Posts Tagged ‘success’

The Mental State of “Flow” – What Athletes Can Teach Us about Focusing

August 20, 2012  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  No Comments

If you are a regular reader you know I bridge the worlds of high performance in sports and high performance in business.  These two worlds are not as different as you might think.  The highest achievers in both places know the difference between using 99% of your potential and 100% is dedication, effort and a willingness to do what it takes to be the best.  It can also be the difference between success and failure.

One of the most common questions I receive from high performers of all types is a variant of “How can I make sure I am ‘on’ when it matters the most?”  In answering that question I am going to assume you have the knowledge and ability to do what it is you are trying to do.  If you are giving a lecture on the intricacies of repairing nerve damage but you have been a bank teller your whole life, this post isn’t going to help you.  However, if you are prepared and want to make sure you peak when the bright lights are on and everyone is watching I have some tips you can use.

First, what is “flow”?  Flow is the balance between challenge and ability that results in an effortless performance where each moment is a singular moment with no future and no past.  There is no evaluation and everything except the task at hand fades into the background.

Set a time – You never see a sporting event that starts “when the two o’clock meeting ends and if I can get back to my desk before the four o’clock conference call.  At game time athletes are in their cleats and uniforms, they have their gear and they are rockin’ on go.  They mentally know when they have to be ‘on’.  No guess work.

Take care of your basic needs – You are not going to be able to concentrate if you are hungry, cold, need to use the bathroom or are otherwise uncomfortable.   Don’t sabotage yourself by going in with the deck stacked against you.  Take care of those things before ‘game time’.

Eliminate distractions – I am sure you are thinking “Yeah, duh”.  But do you really know what distracts you?  Have you ever REALLY thought about it?  Here are a few obvious ones: Phones, it seems there are beeps, buzzes, vibrations and melodies about everything.  Put your phone on silent (yes, sound all the way off) and place it face down behind you so you can’t see it light up.  Close your email; you won’t be reading/responding while you are performing so you don’t need to be alerted when a message arrives.  Put a note on your door/cube wall with the time you will be available so your teammates don’t knock.  Start paying attention to the things that distract you and be creative about how to eliminate them in the future.

Have an end goal – Knowing what you want to accomplish and leaving the timeframe open ended is one option (as long as it is a doable goal).  Tennis, baseball and golf are sports examples of this type of goal.  Another option is to set a specific time with a timer to let you know when you are done (that way you don’t distract yourself by looking at the clock).  Soccer, field hockey and basketball come to mind.   Try different types of goals until you find the one that works best for you.

Have a routine – Top athletes have a routine they follow right before they compete; many of the use music to drown out everything that is going on around them.  Do you have a routine you follow when you need to be in top form?  When I need to be in writing ‘flow’ I turn on an instrumental Jazz station with no commercials or talking DJ’s because I know hearing language interrupts the flow of the words in my head and breaks my concentration.  What signal can you create for your brain that says, “Focus”?

Don’t try to multitask – Clearly focusing and multitasking are mutually exclusive events.  Do one thing and one thing only.

Quell your wandering mind – If it is practical, have a parking lot piece of paper where you can write down the random worries or off topic ideas that pop into your mind.  If you struggle with negative self talk, having a key word can help bring your mind back to task (A mental performance professional can assist you in determining the cause of negative self talk and help you address and eliminate it.)

Enjoy the flow – There is little that is more rewarding than setting your mind to something and emerging some time later with a completed performance.  When you are in the flow you will not think about it.  It will just ‘be’.  Only afterward will you look back and think “Wow, I was really on.”

When you realize you were in flow make a note of how you got there; you are going to want to be able to repeat it.

Do you have a method or pattern that helps you get focused and ready to flow?  We would love to hear about it the comments!

Dr. Robyn Odegaard (aka Doc Robyn) is a nationally known speaker/consultant who is passionate about meeting people where they are and helping them advance to where they want to be.  She holds a doctorate in psychology and is the CEO of the Champion Performance Development (www.ChampPerformance.com).  She combines executive coaching, organizational development, sport psychology and her love for public speaking to help her clients achieve greater success in every aspect of their lives.  She founded the Stop The Drama! Campaign, authored the book ‘Stop The Drama!’ (www.StopTheDramaNow.com) and speaks at high schools and colleges to provide the skills proven to produce success to students.  She is avid in her support of driven, high performers and lives by the motto, “Worst case, I want to be a neutral to everyone I meet.  My goal is to make a positive difference.”

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Why Don’t Grownups Act Like Grownups?

