Behavior

The behavior leaders and employees exhibit day-to-day, both individually and when working together, is the ultimate determinant of success. No matter how great the strategy is, or how aligned the structures, processes, and skills are, if people are not behaving in ways that generate value, the organization will not survive long term.

Accelerating the value produced in how people work together

There are many models of high performance behavior. Some of the disciplines we have found to be most important are outlined below. As experienced leaders find over and over again, you don’t get long term change without shifts in how you think. Mastery in the disciplines shown below requires leaders to become aware of their own mental models and ways of thinking. Only then are they able to shift their patterns of thinking and intentionally choose to act on the interpretations that add the most value.

Without a commitment to these types of high performance behaviors, organizations tend to drift into behaviors that foster lower levels of performance—fragmentation rather than alignment, excuses rather than accountability, and fear rather than learning. People become resigned to the conflicts and breakdowns around them rather than being empowered to overcome them. This natural “drift” toward mediocrity is something we need to counteract every day in our organizations by proactively creating the conditions that foster high performance behaviors.

High Performance Behaviors Energize an Organization and Accelerate The Value Produced from People Working Together

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High performance disciplines

The effectiveness of the organization is significantly influenced by the personal and team "disciplines" that are fostered within the organization.

  • Commitment to results

    The team’s ability to commit themselves accountable to results they said they would achieve even if they don’t know how they are going to accomplish them

  • Alignment

    Choosing to own a decision and act in a way that is consistent with it; includes alignment to decisions the individual or team did not make

  • Accountability

    Establishing and keeping clear agreements and taking initiative to do what is needed for success

  • Leveraging breakdowns

    Proactively surfacing barriers and turning them from roadblocks into a springboard for greater effectiveness and performance

  • Generative listening

    Identifying and changing automatic biases and beliefs that impact actions and outcomes

  • Straight talk

    Sharing honestly what you are thinking in order to have effective conversations that produce results

  • Coaching in the moment

    Providing real-time feedback to each other in a constructive way

  • Acknowledgement

    Recognizing and sincerely expressing acknowledgement for what has been accomplished