The Expert Road

There are a few things I'm really good at. One or two I am extremely great at. And a host of things at which I suck horribly. I know you are thinking this is totally obvious, but stick with me. I'm going somewhere with this one.

Generally speaking, you can drop people into of three categories concerning any skill. They're either Novice, Experienced, or Expert. When you are first learning something you are a Novice. You don't really know anything and you have no muscle or long-term memory for the skill at this stage. Once you have developed some proficiency you can move past the Novice stage and enter the Experienced stage. At this point in development, you either commit or you give up. Those who commit can eventually become Experts. Those who give up stay in the realm of the Experienced.

Whether it is about building products and services to be consumed, or in your own development, identifying when the commitment point occurs is key to understanding your adoption rate and capability for advancement.

Being a novice sucks. When you are just learning any new skill you always stink. At some point, with practice or just time, you stop being awful. That's the point when you move into Experienced. Unfortunately, sometimes we are willing to settle at the proficiency level we have reached simply because the effort to advance is too great. I don't want to try and get better, because trying something new means I'm going to suck again. After all the effort I put in so I don't stink as a Novice, if I move to the Experienced bracket I'm just falling right back into being horrible again.

If you aren't passionate or motivated, if the costs to get better are just too high, you get stuck. But the reality is, the better you get at something, the more fulfilling it will be. The more successful you are with a skill, the more joy and excitement you will feel from exercising it.

So how do you make sure your product or service won't lull people into this middle ground? How can you un-stick yourself when you realize you are settling for mediocrity?

For products and services you need to understand your Attrition Rate. What percentage gives up? What features were used or not before attrition? When considering the effort involved in adoption, what can be provided to help speed the transition into experienced?

For yourself it can help to keep your eye on the end goal. Remember that passion can ebb and flow, especially as you reach each new level and realize how much further your progression can go. It's natural to be daunted because you suck with something new. Focus on the result, establish the habits daily so you aren't fighting yourself everyday. When you do reach a new level, revel in it for a while.

Good, Better, Best

One of my friends is a talented musician. He composes and performs and I've never seen him at a loss for how to coax nice notes from any instrument he's ever picked up. He is, by almost any standard, gifted. Extraordinarily, unfairly, majestically, gifted in the art of making music.

On the other hand, the only way I can carry a tune is in a bucket. Which is not for lack of trying; it is simply that I really stink. So sticking with it when I am so horrendously un-gifted is a challenge.

It used to be that I would just say, I'm not gifted. I don't have that talent. Why waste my time practicing? I'll never be that good. Since then, I've been reading.

If you read books like Satisfaction and The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance you begin to realize that the only thing standing in the way of your growth from novice to expert is dedication. If you are consistent in your deliberate pursuit of change, you will find the change you desire.

Science today tells us that almost anyone can develop expert-level abilities in almost anything (from which they aren't physically impaired). I don't think anyone is saying you can beat Lance Armstrong, that man is just genetically supposed to dominating the rest of us. At least on a bike.

But for most abilities, like being naturally gifted at music or math or languages, the big differentiator between the beginners and the best is usually only a focused, deliberate, and consistent exercise of that ability motivated by a simple desire to keep getting better.

The basic premise we can infer from the science is that if you are willing to do what is required to keep getting better, you will actually get better. The key is that doing what is required to keep getter better is usually the hardest things to do.

Superior performers use their brains to intentionally focus on individual components of a skill to gain increasing control over their performance. In this way more of their performance comes from long-term storage instead of requiring the coding of new information.
-- paraphrased, Dr. K. Anders Ericsson

When you consider that becoming good at a skill requires deliberate, methodical control over each aspect of that skill, it is no wonder so many of us are novices. We would rather spend time on the parts we can actually accomplish or understand, instead of grinding out the rough spots that are the most difficult for us.

This lines up with everything I've ever been told by other musicians: Practice, practice, practice. It also reinforces my elementary school piano teacher, and my good friend when talking about the guitar. Just learn the scales. When you can play them smoothly, fast or slow, and transition between them without faltering, then you can worry about playing songs.

It's back to fingering scales for me.

