Given the choice, would you rather be part of a high performance culture or a low performance culture? If you answered high performance culture, are you certain of what makes a high performer a high performer? To answer that question, we’re embarking on a series of posts delving into Brendon Burchard’s book, High Performance Habits: How Extraordinary People Become That Way.
Let’s start with the definition of high performer.
“High performer – someone who creates ever-increasing levels of both well-being and external success over the long-term.”
Brendon Burchard, High Performance Habits
The good news is that becoming a high performer has little do with your background, genetic makeup, or your experience level. “It’s about your performance habits – which you have complete control over.”
The book focus on 6 habits which the author’s research has shown when taken together “is a powerful predictor of not just whether you’re a high performer but also whether you’ll be happy.”
A happy high performer. Sound interesting! Let’s dive in.
High Performance Habit #1: Seek Clarity
“Our research shows that compared with their peers, high performers have more clarity on who they are, what they want, how to get it, and what they find meaningful and fulfilling. We’ve found that if you can increase someone’s clarity you up their overall high performance score.”
Brendon Burchard, High Performance Habits
How clear are you on what you value, your strengths and weaknesses, your goals, and your plan for the future? Reflecting on my own life, the times I have not been clear on these questions were the times I wasn’t confident in the value I had to contribute, which, as you can imagine, didn’t do much for my self-esteem. Today, as I gain more clarity regularly, I’m more confident in who I am (and who I’m not) and where I add value. I have worked up a personal story pitch to explain who I am, what I do, and why I do it. Seeking clarity is a process, a journey, and I learn a little more about myself each week.
“Clarity is the child of careful thought and mindful experimentation.”
Brendon Burchard, High Performance Habits
If you are just out of school, you haven’t had a lot of time for “mindful experimentation” (and maybe not much time for careful thought either!) I’ve heard many life coaches say, “movement brings clarity”. I’ve said it more than once myself. Sometimes we need to pay attention to what is attracting our attention, articulate it the best we can, then move towards it. This movement will bring discovery and clarity.
I once was curious about snowboarding. I rented a board and took a couple of lessons. I wasn’t getting the hang of it. At one point I lost my balance and did a face plant, biting my tongue so hard I thought it would be missing a chunk. That didn’t happen, but it sure hurt and gave me clarity on that particular winter sport not being for me.
On the other hand, as I studied and practiced The 7 Habits and other facets of self-growth, I would get up the courage from time to time to cautiously coach people when they came to me with a problem. Finding that I was able to add value, I moved in that direction and asked a few people if I could try my hand at coaching them. I never know exactly what we’re going to talk about, or how I’ll add value, but I never feel off-balance. The feedback I get is totally opposite of a face plant. Had I not experimented with coaching in an intentional way (i.e. to determine if I was good at it), I never would have explored my potential in this area.
What do we need to be clear about? “High Performers are clear in their intentions for themselves, their social world, their skills, and their service to others.”
We’ll start with clarity of self. More accurately, we’ll start with seeking clarity of who we want our future selves to be.
“They [high performers] are more focused on sculpting themselves into stronger and more capable people. That’s another big difference: introspection versus intention.”
Brendon Burchard, High Performance Habits
High performers think about who they want to be in the future and they take steps to get there.
Here’s an interesting exercise from the author:
- Think about your day. How do you perceive yourself at work, at home, outside of work, with people you haven’t met before?
- Ask yourself if that’s who you want to be in the future. How would your preferred future self behave differently?
- Pick three aspirational words describing your best future self. Program the words into alarms on your phone that alert you several times a day. This clear vision of your preferred self will have a difficult time leaking away!
tl;dr
High performers aren’t necessarily born that way. Rather, they have performance habits which then result in being a high performer. One of these is seeking clarity of your future self. Who do you want to be? Do a gap analysis of who you are and who you want to be, then take actions towards being your preferred future self.
engineer your life
- Do the gap analysis exercise in the story regarding how you perceive yourself in different situations day-to-day and who you want to be in the future.
- If you are curious, get your success score from Brendon Burchard’s organization at highperformanceindicator.com.