| | Success Stories  Louise helped us focus our computer consulting business and develop clear goals. As a result, our revenues increased 30% last year. Her guidance and support is a huge factor in our success and sanity! I would recommend her to consultants and professionals who want increased profits and peace of mind. Mike Pollack, Mighty Mouse Computer Consulting, Inc. www.mmcci.com
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| BRINGING OUT THE BEST IN OTHERS Three Keys for Business Leaders, Educators, Coaches and Parents
by Thomas K. Connellan, Ph.D.
(nonfiction) Reflections on why certain individuals are more successful than others. I went looking for environmental factors. Specifically, what was different about the way firstborns were raised? About the way they were treated by the people around them, their parents, their schools? There are lots of possibilities, of course. Things like being raised by younger parents, which as we all know has its downside as well as its advantages. "I read the psychology journals. I talked with child psychologists. I interviewed parents. I watched families in action. I learned a lot, and I identified dozens, maybe hundreds of things that could potentially influence success in life. "But when it came to the differences between firstborns and the rest of the children in a family, there were three factors that stood above the rest. Firstborns get more positive expectations, more responsibility, and more feedback. "These are worth writing down and thinking about. I fact, we′ll be talking about them for the rest of the day. "First factor." Tony turned and scrawled a large number "1" on the chalkboard behind him, followed by a single word: 1. EXPECTATIONS "Expectations. People have more positive expectations for firstborns. They′re going to be president of the senior class, the all-star quarterback, head cheerleader, captain of the tennis team. Whatever they′re involved in, they′re expected to excel. 2. RESPONSIBILITY "Second factor: Firstborns are given more responsibility, and at an earlier age. They′re asked to look after and help take care of their younger brothers and sisters. When they all go to the movies together, or to the mall, or out to the street to meet the ice cream truck, the oldest is given the money, the cell phone, the directions on how to get there, what to buy, what not to do. 3. FEEDBACK "Third factor: Firstborns get more feedback. They get more attention from parents, relatives, family friends. They have more pictures taken. Parents spend more time encouraging them to walk and talk. "To me, this was very exciting information. It meant that we could actually identify three distinct conditions that tend to make firstborns better-than-average achievers. And having identified them, we could examine them, and study them, and learn from them. Then, perhaps, we could replicate them in other situations-- business offices, retail stores, classrooms, civic organizations, even sports. "You see, the important thing to keep in mind is that these factors are not intrinsic to firstborns. They are plainly environmental. And here′s the most wonderful, amazing thing about them: it′s the ′presence′ of the three factors that makes the difference. It′s not about being firstborn--it′s about the presence of the three factors. Sure, they happen to be present more often with firstborns than with those born later. But when we′ve put these three factors into practice with later-born children, they have worked there as well. When we used the factors on a sales team, they worked there. When we applied them to manufacturing, they worked again. In short, everywhere we′ve tried them, they′ve worked. "I discovered this when I dug deeper beneath the surface of what makes top performers. The more research I did, the more top performers I found who didn′t necessarily match the ′first child′ pattern. "For example, I talked with a number of high-performing and low-performing sales reps in wholesale distribution companies. Mary, I know this will interest you. In one study, I found quite the reverse of what I expected--there were more firstborns among the low performers than among the high performers. "I thought, What the heck is going on here? "But I kept talking with people. I began to focus more on the leaders, and I discovered something very interesting. The leaders of the high performers were actually creating the three factors in the job setting. That is, they were supplying the environment that usually gives the firstborn an advantage. "In another of my sales rep studies, I focused specifically on how good the sales managers were at introducing the three factors into the workplace, and I designed a test to measure the results. And sure enough, the managers of the high performers scored 22 percent higher in their ability to create the three factors than the managers of the low performers. "I interviewed company presidents who achieved that position before age forty. I didn′t find as many firstborns as I expected, but I discovered something just as significant. Two-thirds of them could identify a supervisor or manager or mentor from earlier in their career who created the factors in the job climate. "The effects of expectations, responsibility, and feedback are age independent. They are something you can put into the work environment to improve the performance of adults. Janet, you can build them into your interactions with your nursing team, the administration, the pathology lab, and other departments to improve communication, attention to detail, cooperation--in other words, teamwork. Mary, you can apply them to your problems with Marvin and Pat to make them full-time top performers--and, not incidentally, raise the performance level of the whole sales staff. Carlos, you′ll find it will help you raise throughput, product quality, and most other measures of productivity. "And, of course, Mike and Lloyd can use them on their kids, who are still in their formative years." The two men nodded hesitantly. |
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