The Juice vs. The Squeeze

In my recent work-life, I've been noticing a recurring conversation. Mostly the subject of the dialogue goes by names like Motivation, Incentive, or Compensation. At the heart I find they contend with the same concepts, they just take different forms depending on the vocabulary of the participants.

How do you decide that the cost to you for expending your labor continues to be worth whatever you gain by doing so?

How do you know if the juice is worth the squeeze?

The flip-side of this equation is equally important to understand when you are in a position of leadership. Regardless of the words you use, the same exchange takes place. You might call them resources or employees, contributors or individuals, children or parents, spouses or significant others, all these are participants in the various value exchanges we participate in every day. You might call it money, freedom, pleasure, power, contribution, or simply productivity; these are all substitutes for the value in a value-exchange.

When you are trying to get productivity out of contributors (or money out an employer) it only works successfully if the value systems between the two parties have some overlap that can be shared. You can't expect an employee to work for free, you can't expect to be paid if you haven't delivered.

It seems like these value-exchanges would be simple, but in reality it's what causes all the office tension and much of strife in our personal relationships. My current perception is that this is because we tend to hide our true value-systems. We hide them from each other, from our employer, our spouses, and most noticeably from ourselves.

Think about the last time you saw someone complaining about not getting paid enough to you, but then asking the boss for more training, or more vacation time. I witness people hiding their value-systems all the time. They talk about having "interesting" work, when they really only want more responsibility. They complain about working overtime, when they really just want to choose their own working hours.

Even the simple exchanges are difficult enough but when you add the group dynamics, and the comparisons that are invariably made between different value systems, things get even more complicated. You can hardly give out raises to satisfy a person who is driven by financial incentives if most of your workforce is motivated by non-monetary benefits. You can't expect to motivate people with extras and intangible benefits if the financial incentive is non-existent.

My friend said it very well the other day:

I will behave exactly as you incent me to. -- H

If you aren't getting the response you want from your employees, or your boss, from your spouse or from your kids. Then you might examine the value-systems being exchanged. A good analytical review might really surprise you.

Changing Direction

In the previous post we discussed how our beliefs guide our behaviors just like the rudder on a ship. Now let's talk about how to uncover those beliefs and use them to change our direction. If you want the ship of your life to head somewhere specific, you have to know how to control your rudder so you can steer.

If you recall, there are two types of beliefs: positive and negative. When it comes to dragging us off course, it is our negative beliefs that tend to be more dangerous. If you want to control the direction of your behaviors, you first need to understand your negative beliefs.

Identifying your negative beliefs can be tricky, but let me walk you through a simple technique that can help you to to discover your negative beliefs.

Start with an area of your life where you are haven't been seeing the results you'd like. Then construct a sentence starting with the words "I can't..." that you believe to be true. For example:

• I can't lose weight.
• I can't become rich.
• I can't find my soulmate.
• I can't learn to speak another language.
• I can't take the vacation I would like.

So now you have a statement that gives you a clue to your beliefs in this area. Remember, many of our beliefs we don't even realize are there, but an obvious statement like this will give us the opening we need to discover the other less obvious beliefs.

Now consider the statement you just constructed (I can't...). Construct another statement that explains how you know that your original statement is true. We often call this a Classify step. This exercises the internal process you normally use to verify beliefs or statements. For example:

I can't lose weight.
Because I've tried dieting and that doesn't work.

or

I can't become rich.
Because it takes money to make money.

or

I can't find my soulmate.
Because all the good ones are already taken.

The classifying sentences you come up with should give you a good starting place to identify the beliefs you hold that are guiding this area of your life. Once you can clearly state your beliefs, you can begin to change them. If you can change your beliefs, then like a rudder on ship, you can change the direction for your life.

As we continue through this series I'll introduce some other techniques like the one discussed in this post. As you bring together these tools and practice you will become adept and influence. First with yourself and then with others.

Where's Your Rudder?

Our beliefs about ourselves and about the world around us are like the rudder of ship. They guide us to follow certain directions to avoid others. Just like a rudder on a ship, your beliefs are very small but enormously influential. Because they are usually out of the way they are easily overlooked. Most of us don't even realize they are there.