May 21, 2012  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  No Comments

You don’t have to look very hard to find people behaving badly in just about any walk of life.  I found five stories without even trying (CEOs, Baseball umps, “Regular People 1, Regular People 2, and Athletes).  If you spend more than two seconds on any news site or with the TV on you are bombarded with adults behaving badly.  Granted, it is disproportionally bad behavior that is broadcast because, well, it’s news.

But even in everyday life I see adults engaging in behavior that we shouldn’t even accept from children.  Just yesterday I witnessed an adult in a screaming match with a store employee over a return policy and in the same store saw someone cut in line because they didn’t think the person in front of them was moving fast enough.  What is going on with our society that being a grownup no longer means behaving like one?

This is the problem and how we fix it:

‘Feelings’ has become the new F word while the real f-bomb is dropped without a thought.  I can hardly be in public without having to hear it.  Sitting in traffic with my window open, waiting for a friend in a sushi restaurant, in a stadium trying to enjoy a double-a ball game, I have even heard it in boardrooms.  But say the word feelings or have the audacity to ask someone how they’re feeling and everyone looks at you askance.

I hate to break it to you but those emotional tirades people go on and use the f-bomb (a completely useless word that provides no meaning to the conversation what-so-ever) are driven by feelings.  In most cases, feelings that aren’t understood and that person has no idea how to manage: hence the explosion.

Speaking of not knowing how to manage our feelings – how are we supposed to learn what to do with negative feelings?  Who teaches this stuff?  I mean other than sport psychologists and executive coaches.  It seems that somewhere along the way we have forgotten to teach our young people how to have a disagreement without being rude, disrespectful and throwing a tantrum.  Now we have people who don’t know how to manage anger and disappointment raising children.  Somehow that doesn’t make me feel very good.

Why does it matter?  Well aside from general human decency (which I think is a pretty big issue), knowing how to use productive conflict and engage in a professional disagreement has been shown to lead to greater success.  And success leads to more happiness and higher income.  Need evidence?  See here, here, here and here.

What are we going to do about it?  Well I don’t know about you, but I am on a campaign to show people from junior high through CEOs how to understand what they are feeling and to use language powerfully to move toward resolution rather than epic meltdown.  You can call it organizational development, teambuilding, professional coaching or team psychology.  Whatever label you put on it the bottom line is this – grownups who are able to act like grownups are going to get further in life.  And I am not suggesting people suppress their feelings.  In fact I teach exactly the opposite.  We all can benefit by learning how to express ourselves productively rather than using the volcano method (push it down until the pressure is so great it explodes).

And while we’re at it, if we could tone down the use of the f-bomb it would make it a lot easier to focus on what people are trying to say rather than being distracted by their lack of vocabulary.

What is your most recent experience of someone not acting like a grownup in public? Share it here.

Dr. Robyn Odegaard is the CEO/Owner of the speaking/consulting company Champion Performance Development, the founder of the Stop The Drama! Campaign and author of the book ‘Stop The Drama! The Ultimate Guide to Female Teams’.  She specializes in showing people how to use language powerfully to achieve more from their potential.   You can invite her to give one of her funny, powerful, informative presentations and inquire about her other services at www.ChampPerformance.com and order her book from www.StopTheDramaNow.com

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Can a Niche be Too Narrow?

April 9, 2012  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  No Comments



It is has become a common mantra that everyone is looking for their ‘niche’; the part of the market they can own.  In business we see people becoming more and more specialized.  Even in the athletic world players are becoming focused on a specific role.  Overall the concentration on becoming an expert in a finite area is seen as a good thing.  But is it possible to become too “niched”?   I believe the answer is yes.  There are some serious negatives to consider when thinking about your niche.

  • Fewer Opportunities – As you gain expertise in a specific area you may start to be seen as a clutch player.  That is great when there are lots of clutch plays.  But when the ‘game’ goes smoothly you might find yourself standing on the sidelines.  Consider the football linebacker who is the “go to guy” for third and short.  If there are rarely third and short opportunities he is going to be warming the bench.  And too much time warming the bench can mean being cut from the team.

The solution – Go ahead and focus on becoming an expert in your niche but not at the cost of all else.  Maintain all of the skills you need to be successful in your business.  That way you can part of the everyday game during the regular season and still be clutch player who makes the huge play when you are needed in the playoffs.

  • Lower Income Stream – Clearly as a niche becomes smaller the number of people in it to buy your product become less.  It is a simple matter of numbers.

The solution – You have two options, either decide to make your niche bigger or charge more for your product/service within your niche.  If the market within your niche will support a higher price tag – great, you have no problem.  If that isn’t an option you may have to consider broadening your boundaries a little bit to survive.

  • Slower Growth – This goes hand-in-hand with the issue of income stream.  Fewer potential customers = less revenue = slower growth.

