The author says that it’s important to notice that there is not one particular approach either. As long as our values and practices are genuine, they will guide us to perform in a variety of roles that are different expressions of our best self. We can ensure that way that our performances will be remarkable. “A remarkable performance… moves us and makes us want more.” That’s the potential and the promise of the Encore Effect.
Conversely, think how hard it is to perform remarkably when your heart is not in what you’re doing. “It’s difficult, if not impossible,” says Sanborn.
The key is recognizing that our lives are performances of which we are in charge. Every remarkable performance by others affects us positively, and every remarkable performance by us affects someone else positively too.
Remarkable performances can change lives, and “that’s why creating a remarkable performance is so key to personal success.”
Sanborn closes by saying that it is likely that, “all of us, would like to have our performance described as remarkable. All of us would like to excel at the things that matter most to us. And it is by giving such performances that we achieve the Encore Effect.”
Come back tomorrow to continue learning about the encore effect, we will focus on the traits of remarkable performances.
ACTION
TODAY: What remarkable performance can you give today as an individual, spouse, parent, employee, boss or as any other of the roles you play in life? Sanborn says, “Try this. Do the important jobs or tasks you have to perform before turning out the light tonight remarkably—even if you’re alone, even if there’s no one there to watch you. After all, you will still be aware of how you do what you need to do. Remember: self-respect is the first step toward gaining the respect of others. Ask more of yourself today; it will lead others to expect more of you tomorrow.”
FUTURE: Create the habit of planning, preparing, and creating remarkable performances that will leave your audience wanting more.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
We all have our hot buttons that, when pushed, inevitably cause problems in the form of us getting upset, or saying things we shouldn’t, etc. And whether we point fingers and blame (“you made me mad”) or not (“I get so mad when XYZ happens”), the truth is that the only response we can control is ours.
M.J. Ryan, the author of Habit Changers, addresses this in a masterful mantra: “My response is my responsibility.” She goes on to say: “That doesn’t mean that the other person didn’t do whatever it is I’m worked up about, but rather that I alone am responsible for my reaction.”
The author shares how she deals with this: “If I get worked up, I need to deal with my reaction within myself until I’ve cooled down enough to decide whether this is an issue that needs to be addressed with the other person. Because it is only when I am calm that I can talk about it in a way that does no damage to me, the other person, or our relationship. Otherwise, I’m likely to say or do things that are mean or destructive because the ‘fight’ of the fight-or-flight response has taken control of my brain.”
Ryan’s suggestion is to give this a try if we find ourselves playing the blame game at home or work. She says, “You are responsible for your response, and it’s up to you to be as skillful in responding as possible.”
So true!
ACTION
TODAY: Give yourself some time to think about how profound a mindset shift this mantra brings. Identify your hot buttons and put past scenarios of times when they’ve been pushed against this mantra. What happens? I bet they melt away.
That’s what happened to me with one particularly ridiculous hot button of mine. It was a stupid, irrational and unfounded hot button (are any hot buttons smart, rational and well-founded??), and when it got pushed… Oh, no! It would drive me nuts! Once the realization that my response is my responsibility really sank in, then I felt truly embarrassed: how foolish of me to react in the way I have been reacting all this time! But this helped me become very aware of that particular button and be mindful of my reaction to it should it come up again in the future.
My hope is that sharing this story will help you set the intention to remember this mantra when one of your hot buttons gets pushed. That way you will be able to react better.
FUTURE: Make a mental note of being aware of the times when your hot buttons get pushed. Then keep the mantra in mind until you’ve cooled down and can skillfully respond.
Know someone who might benefit from this idea? Please share this post: Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
“The great successful men of the world have used their imaginations… they think ahead and create their mental picture, and they go to work materializing that picture in all its details, filling in here, adding a little there, altering this a bit and that a bit, but steadily building — steadily building.” – Robert Collier
“While [most people] think of imagination as child’s play, the world class relies on it as a mental preview of things to come,” says Steven Siebold, mental toughness guru, in his book 177 Mental Toughness Secrets of the World Class. This is true. In the world of sports, athletes are coached to visualize their efforts, from beginning to end of the competition, and in every possible scenario. (Here’s a 3-min video of Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps where he talks about visualization at the 1:05 min mark.)
Yet imagination and visualization don’t just apply to athletes, it can apply to all of us, and we should use it as the champions in any industry do. Siebold continues, “Before champions make a move, they have lived out the scenario through imagination. The great ones know imagination is the first step in the design of the perfect house or the perfect life.”
Imagination is a natural, never-ending gift from which we can draw anytime. Siebold mentions that “champions often go on sabbaticals or places of great natural beauty for the sole purpose of heightening their sense of imagination when pursuing the solution to a problem.” That’s why Einstein rightly said that we cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
The author points out that champions combine imagination with their penchant for action, and the results are remarkable and awe-inspiring. “While [most people] scold their children for daydreaming and letting their imaginations run, the great ones are impacting the world with the manifestation of their visions.”
Happy imagining!
ACTION
TODAY: Siebold suggests writing a one-page essay where you answer this question: “If you could be, have and do anything you wanted, what would that look like?” Forget about limits and write as if anything were possible.
FUTURE: Siebold encourages us to take this a step further: “Commit to investing three minutes each day reviewing the essay you wrote. Allow your imagination to run wild with ideas of your perfect life…Forget about the how-to part of the equation during this exercise, and suspend any disbelief you may have. This three-minute, daily habit has the power to transform your life forever.”
Know someone who would love this idea? Please share this post with that person: Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
TODAY’S IDEA: The Encore Effect – Part 4
