The Performance Paradox
Every leader dreams of finding the magic bullet that will increase creativity, boost productivity, and improve morale. Surprisingly, one of the most effective solutions may be the most counterintuitive: sometimes less effort, not more, yields optimal results.Keep Your Eye on the Present
A few years ago, I worked with a Formula One racing team. Pit crews, consisting of 19 people, serviced the ultrafast, high-tech race - refueling cars, changing tires, and performing required maintenance in a matter of seconds. The crew members continually shifted positions to find the best combination for the optimal configuration of the team. As they practiced, they used a stopwatch to measure their time to milliseconds. Yet, ultimately, no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't work any faster. They had hit their performance plateau.
Then, they tried a new approach. They decided not to concentrate on their time, but on their style instead. Now, their movements became more significant than their speed. Astonishingly, the crew shaved several tenths of a second off their best time, even though they "felt" they were moving more slowly. This experiment reinforces the concept that the more you focus on your goals, the less likely you are to achieve them. By worrying about the future, you take your eye off the present.
In higher intellectual activities, the results are even more pronounced. Take the true story of a high school student who became increasingly anxious over passing her upcoming final exam in math, always her weakest subject. She studied hard, all the time focusing on her goal of passing her exam. In spite of her efforts, she failed. She pleaded with her teachers to give her one more chance. They did. This time, instead of concentrating on the goal, she used a powerful creativity technique.
Her first conscious thought each day when she awoke was to visualize herself as Condoleezza Rice, the U.S. Secretary of State, a very successful, highly educated woman. Dr. Rice wouldn't worry about a high school math exam, right? By imagining she was someone else, she stopped agonizing and gained more confidence daily. By focusing on the present rather than the result, she scored a 93%, her greatest performance with less effort.
Dare to Be Different
Does this also apply to sales? Can we perform better when we don't focus on our sales goals? A woman's clothing store had a competition to determine who among its employees could sell the most in two months. The winner would receive a bonus and, possibly, a raise. All had their eyes on the prize, except for one sales rep who decided on a different approach. Instead of trying to make a sale, she zeroed in on serving the customer. If a customer needed help for eight hours to pick out a blouse, that's what she would do. If she felt customers would find a better product at a competitor, she would send them there. After two months, this sales person who was not trying to make sales outsold everyone else by a significant margin.
We have seen similar results in many sales and service organizations. We all know (and believe) the expression, "You get what you measure." But a serious question arises: will you get what you want? Often, targets and goals create stress and dysfunctional behavior.
Less Motivation, More Performance
The concept of reducing goal-obsession to improve performance is not new. In the early 1900s, Robert Yerkes and J.D. Dodson developed the eponymous Yerkes-Dodson Law. The premise is performance increases relative to motivation only to a point, after which performance drops. Typically, it is drawn as an inverted U-shaped curve.
If you lack motivation, the result is low performance. This is not surprising. As your motivation increases, your performance increases - to a point. This point is the sweet spot of optimal performance. Then, as you become more goal-obsessed, performance paradoxically decreases. Goals increase stress and cause you to fixate on the future rather than the present.
Yerkes and Dodson suggest that different tasks require different levels of motivation. For example, physically demanding tasks often require higher levels of motivation. This explains why professional athletes are inclined to be very goal-driven. Even so, as demonstrated by the pit crew example, too much goal orientation will hurt even athletic performance. In 2004, the New England Patriots broke the records for the longest winning streak in NFL history - 20 games in a row. At a press conference after the game a reporter asked the team's coach, Bill Belichick, to comment on this winning streak. He replied, "We did not have a 20-game win streak. We had 20 one-game win streaks." His philosophy was for the team to play each game to the best of its ability. Setting your sights too far ahead is a sure recipe for failure.
Creativity Has its Own Rewards
Within the business world, Yerkes and Dodson found that intellectually challenging tasks required lower levels of motivation. The more creative the work, the less motivation required to hit peak levels of performance. Studies reveal that creativity diminishes when individuals are rewarded (externally motivated) for doing their work. Why? The desire to achieve the goal overtakes the personal interest in the endeavor. A myopic focus on the outcome overshadows the intellectual stimulation of the process. As a result, risk taking becomes reduced and creativity vanishes.
"Working hard" may not be the best way to improve productivity and creativity. Maybe it isn't even "working smarter." As we have seen, perhaps the answer lies in trying less. Or maybe it can be found in understanding human behavior and motivation, as illustrated in the following studies.
Your Loss Could Be Your Gain
Which magazine do you think American men are more likely to buy?
- A men's health magazine with the cover, "Lose Your Gut Fast" or
- A similar magazine with the cover, "Get Six-Pack Abs"?
Although most people intuitively think that the second cover, "Get Six-Pack Abs," is the sure winner, when a magazine did such a comparison, it found that "Lose Your Gut Fast" sold six times more copies. Why? The answer lies in the three requirements for individuals (or an organization or a society) to change:
- They must be dissatisfied or uncomfortable with the current situation.
- They must foresee a better future.
- They must believe that they can reach that better future with a reasonable amount of effort.
