How to Take Your Performance to the Next Level

• You see the “new world” and are excited by its mysteries. This makes you a potential leader of others. But remember, to get others to join you on your mission you have to describe this “new world” as vividly as you can. The more detail you give people, the more certainty they’ll have, and the more likely they’ll be to put aside their anxiety about the unknown and follow you. So, before you embark on your mission, get your details together and practice your descriptions of what they will discover and how they will benefit if they sign up.

• You have a natural instinct for change. It will serve you well to “bottle” that instinct. Work out a formula that captures your natural instincts for how to handle uncertainty. Turn them into a clear process that other, less risk-oriented people can follow. In your career you will meet change often. Your formula can ensure that you have a turnkey method for rallying and focusing the people around you.

• Practice and get comfortable with a few phrases that express your natural optimism without making you sound like a reckless fool or a naïve idealist. For example, when colleagues say, “We can’t change the way we’ve always done it,” instead of saying, “Yes we can. Just try it,” ask a nonthreatening, easy-to-answer question, such as “Well, if we had already changed it, what would the new way look like?” This won’t save you every time—some people will always be suspicious of your optimism—but by assuming that the change has already been made, it may help others break through their initial inertia.

• Find ways to showcase how your innovations have succeeded in creating new business opportunities or new products. These examples of how inquisitiveness turns into performance will give people more certainty, and they will become increasingly tolerant and even supportive of your pioneering spirit.

• Since you are curious first, critical second, you could make a fantastic mentor. You allow people to show you their best and reveal to you their dreams, and your instinct is to take the ride with them, asking one question after another, each question carrying them along a little further, a little faster. Yes, at some point, as an experienced pioneer, you should bring your critical thinking to bear on their dreams. Nonetheless, what’s truly powerful about you as a mentor is your willingness to let young talent run.