I’m going to give you a hat. Whenever you need it, simply put it on. This hat will help you get the best results in your life.

When triggers happen that cause you to react, add a pause, and put on your metaphorical hat of effectiveness. When you put this hat on, you’re shifting gears. You’re shifting from reacting to responding.

At Microsoft, we use the term “frame” or “framing a problem” in the context of project management. You might hear somebody ask, “what’s the frame?” or “how have you framed the problem?” A Frame is simply a way to partition a problem. The heart of a frame is coming up with a context to understand the dimensions that matter and figure out how to prioritize and scope. I use frames a lot here on Sources of Insight to chunk bigger problems down, as well as to organize and share information. It’s a lens.

Do you choose your response or act on impulse? Impulse says, “eat the M&M” or “pull the lever”, or “hit the snooze button.” It feels good in the moment. It’s bad for you in the long run.

This is a follow up to my previous post, Influencer Training Day 1. These are my notes from day 2 of Influencer training. It turned out to be way tougher to write up than I expected. I had a lot of notes and we covered a lot of material and I wanted to boil it down as simply as possible. This is actually my third variation and I think it’s the cleanest so far. Why would I spend so much time trying to get this right? Because I think it’s some of the most powerful information for changing you, your environment, your team, your work, or the world.

This is too cool not to share. During my Influencer training, we watched a video on delaying gratification. Apparently, people that can delay gratification can do better in school, get more promotions, have better relationships and lead a more successful life. Rather than do what they want in the moment, they choose what’s right for the long run. That’s the will part.

In my previous post, I wrote about the power of Hot Spots. In this post, I’ll show you how I apply Hot Spots to life. These are the categories I use for skilled living. This is the big picture. It’s how I chunk up my overall time and energy. There are certain areas in life that if I invest in, I get rewarded. On the other hand, if I ignore these categories, I get penalized.

Hot Spots are a simple approach I use to organize and prioritize where I put my focus. They help me put the spotlight on what’s important. Hot spots are a heat map for my opportunities as well as for my pain or friction. By focusing on the hot spots, I can unleash the best results. The sum is more than the parts. I can use hot spots to identify, clarify, and simplify where to spend my time and energy, before I maximize and optimize. It’s first stepping back far enough so I can see the forest from the trees, but then getting close enough to know the differences that will make the difference. It’s figuring out where my levers are in the system.

I have the privilege of taking some extreme training on influence. It’s a pilot class based on the book, Influencer: The Power to Change Anything. Influence is about changing hearts, minds, and behavior to produce meaningful, sustainable results. The beauty of the model is that it scales up and down from personal life style changes, such as losing weight, to global changes, such as eliminating diseases. I like it because it’s a simple lens to look at those persistent problems where change seems impossible. Rather than bump your head against a glass ceiling or spin your wheels without traction, it’s a systematic approach to diagnose and implement change.

Productivity is a spectrum from day dreamer to achiever. What if we named these various flavors of productivity? Then when you recognize you have the wrong hat on for the job, you can switch hats. For example, maybe you’re thinking “details” when it’s really time for “big picture.” I’m calling these personas, but they’re really just behavior or thinking patterns. I’m highlighting some of the more common personality personas that you’ll easily recognize.

I’ll use personas as a simple way name the different types of behaviors. Anybody can be a mix of some or all of the various personas. No persona is good or bad. Some are more effective than others depending on the situation. The key is to use the personas as a lens on behavior.

Inspire … “To breathe life into” …
… That’s how one of my instructors defined it.  Now, I have a new respect for the word inspire.  I find myself asking, “how do I breath life into others?”
Photo by km33068.

The 20 percent spike is a distinctive strength. It’s unusually powerful. Using your 20 percent spike generates exponential results. It’s a way to amplify your impact and maximize results. My 20 percent spike is information artistry. I use this skill to create, organize, and share complex information in a simple way. At work, it helps me write more effective books. At home, it helps me learn faster and turn insights into action. From a service standpoint, it helps me unleash the best in others.

I’ve been thinking of my life as a business. Without getting too carried away with the analogy – after all, life’s way more than business – it gives me a helpful frame, along with patterns and practices, to draw from. Rather than think of a business that makes money, I think of a business that creates value (the mark of an enduring business.) In this case, value for yourself and others.

Unleash a version of your best self — quickly find your purpose, values, and personal success patterns.

Whenever I hear people debating whether life is an intelligent design or an evolutionary process, I can’t help but think that evolution is an intelligent design! When I think of design, I don’t think of veneer or appearance. Instead, I think of it as the soul of a thing, a sort of creator’s signal of intention.

Dr. Rick Kirschner (aka Dr. K) shares how to bring out the best in people.

One of the best lessons I learned in life, I learned from foosball. During a competitive match, I kept going for the long pull. The long pull is a beautiful shot. It’s like poetry in motion. The problem was, I kept missing all my shots. Finally, my partner pulled me aside and said, “Hey, don’t always go for the long shot. You’ll miss all the beautiful short and middle along the way.”

Your personal belief system can work for you or against you. When it’s working against you, your mood is subject to whatever is going on around you. You feel a sense of entitlement. Love is a requirement for your self-esteem. You take things personally or try to control the world around you. You’re a perfectionist and nothing is ever good enough.

When your personal belief system is working for you, your self-worth is not based on your achievement. You don’t seek others for approval. You’re able to find happiness inside yourself. You don’t feel entitled to everything. Love is not a requirement for your happiness or self-worth.

I’m always on the prowl for useful insights.  A colleague, Dustin Andrew, has a useful post, Learn to Get Traction in Your Team.  I like his collection of tips, and I found myself using the phrase, “iterate more, plan less” a few times.  When I joined Microsoft, one of my rules was “avoid analysis paralysis.”  I avoid analysis paralysis by taking action, producing results, and changing the approach as I learn.  I’ve learned to improve by versioning perfection over time.  I find it’s easier to settle for “good enough’ for …

My favorite definition of power is, “the ability to act.” So personal power is the ability for you to take action. Self-belief is the energy that drives you to take action. Self-efficacy is your belief about how much you can control your own actions and the events that affect your life. One of the worst enemies of personal power is, learned helplessness — why bother if you can’t get results? That’s why self-efficacy is so important. If you have confidence in your ability to get results, you’ll take action and build momentum.

What’s the difference between motivation and discipline? I like to think of discipline as “what to do” and motivation as “why to do.” Discipline has a Latin root, but the gist is it’s about teaching. So I think of self-discipline as teaching yourself self-control and shaping your behavior, so that you’re not a slave to your motivations. Primal motivations served us at one point, but society’s changed what survival means. For more precision, you can think of discipline as shaping your thinking, feeling, and doing to adopt a new behavior. Discipline serves you most when motivation says do otherwise. At the end of the day though, I think a key is to find ways to link things to feeling good.