Point #3 is critical. Using the "gut" example, when someone is 20 pounds overweight, as are many Americans, six-pack abs may be desirable yet seem inconceivable. It's just too much work, and the likelihood of success seems poor. Only when your gut is gone will the idea of six-pack abs seem like a possibility. Similarly, only when your organization is a lean, mean fighting machine will people embrace longer-term, strategic visions.
A question I ask when I address my audiences illustrates this concept further: "Which would you choose?":
- Option 1: A guaranteed gain of $75,000 or
- Option 2: An 80% chance to gain $100,000 with a 20% chance of getting nothing?
Seventy-five percent of audience members choose Option 1, consistent across all groups, regardless of demographics. People are risk averse when it comes to increasing gains. What would you choose if I worded the question as a loss rather than as a gain?:
- Option 1: A certain loss of $75,000 or
- Option 2: An 80% chance of losing $100,000 with a 20% chance of not losing anything
Over 80% of my audiences choose Option 2. People will take risks to reduce their losses. This explains why the status quo often wins over change. Although there may be a benefit in changing, the risk of losing what you already have is too great.
People will take great risks to minimize their pain/losses yet play it safe when the option is to increase their pleasure/gains. When your organization's change plans are utopian visions of a grandiose future, your employees move to the far end of the performance curve: high motivation, low performance. They become cynical about success and feel as though you are not addressing their current pains and frustrations. Instead, fix immediate problems first, then move on to more strategic visions.
The Bottom Line
To create a pervasive culture of innovation, you must first create an environment of performance and motivation. Achieving this is often, paradoxically, the result of less, not greater, effort. Although goals and performance targets are useful tools, they can also have a detrimental impact on results. When people are too future-fixated, their creativity and overall performance diminish. Find the sweet spot of optimal performance, and you will undoubtedly see an increase in employee productivity, creativity, and satisfaction - all with less effort.
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Stephen Shapiro is the author of three books, a popular innovation speaker, and is the Chief Innovation Evangelist for Innocentive, the leader in Open Innovation.Labels: culture change, Goals, Innovation, Managing Change, Performance, Stephen Shapiro, Strategy, Stress

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Open innovation will not only lead to new ways of making innovation happen. Innovation leaders and their executives will also experience side effects. I think most of these effects will be positive, but some will be mixed or perhaps even negative.![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=d1454564-5699-44bc-9325-514f3fdef6db)

These days, almost all of my clients are talking about the need to establish a culture of innovation. ![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=5e0c33d8-0196-4bef-9c14-2a62ebb244fb)

After months of intrigue, Kraft finally made a successful bid for venerable British candy maker Cadbury, leaving archrival Hershey's on the sidelines.![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=a4d03d81-fe57-44cd-9b28-5bf4e4e12f2e)

I'm constantly amazed by all the talk about innovation that I hear within many organizations, and how little real action is taken. It's time, my friends, to gird up your loins and take action. Let's borrow the motto from Nike and decide to "Just Do It."
Being on the wrong end of the continuum between realistic and impossible is what plagues many of today's large multi-national corporations. The fear of failure by employees who are only partially engaged and don't entirely feel like valued members of the team, will always translate into goals and ideas that are mediocre and achievable and never ones that are innovative or impossible. In the 21st century, which is fraught with global economic adjustments, global-interdependence, developed world saturation, and a consumer base that is rapidly changing, creating the impossible is the only way to break away from the competition, ensure success and create a meaningful impact on the world.
I've been thinking a lot lately about "creating a culture of innovation", which is what a lot of firms suggest they want to do. Of course this is a very lofty goal. Changing a corporate culture doesn't happen easily, and it certainly doesn't happen overnight. Yet clearly one of the most significant barriers to innovation is the entrenched culture of effectiveness and efficiency, of risk-avoidance and following rather than leading.
In the C-suites of corporate America, innovation has become a mandate. Executives - from CEOs to marketing officers - believe that to innovate is to embrace the Holy Grail of 21st Century business.
Imagine if you will, somewhere in the distant recesses of our existence, a group of cavemen huddled around a fire. The wiseman of the group gathers the tribe around the fire and regales them with stories of their ancestors - how they fought the neighboring tribes, how they found the food necessary to survive. The shaman passes on the wisdom of the tribe, and teaches in the process.
I guess I'll never fully understand the depth of concern that many management teams have around command and control, especially in an era of constant change. It seems that the more demands are placed on an organization to create new products and adapt to environmental change, the more resistance to that change is created and encouraged at mid and senior management levels. I understand that what's "known" is comfortable and what's unknown and new is uncomfortable, but at some point every firm has to create some new products or services or it will simply atrophy.
I recently made another trip to China. My purpose was to meet with innovation leaders in order to build further on my understanding of the Chinese innovation community and thus on my global perspectives on innovation.
Having been involved in several efforts on developing the innovation culture within companies, I have learned that you need to work with three organizational approaches.
Innovation is about change. Companies that successfully innovate in a repeatable fashion have one thing in common - they are good at managing change. Now, change comes from many sources, but when it comes to innovation, the main sources are incremental innovation and disruptive innovation.
