Being clear about our goals is the key to our success, yet anyone who has made and failed to achieve a goal, will know that it is not that simple. New year resolutions are a great example of this; often made with a feeling of optimism, quickly become a distant memory within weeks of their inception. You see, we all start off with good intentions when we set our annual goals. We have rose coloured glasses that lend the myth that the road ahead is smooth and straight with no obstacles.
We often tell ourselves we should be able to succeed on our own and shouldn’t need outside help. The more senior we become, the more we feel that our track record should speak for itself and success will continue in the future as it has done in the past.
Past performance however, like the warnings tell us for stock market investments, are not an indicator of future results. They are only a weak correlation with what is likely to happen when we face a new challenge, volatile markets, failing teams or an organisation struggling to find its sweet spot in a crowded marketplace.
What happens when you go it alone?
Trying to succeed without outside help is of course possible, but it is likely to take longer and lead to disappointing results. There are three reasons for this.
1. Inner critic
The trouble with trying to achieve your goals alone is that you often have a voice in your head which is one part cheer-leader (Yeah, we got this!) and four parts critic (I told you you’d never be able to make it!). Our inner critic is not objective, helpful or kind, yet it is often a constant companion. On the days where we are feeling particularly resilient, we can ignore it and give room for the cheer-leader to come through. On our bad days or unexpected disappointment that critic can be very loud and deflating to our sense of purpose.
2. Monkey Mind
The other issue is our distractibility. If you have ever read or heard about ‘The Monkey Mind’ (see Addicted to the Monkey Mind by J.F. Benoist), you will know that we are a very fast-thinking mammal who gets distracted at any change in our environment. We can also allow our thoughts to run away from us, falling into every-decreasing circles of gloom. Add to that the ever-present technology distractions of email, social media and instant messaging and you can see how we can stray far from our intended path without even realising it.
3. Unexpected road-blocks
Do you remember the grand old duke’s men? When they were up, they were up. When they were down, they were down. And when they were only halfway up, they were neither up nor down. Well life can be very much like that for us. It is hard to always be up, motivated and strongly committed to our course of action. This is especially true if we experience unexpected setbacks that are unique and we are unable to find a way around them. If we are lucky, we might have a great network around us or a sponsor who we can talk things through with, but this is not always an option, or perhaps the best option, especially if we are in a situation of damage limitation.
Why is coaching a performance differentiator?
Coaching creates the space and opportunity to think through your situation in a new and novel way. It is like have an external brain to access to help you arrive at creative and unexpected solutions. Here are the four key benefits you can expect from an effective coaching relationship.
Objectivity
We are not always our best judge of our performance. We often fall into two camps. Either being wildly optimistic about how we are doing, or overly pessimistic. It is a rare person indeed who can see their own situation with a clear unemotional eye.
Sports performers have known for decades that their way to the top and to maintain their edge, they need someone who can give them the feedback they need, rather than the feedback they might prefer to hear. Often sport coaches provide a challenging yet achievable environment for their sporting clients to find their own limits and surpass them. It would be unthinkable in the world of sport to try to get or stay at the top without that external support.
Business leaders however can be resistant to the idea of coa
ching. They can often feel that they ‘should’ be able to manage on their own. That their track-record will get them through, and they will find a way. For some the sheer power of their personality and their experience is enough, but for many it is not. When we are under pressure to perform and have challenges at every turn, we are not able to access our full faculties objectively to find the way through and can find that an overly reactive approach can cause collateral damage along the way.
Motivation
We cannot be up all the time. We are human and we have bad days and good days. We have times where we feel that everything is going our way and other days where everything seems stacked against us. Yet as a leader, we are not expected to let those bad days get in the way of our performance.
Leaders who work with coaches can often find that they access greater resources to help them think more deeply on an issue. They also find that they can get the pep talk they need to see a situation from many angles and find a way through. This helps to maintain motivation, perspective and see possibilities that would not have emerged without this support.
Accountability
One of the most popular new year’s resolution is ‘Go to the gym, get fit’. The intention is there, but it is rarely followed up with consistent action. We are very poor at being accountable to ourselves for our actions. There are some people with the level of self-discipline to always meet their goals and put in the effort required, but for most of us, we tend to look for shortcuts, alternatives, and excuses. That is why going to the gym regularly can lead to little improvement, because the effort we put in is likely to slack off over time, even if we continue the same pattern of exercises whilst at the gym.
Life is no different. We might set ourselves stretching goals, but without external accountability (beyond the high-level accountability of business performance) we can find ourselves aiming high but only achieving mediocre results. Who is it that we discuss our results with and how do they help us to consider new ways of achieving them? Sometimes this is achieved through our reporting line in the workplace, but not all our goals are about business.
Having a confidential external support tailored just for you and your needs is what coaching is all about. This creates a safe, open and non-judgemental space where you can really explore who you are and who you want to be. You can review your actions, honestly assess your intentions, and evaluate your results, in an objective manner. Coaching conversations are unique, in that they ensure you are being accountable to yourself, but also congruent in how you show up in the world.
Wide-angle view
We have a life outside of work, made up of relationships, dependants, interests and community. Our lives are richer when we can invest in the many areas of our life, not just be singularly focused on one area. Building a life plan that has goals in all these areas leads to a greater level of fulfilment. Yet if we go it alone, we can have a narrow focus, only considering our business objectives and hope that life will somehow mould itself around the space we have left for it. This puts considerable strain on us and all the important relationships in our life.
When we work with a coach, we are encouraged to take a much wider view of what’s important. Yes, of course business results and impact are important, but they should not be at the cost of happiness and enjoyment of all aspects of who we are. In fact, what we know is that when we become too singular in our focus, we don’t always get the best results and relationships in work and home suffer because of it.
The ultimate success we are all striving for is to be the best version of ourselves that we can be. That means thinking of our life and our goals in terms of how they relate to our values, how our behaviour is guided by principles and how we can have a positive impact on the lives of those around us.
In Part Two you’ll learn how coaching is framed around your goals and needs to help you achieve your goals.