Our positive beliefs about ourselves help us become successful. These same beliefs can make it tough for us to change. The same beliefs that helped us get to here - our current level of success, can inhibit us from making the changes needed to get to there - the next level that we have the potential to reach .
Belief 1: I Have Succeeded
Successful people have one consistent idea coursing through their veins and brains - "I have succeeded. I have succeeded. I have succeeded." This strong belief in our past success gives us faith to take the risks needed for our future success. You may not think that this applies to you. You may think that this is ego run amok. But look closely at yourself. How do you have the confidence to wake up in the morning and charge into work, filled with optimism and eagerness to compete?
It's not because you are reminding yourself of the screw-ups you have created and the failures that you have endured. On the contrary, it's because you edit out failures and choose to run the highlight reel of your successes. If you're like the successful people I know, you're focused on the positives, calling up mental images when you were the star, dazzled everyone and came out on top. It might be those five minutes in the executive meeting when you had the floor and nailed the argument that you wanted to make. (Who wouldn't run that highlight in their head as if it were the Sports Center Play of the Day?) It might be your skillfully crafted memo that the CEO praised and routed to everyone in the company. (Who wouldn't want to re-read that memo in a spare moment?)
When our actions lead to a happy ending and make us look good, we love to replay it for ourselves. When it comes to the thoughts successful people hold in our heads, we are not self-depreciating, we are self-aggrandizing - and that's a good thing! Without it, we wouldn't be so excited about getting up in the morning. I once got into a conversation about this with a major league baseball player. Every hitter has certain pitchers whom he historically hits better than others. He told me, "When I face a pitcher whom I've hit well in the past, I always go up to the plate thinking I ‘own' this guy. That gives me confidence." That's not surprising.
To successful people the past is made up of rose-colored prologue. But he took that thinking one step further. "What about pitchers that you don't hit well?" I asked. "How do you deal with a pitcher who ‘owns' you?" "Same thing," he said. "I go up to the plate thinking I can hit this guy. I have done it before with pitchers a lot better than he is." In other words, not only did he lean on his past success to maintain his positive attitude - he relied on it even when his past performance was not so rosy - i.e. when the evidence actually contradicted his self-confidence.
Marshall Goldsmith FeedForward Tool
Successful people don't drink from a glass that is half empty! When achievement is the result of a team effort - not just individual performance - we tend to over-estimate our contribution to the final victory. I once asked three business partners to estimate their individual contribution to the partnership's profits. Not surprisingly, the sum of their answers amounted to over 150% of the actual profit. Each partner thought that she was contributing more than half! This over-estimation of our past success is true in almost any workplace. If you ask your colleagues (in a confidential survey) to estimate their percentage contribution to your enterprise, the total will always exceed 100%. There is nothing wrong with this. (If the total adds up to less than 100%, you probably need new colleagues!)
This "I have succeeded" belief, positive as it is in most cases, can become a major obstacle when behavioral change is needed. Successful people consistently over-rate themselves relative to their peers. I have asked over 50,000 participants in my training programs to rate themselves in terms of their performance relative to their professional peers - 80-85% rank themselves in the top 20% of their peer group - and about 70% rank themselves in the top 10%.
The numbers get even more ridiculous among professionals with higher perceived social status, such as physicians, pilots and investment bankers. MDs may be the most delusional. I once told a group of Doctors that my extensive research had conclusively proven that half of all MDs had graduated in the bottom half of their medical school class. Two of doctors insisted that this was impossible! We all tend to accept feedback from others that is consistent with the way we see ourselves. We all tend to reject or deny feedback from others that is inconsistent with the way we see ourselves.
Successful people feel great about their previous performance! The ‘good news' is that these positive memories build our self-confidence and inspire us to try to succeed even more. The ‘bad news' is our delusional self-image can make it very hard to hear negative feedback and admit that we need to change.
Life is good.
Marshall
My newest book, MOJO, is a New York Times (advice), Wall Street Journal (business), USAToday (money) and Publisher's Weekly (non-fiction) best seller. It is now available online and at major bookstores.
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