Translator: Elissa Jahjah Reviewer: Peter van de Ven
What if I told you that there was no such thing as a difficult person?
What if I told you that the people that you find to be the most irritating
are probably the very ones that you need on your team?
I get it. You're skeptical.
And you're probably thinking about a difficult person in particular.
But over the next 15 minutes,
I'm going to show you how their annoying behaviors
can become valuable to your team.
We all walk around with blinders on;
we see the world and everyone in it in a very particular personal way.
We don't even recognize that we're doing it,
but even when we do, it's difficult to shift our perspective.
Let me show you what I'm talking about.
How would you feel in this room?
Some of you will feel perfectly comfortable here,
while others are very stressed just by looking at this picture.
How about this?
What kind of a reaction does this elicit?
Some people light up when they think about working with complicated formulas,
others are stressed just by thinking about opening an Excel spreadsheet.
So, just as we have preferences as to physical spaces and activities,
we also have preferences as to who we connect with.
Pretty quickly, we decide who's nice, and who isn't;
who we're drawn to, and who we aren't.
These judgments are based on deep-seeded assumptions.
They're developed early in life by the way that our brains are wired.
Let me show you what I'm talking about.
How many of you have seen this picture before? Yeah?
So shout out some of the things that you're seeing.
(Audience shouting answers)
An old man, sleeping dog, a lady holding a baby,
maybe you see the old man with the cane,
maybe the man's profile looks like he has his hand on his chest.
What I'm getting at is this:
We're all looking at the same picture,
but we're having very different experiences.
With just a tiny shift in perspective, everything changes!
That's why it's so important
to continuously challenge and change our own perspectives.
What we've discovered is that for every successful project or process,
there are four energies or dynamics that are required.
They are:
Explore, Excite, Examine, and Execute.
So, we're going to take a look at the embodiment of each.
How many of you recognize this man?
For those who don't, let me tell you a little bit about him.
His name is Doug Engelbart,
and Doug was focused on the computer-human interaction.
His work resulted in such things as the creation of the computer mouse,
hyper text, network computers, and early graphical user interfaces.
These were demonstrated at the mother of all demos in 1968.
To say that Doug lived in the world of ideas and possibilities
would be an understatement.
His high Explore energy kept him in this space at all times.
Let's take a look at someone who's high in Excite.
I'm sure that many of you recognize this person.
President Clinton's Excite energy had people accept him and connect with him
because he was so engaging and empathetic.
When you met him, you felt like you were the only person in the room
and that your ideas were incredibly valuable.
His high Excite energy has him to come across as very charming and engaging.
Let's look at someone high in Examine.
You probably won't recognize this man
because he's not your stereotypical, in-your-face CEO.
However, he is the CEO of a Fortune 200 company - CenturyLink.
His name is Glen Post,
and Glen lives in the world of data, facts and figures.
He's very detail-oriented.
He can be strategic,
but he's capable of creating incredibly detailed plans.
I had a difficult time selecting someone high in Examine
because they tend to be very low-key.
They come up with systems and structures to help organizations grow and succeed.
And finally, here's an example of someone high in Execute.
This one is for all you history buffs.
General Patton was one of the most prolific combat generals in US history.
He's famous for his hard-driving approach,
and infamous for his bluntness in controversies.
One of his better-known quotes is,
"It's better to execute on a good plan today
than to wait and execute on a perfect plan next week."
Notice the focus on execution.
General Patton believed in accomplishing no matter what was in the way,
and he had a disdain for cooler heads.
His high Execute energy is exemplified in his competitive nature.
So which energy are you drawn to?
Which one can you relate to?
Without awareness, we tend to be drawn
to people who share our energetic preferences,
and we're put off by those who don't.
Let me give you an example.
I was in my twenties when I developed my first company.
To say I lacked leadership experience would be a gross understatement.
One of the golden rules that I put into place right away
was that we would never miss a deadline.
It seemed like a lofty goal,
but what I didn't realize
was what this blind adherence to execution was costing me.
We had a tremendous amount of external success;
we had 1100% growth in three years,
bringing in a million in the first, ten million by the third.
But I was burning people out,
and turnover was high.
Some people couldn't survive in this chaotic environment.
But just as we're drawn to certain phases of work,
we also seem to align with those people
who share our passion for a particular energy.
Who do you think survived at my first company?
It was other high Executes, of course.
There was one woman in particular;
she kept three computers on her desk,
and they were all going at the same time.
She thrived in this environment.
But others didn't.
So who do you think didn't survive?
Well, anyone who needed detailed and thorough planning.
They didn't survive
because they found the environment to be frenzied and disorganized.
