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Time & Discipline Once the Chinese Bamboo Plant is planted, there is no visible growth for up to five years, even under the most ideal conditions. Then, as if by magic, it suddenly begins growing at the rate of nearly 2.5 feet per day, reaching 90 feet within 6 weeks! What is Mother Nature trying to tell us? Greatness takes time to grow! Following is an article written by True Growth® Associate Dr. Larry Cole that illustrates the critical importance of daily discipline… Do you have what it takes to be really good? Let's see. Have you wondered what separates those who excel in a profession vs. those who don't? Many want to credit innate talents to be the differentiating factor. Of course, there are the prodigies who are born with a specific talent to excel. We're not addressing these unique individuals. We're talking about people like you and me. Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers, reported a study by K. Anders Ericsson who studied three groups of violinists: elite, good and future music teachers. He found that around the age of eight years of age there was a major change in the number of hours practiced. Eventually the elite practiced 10,000 hours while those that were good practiced 8,000 compared to the music teachers who logged 4,000 hours of practice. Subsequent research, according to Gladwell, supported Ericsson's results. The conclusion is that people at the very top work much harder than those not included in this category. Research supports the notion that ten thousand (10,000) hours of focused practice seem to be the differentiating point between excellent and simply good. You may be wondering what this information has to do with leadership development. Let's examine practice more detail to answer that. The focus of any given practice session is designed to improve a particular skill. The professional expects to be improved upon after completing each training session. The professional evaluates their performance to determine if the practice session was successful. As an employee, you're practicing interacting with people every day for a period of eight hours or so. Do you use this time in a focused practice to improve your performance? If you use the 2,000 hours you're at work to improve performance, you could reach the elite level of 10,000 hours in five years. Recent research is providing insight as to why so much is required to improve performance. Our behavior is regulated by neural "highways." Every action we do today strengthens the corresponding neural highways. The more we engage in ineffective behaviors, the stronger the habit strength. To improve performance, we need 10,000 hours of focused practice to substitute improved performance for our bad habits. If you're like most people, we waste a lot of time. We "plod" through our day without concentrating on improving our performance. I often ask seminar participants to record the skill set they are working to improve. After fifteen seconds or so, I ask them to stop. The point made is if you're still thinking about what you're working on to improve, you're not serious. Those of us who are serious about improving can quickly tell you the skill set being improved. Stephen Covey reminded us in his best selling book, 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, of the importance to begin with the end in mine. I do that. At the beginning of each day, I read a description of the person I want to be that day. The challenge becomes practicing that person throughout the day. The issue is that I get so busy with the day-to-day frustrations of running a business that I tend to forget being the person that I thought about that morning. If you find it difficult to stay focused throughout the eight hour period, as I do, perhaps we can start by staying focused for 30 minutes. Then on each successive day we can add another fifteen minutes to our practice time. With a concerted effort, we will ultimately make it through the day! Hint: Continue to remind yourself of the benefits associated with improving your performance. The stronger the magnetic qualities of these benefits are, the easier it will be to experience the discomfort of the practice sessions! Focus on the benefits of becoming a new you. Larry Cole, PhD www.teammax.net lcole@cei.net | |
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