egyii blog

We lead a split life. On the one hand, we do what we have to do to earn a living; on the other, we do what we want to do to have fun. But high achievers don’t experience this dichotomy: they love what they do and they do what they love. In his classic study of Americans’ perception of their work Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do (New York: Pantheon Books 1974) Studs Terkel quotes Nora Watson as saying: “I think most of us are looking for a calling, not a job… Most of us have jobs that are too small for our spirit. Jobs are not big enough for people.”

You can call it a grand quest or a mission – those who discover it find the same feelings as Stephen Spielberg: “I wake up so excited, I can’t eat breakfast. I’ve never run out of energy.”

But how do we discover this passion? All I can do is tell you how I, James Irvine, discovered it and hope that you will tap into what I say and somehow relate it to yourself. I was a banker for 10 years and was unhappy. I certainly had no passion for my work. I went through each day as if a machine was doing the work while my real self was somewhere else waiting to come out. After 10 years of enormous stress resulting not from the pressure of the job but the fact that I was doing something all day long that was against my nature, I quit.

I attended a career counselling program, and did the usual analyses with my logical mind about what interests I had had when I was a child, what I enjoyed doing in my spare time, and so on. These were helpful in a limited way, because they were all thinking processes, whereas what I really needed to do was find some quiet time to listen to my heart. What I realised was that nothing from my past was really a clue to my future.

So I spent some time working in a retail shop while I struggled with this issue. And as the days went by and I started listening to my feelings and the spontaneous thoughts that occasionally emerged, I began to feel a bit like teaching people. It wasn’t a sudden decision like ‘I want to be a teacher’. Rather, I just began to see myself talking to people and sharing some of my own feelings and thoughts, and as I saw this I felt good.

I didn’t make some grand decision to become a teacher. I decided to enrol in a certificate course in Teaching English as a Foreign Language. I knew I liked languages and grammar, so I thought this was a way to try out my gut instincts without too much commitment. Remember, I had never so much as made a presentation or stood in front of an audience in my whole time in banking or at any other time in my life. I just had this feeling that was good when I pictured myself doing this.

After two weeks of theory and instruction, we had to deliver our first lesson in front of a live audience who came from the local town for free lessons from these student teachers of English. This first lesson would last for 15 minutes, and I had no idea how I would have enough to say and do to last for 15 minutes. I spent hours preparing, but on the day I stood up in front of about 20 adult students and within a couple of minutes felt very comfortable and energised. I actually discovered a new person inside of myself during those 15 minutes. I really enjoyed the experience in a way that I had not when I was analysing balance sheets and drawing up financial proposals. I had found my passion.

Because I enjoyed the experience of teaching so much, I became good at it, and now, as a corporate talent developer with Egyii in Singapore, I wake up every morning feeling the same as Stephen Spielberg. Well, maybe not quite so excited – I still have time for breakfast!

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) training has a lot to say about motivation: how we motivate ourselves, and how others are motivated. These motivators are called Metaprograms, and when we understand how they work, we gain enormous power to influence ourselves and others.

In fact, ignorance of Metaprograms can relegate us to the group of chronic underperformers if we are in sales, management, human resources or leadership. Understanding this vital aspect of relationship management gives us one of the keys to performance acceleration and improved personal results.

One Metaprogram is known as ‘toward or away from’, and describes people’s preferences and drives. For example, if John is a ‘toward’ person, then he will be motivated by the prospect of receiving or gaining a benefit, or achieving a future goal which has positive results for him. In other words, you must show him how he can move towards a pleasurable feeling. If you attempt to persuade John by emphasising what he will lose by not doing what you suggest (e.g. buying insurance or investing in your financial product), you will fail to win him over time and time again.

On the other hand, if you attempt to influence him to invest in your financial product by emphasising the possible increase in asset values and income, he will probably sit up and listen to you. So long as you present John with a movement towards some positive future outcome, you will gain his attention and interest.

Turning to the opposite motivation, if John’s friend Judy is an ‘away from’ person, you will stand a greater chance of persuading her if you present her with the lost opportunity of not investing. You will need to show her how much profit she will potentially lose by not investing (“Imagine the increased wealth you would lose by this time next year if you don’t switch from cash to a unit trust”). In other words, she is motivated by avoiding pain. With Judy, no amount of positive messaging will encourage her to invest. She is motivated by the fear of loss, and will do anything to move away from a potentially negative situation.

Of course, ‘towards or away from’ are not the only metaprograms. You can probably identify some other of your motivations if you think about it.  The point is, no amount of skill in active listening or speaking in short, clear sentences is going to help you get the results you want if you don’t first lay the foundation of human understanding. Once this is in place, your relationship skills will come into their own and help you achieve more than you ever thought possible.

If you want to succeed in your career, or you’re a manager who wants to get the best out of your people, the first place to look is inside.

What does this mean? Well, some people such as myself, James Irvine and my partner Trip Allen at http://thethinkingcircle.com believe that it doesn’t matter how many communication or leadership skills you learn – if your beliefs or ability to put yourself in the right frame of mind are working against you, no amount of technique or skills asquisition will work.

If you are really interested in personal development and performance acceleration, start with your private voice i.e. the things you say to yourself all day long. Pay attention to the kinds of messages you are giving yourself, because these messages will directly affect your state (i.e. your mood and thoughts) and therefore your behaviour. In fact NLP teaches us that our internal communication does more for our performance than our external communication, our public voice.

Egyii’s founders know this, because Trip Allen and James Irvine have experienced the powerful impact on their results of even small changes in their beliefs and thoughts. So if you really want that performance acceleration, or you want to differentiate your company through your people’s flexibility, resilience and resourcefulness, then look inside first. You will be amazed at the difference to your leadership capabilities, relational skills and personal results even a small personal change can make.