In this discussion beliefs aren't those heavy presuppositions about God, politics, or freedom. We're focused more on the little beliefs like whether you can become wealthy, or lose weight, or whether all jobs are draining and devoid of enjoyment. Does someone have to lose for someone else to win? Do any good deeds go unpunished? Will you ever be good at languages? These are the types of (mostly) unspoken questions that we answer with our beliefs every day.

Do you know about the foundational beliefs you hold that are silently guiding your life? There is an easy way to find out what they are, and how they are guiding you. Just look at the results that have been occurring in your life over a recent period of time. Just like you can tell what a ship has been through and where a ship is heading by looking at the wake it leaves behind.

We develop and grow our beliefs in a variety of ways. We learn them some of them directly from other people. We might draw them from the experiences we have had. If we are fortunate we might learn them by observing the experiences of others.

We develop our beliefs quickly, they are plentiful, and cover the vast landscape of our lives. It is our beliefs that give us the sense of stability we require to operate everyday in a chaotic world. These feelings of security and certainty are necessary for us to predict, plan, and proceed each and every day in every situation.

Because our beliefs provide this amazing ability, we often fail to remember one of the most important aspects about any belief:

Beliefs are not Truth.

It is easy to forget that beliefs aren't reality. They are not necessarily true, and they are definitely not Truth. That is because we've just made them up. We've fabricated them from what we learn. They speak about the world, they are not the world. While they can give you a picture of the landscape, they are not the landscape.

There are two basic kinds of beliefs. There are beliefs that are positive. These empower us and give us the capability for forward direction. There are also beliefs that are negative. They limit or restrict us. Both types are valuable and necessary. But it can be interesting to discover which ones are influencing you in particular ways.

Think about the situations you have recently been faced with. Were you reacting to restrictions or limitations? Or were you pursuing something you desired?

In the next few posts in this series, I'll discuss some ways you can influence your own thinking (and by extension your own performance) simply by being aware of your beliefs and how they are motivating you.

Tenets of Appreciation

What makes you feel appreciated? Do you know your Love Languages (read: The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman)?

Sometimes when I am out and about in public, I can't help but overhear the conversations of those around me. It's not that I'm intentionally eavesdropping (well, most of the time), it is just that I really like to pay attention to what is going on around me. During one snooping session in an airport recently I noticed a couple discussing her specific position within the company for whom I presume they both must work. At first it simply sounded like the same old whining you've come to expect always accompanying our American sense of entitlement.

As I listened with one ear, reading a paper out of one eye, the phrases started to become misaligned with how people normally register their dissatisfaction. It made me want to know more about why we she wasn't feeling particularly motivated or appreciated even as her friend effused praise on her obvious contributions to him and others in their workplace. If he was so readily able to supply evidence of her worth, why was she questioning her place? I wondered if her boss was aware? If she worked for me, would I have been aware? As is typically the case, I abandoned my attentiveness choosing instead to pursue something of more immediate self-interest. Namely, what did I think about her predicament? What would I do in her shoes, her friends sneakers, her team leaders clogs. (Okay, they may not have been clogs, but who knows.)

In dissecting the situation I had stealthily stumbled upon, I was reminded of some of the guiding principles in my own philosophy on motivation, personal career choices, and leadership.

I have to believe that I am relevant, valuable, and have an impact.
I will perceive this through the respect they accord, and the riches they afford.
Otherwise, it is as the author said, "[S]he's just not that into you."

These simple words guide my thinking whenever I begin to question my place and position. When responsible for the success of those working with me, I try and recall these principles and apply them to the value proposition I create for them.

What I find most useful about such a simple set of tenets, is that they can be applied regardless of the specific drivers and motivators of each individual. The indicators and behaviors that will show value and impact may be different from person to person, but their existence will be consistent. One mans riches take shape in cash, another in experiences, and still a third in freedoms.

Regardless of what the specific circumstances are, it can be very telling to ask yourself how you are measuring up? Are getting what you need? Are you making sure the people you are responsible for are getting what they need?