Others who didn't survive
were those who wanted to make sure that people were aligned and engaged
before we moved to execute.
They were frustrated
because there was never time to get people on board.
And finally, those who didn't survive
were those who were focused on the big picture.
They wanted to see all the connections
before they could move forward to action.
They didn't survive because there was never time
to look at anything holistically.
I valued action above all else.
And in the process, I missed what others had to offer.
And I'm sure that I irritated plenty of people in the process.
So my question to you is,
who irritates you?
Maybe it's the person who's constantly telling you
what's wrong with your plan
or why your idea won't work.
Or perhaps it's the one who throws out "what if's" and "we could's."
Maybe it's the one who wants to make sure
that people are aligned and engaged before moving to action.
Or it could possibly be the one that pushes you to get things done,
but they move so quickly, they never listen to your ideas.
[What is happening in our brians?]
So our brains are made up of neural pathways
that are composed of bundles of neurons
that are formed early in life.
This early brain development influences
what we see, what we value,
who we're drawn to, and how we process information.
You can compare the development of neural pathways in your brain
to developing a path in the woods.
Our brain makes a connection between two ideas or objects
sending electronic pulses back and forth between corresponding neurons.
With repetition, these pathways become reinforced, and therefore stronger.
Much like a path in the woods becomes more established
as people pass through it many times.
The stronger and better developed these pathways are,
the more difficult it is to move off of these pathways.
Because it's always easier to follow a well-trodden path
than it is to create a new one.
Sometimes, we're so blinded by our neural pathways
that we don't even recognize that there are other ways
of getting to the same endpoint.
We don't see what we don't see.
And once they're hardened and established,
it takes effort to try a different route.
Let's go back to that difficult person.
I know some of you are still thinking about him.
What if that person isn't difficult at all?
What if that person is simply operating from a different perspective?
Have you ever heard a leader say,
"If someone is negative, just get rid of them" or "fire them all"?
Well, I have.
And I cringe every time I hear one of these ridiculous statements
because what they're actually saying is
"If someone comes from a different perspective than you do,
don't seek to understand them, just get rid of them."
Here's a different perspective;
at my organization, we've had 10 years of working with hundreds of companies.
And what we've seen is that organizations
that are too enamored with one energy or another
tend to be under-performing and have low morale.
They are so focused and enamored with a particular energy
that they get into groupthink.
They don't know what they don't know.
Much like my experience at my first company.
We were getting shit done,
but we were burning people out in the process.
What we've discovered
is that for any project or process to be successful,
you need someone who's looking at the big picture;
someone high in Explore.
You need someone who's focused on people;
someone high in Excite energy.
You need someone who's capable of developing detailed plans;
someone high in Examine.
And you need someone who's focused on getting things done;
someone high in Execute.
If you remove any of these elements,
your output will be diminished,
and by the way, so will your impact.
If you don't walk away with anything else,
I want you to walk away with this:
Think of that person that sits across from you and is so annoying;
think of that annoying, challenging behavior as being their gift to you.
We're frustrated because we see this as negativity.
But in reality, all this human is doing is trying to share their gifts with us.
Let's go back to the guy in the office
who frustrates us because he's always telling us what's wrong with our plan,
or how our data doesn't add up.
We're frustrated by him because we feel like he's trying to make us look bad.
But in reality, he's just sharing his gift with us.
He wants to make sure that our plans are data-driven and factually based.
His gift is in trying to protect us by making sure that we don't go off path.
Or that person that comes up with a million and one ideas.
We're frustrated by that person because of the constant iteration,
the constant churn.
But their gift is in making sure that our organizations are innovative,
that we don't become dinosaurs.
Or maybe it was the person that wants to make sure
that there's a solid communication plan that people are aligned around.
We're frustrated by this person because they slow us down
while they're trying to make sure that people are engaged.
But what happens when someone is not engaged?
Well, we all know that productivity goes down,
and by the way, searching for a new job in a different company goes up.
Or maybe it's the person, like myself,
who pushes everyone to accomplish more and more.
What if we don't focus on execution?
Well, we have a lot of great ideas;
we might get people aligned around them;
we might even have a detailed plan;
but then we don't quite get around to accomplishing, well, anything.
I'm going to give you a simple formula to shift those difficult relationships
and make them as easy as the ones that you're naturally drawn to.
Be aware of your energetic preferences.
Appreciate the preferences of others.
And learn to adapt.
As I said at the beginning, there are no difficult people.
Being aware of other's gifts is as simple as shifting our own perspective.
And once we remove our blinders,
we begin to see others for who they are
and the gifts that they bring.
Thank you.