Note that the chart has arrows going in both directions, but not simultaneously. There is a push-pull relationship. At the beginning of the innovation process the satellites influence what the innovation will look like (new production capabilities, new suppliers, ideas from partners/suppliers, component innovations, new marketing methods, etc.). But as the innovation goes into final commercialization, the direction of the change becomes outwardly focused.
I've been thinking for a while about the perfect physical space for innovation. When we work with our clients we often are asked to help design a physical space for the team to work in. This should be a space that is open, colorful, inviting and really different from the regular work environment. The space needs to remind the people working there that when the teams are innovating, they need to be thinking differently than they do when in their day jobs. In a perfect world, there would not be such a separation of thinking, but until everyone is a perfect innovator, we'll have to settle for great thinking spaces.
Also, at any party, where do people end up? In the kitchen, standing around, talking about the events of the day. A kitchen, because there's food and drink available, is inviting. People tend to remain there, talking about the issues of the day. From an innovation perspective, that's valuable. A wide range of people mixing together, exchanging ideas is a good building block for innovation. Additionally, kitchens are much less formal than a living room or sitting room, and invite people to interact. The fact that there are few comfy chairs in a kitchen encourages people to mill around. This ensures an exchange of ideas.
Many strategic challenges have a "chicken or egg" quandary. In the case of the chicke and the egg, which comes first? Clearly you can't have a chicken if the chicken didn't come from an egg. But you can't have an egg if it didn't come from a chicken. Quite a conundrum. Ranks up there with
So, in many cases we are left with two alternatives, neither of which seem to have positive outcomes. On one hand a firm can innovate with small projects and programs and attempt to overcome cultural issues as they arise. Often they will find that the culture doesn't reward people who take risks and who propose programs that are different from the status quo. On the other hand, a firm can start working on the culture and begin changing the expectations before launching innovation programs, but this is time consuming and most executives don't have the patience for such efforts.
Kevin Roberts is the CEO worldwide of The Lovemarks Company, Saatchi & Saatchi. For more information on Kevin, please go to
I had the opportunity to interview Chris Thoen, Director Innovation & Knowledge Management at P&G about the challenges of shifting an organization as big as P&G from closed innovation to open innovation, and the
A great example of this is the Sonic toothbrush. P&G was looking at entering sonic toothbrush market. We considered doing it ourselves, but projected 3-5 years before going to market. Instead, we partnered with one of the largest home electric product companies in Japan (cannot name partner due to confidentiality) and went to market in fraction of the time (18 months) and cost. Finally, I'd add that you have to champion the early adopters. Whether it's an individual or a business, you take those who are on-board, passionate, and have embraced open innovation and you make heroes of them to the rest of the business. The more you can publicize success, the more you'll see that others want to be a part of it.
Approaching 'partner understanding' in a similar way to consumer understanding. To become the 'partner of choice' requires being outwardly focused to understand partner's needs, concerns, expectations, goals, etc. and finding ways to delight them at the first moment of truth (their initial contact with P&G as a potential partner) and the second moment of truth (during the collaboration). And at the monetary level, ensuring that partnerships are truly a win/win for both sides. We often coach internally and ask the question "Would you sign for either side?" In doing so, we increase the likelihood of repeat partnerships. And we build a solid reputation as a true partner of choice.
I grew up as one of those kids who was sort of good at a lot of sports but not really a master of any one sport. As I've gotten older, I've put considerably more time into biking, tennis and running, which leaves little time for the sport of business titans: golf. Now, I "play" golf at least four times a year, in a fund raising game or with friends and neighbors. I never practice and it shows. I cannot break 100 to save my life. I'm not familiar with any of the local courses and not familiar with my clubs (tools). I don't expect to be successful when I play and I don't take it too seriously. I uncork a nice drive every once in a while, or a good putt, but I don't expect it to happen regularly. Mostly I am a very poor golfer who occasionally gets in a good shot, and that's all I expect.
If I want to be a good golfer, I need to take lessons and play regularly to gain insights and improve as a player. If I want to be innovative as a firm, I have to do things on a regular basis that grow my skills and demonstrate my intent. An occasional innovative project or task does not change the baseline capability, and often detracts from a larger intent or goal, since "everyone" knows that nothing will be done with the ideas anyway.
Recently we received a call from a potential client. The individuals I spoke with noted a number of significant issues preventing them from innovation effectively. As I recall there were several significant issues: an 'engineering' oriented culture, several large customers who demanded exceptionally high quality, few competitors and a complete lack of risk taking in the organization. The good news is that the management team has recognized that what worked in the past will not work in the future. The team has to become more market oriented, and the organization has to learn to identify and satisfy more customers. New competitors are entering the market, so the firm, once very comfortable and slow moving, has to learn to move more quickly, identify customer needs and innovate to create new products and services.
Now, leave aside for a second the challenges that any firm faces when innovating and place yourself in the shoes of the folks who will be trained. What, exactly, are they going to do for the next four months? How can they succeed when everything in the culture is diametrically opposed to what they might learn? How can they enact any changes with no budgets, no clear goals and little management commitment? Why exercise this training budget simply because it exists to be spent?