The solution – When working in a small niche you must protect your reputation at all costs.  It is a small world within a niche and all of your potential clients are likely to know each other.  That is a great thing if they are all singing your praises.  It will be disastrous if someone feels mistreated.  If you want to grow within your niche you MUST make your clients feel heard and like they are receiving world class service.

What do you think? Is it possible that some of us have become so focused on our niche that we are losing sight of the bigger picture and the people we could help if we were willing to expand outside our narrow focus?  Let me know in the comments!

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What is Your Communication Fingerprint?

February 27, 2012  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  2 Comments

If you are a regular here at the Champion Performance Topic of the Week you have heard me talk about everyone having an individual communication fingerprint; the default way they use language. A question I regularly receive and one Jaime recently posted on our Facebook page is, “How can I figure out what my communication fingerprint is?” There are a few different places to look to gather that information:

Your family – When you spend time with the people who lived with you growing up (typically parents and siblings) how do you interact with them? Do you speak over others? Do they speak over you? Are you reserved or outspoken? When the conversation becomes heated do you yell or shut down? Are you a power player in some conversations and take a backseat in others? Who else is involved in the conversation and why do you take the role you do? Observe how the other members of your family interact with each other.

The information you glean from how your family communicates, argues and uses language will provide you with the foundation for your communication fingerprint. Don’t worry if you don’t like what you see. Your fingerprint is yours alter to what works best for you.

Ask those close to you – A great source of information is the people who interact with you regularly. Of course it is only beneficial if they love you enough to tell you the truth and you trust them enough to apply it. Talk to people from different parts of your life, your significant other, a friend and a work colleague. Ask them what your conflict style is. Do you subscribe to the volcano method,  are you a Pollyanna or do you practice proactive productive conflict resolution? (For those who have a copy of my book, see page 23 for additional conflict styles and descriptions.) Ask them what it is like to be in a casual conversation with you. Do they feel heard or do you hijack the conversation? Do you talk loud or soft? Are you clear or do they have to dig to find your meaning?

Compare what you learn to the data you got from your family. How similar or different is it? Maybe you start out different from what you learned as a child and migrate toward it as the situation escalates. There is no right or wrong answer. It is just data to observe.

Consider what feels the most natural - This is your chance to add your opinion about your communication fingerprint to the information you have gathered. Remember, this isn’t how you wish you were. Be honest with yourself. How are you really? If you do what is most comfortable, what does that look like? Do you really listen to others or are you thinking about what you want to say?

Put it together - How does the information you gathered fit together? Look for similarities and differences. How does what you learned from personal friends and family compare to people who know you from business? If you are fortunate enough to have access to someone who understands communication fingerprints, sit down with him/her and discuss what you gathered. The ridge detail of your fingerprint will start to emerge and you will be able to start making decisions about what to keep and what would serve you better if you changed it.

How do you think having an understanding of your communication fingerprint will help you be more successful?

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Are Boys’ Sports Better Than Girls’?

October 10, 2011  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  No Comments

It has long been considered a fact that sports, particularly team sports, provide athletes with the opportunity to learn and practice leadership and teamwork skills.  But is that true across the board? Is it valid for us to assume that an athlete is generally going to be better at working with others than a non-athlete?  Clearly the answer to that question is “no”.  Some teams and coaches are better at providing those skills and some athletes are better at picking them up and implementing them than others.  But the problem runs more deeply than that.  If you put aside the variation from team to team and coach to coach, I believe there is a deep divide between how applicable the skills boys’ teams use are compared to those used on girls’ teams.

That is not to say I think boys are being taught something fabulous.  That certainly isn’t the case. But the skills they use are at least transferable to business relationships.  What most girls get from sports is not only non-transferable; it is detrimental to their workplace success.

Allow me to explain:

On boys’ teams there is often bravado, some posturing and likely even a little physical pushing and shoving.  But in the end, a direction is chosen (maybe not the best one, but a direction) and everyone on the team works towards that goal – together.

By contrast, on a girls’ team there is gossip, backstabbing, and grudges.  A direction may be chosen, but there could be a clique made up of several members of the team who will not work toward that goal.  Members of the team may refuse to work together at all.  Hurt feelings and anger escalate and the team becomes hooked into a firestorm of “she said, she said” causing individual and team performance to plummet.

Now, before you get all up in arms and start writing nasty comments about how not all girls’ teams are like that – I know.  Not all of them are.  Sometimes you will get lucky and a female team will not have to deal with girl drama.  But that is the exception and not the rule.  I have worked with enough female teams to say with certainty that most of them have at least one mean girl and often entire cliques of girls engaging in mean girl behavior.  But most importantly, no one is doing anything about it!

Everywhere I go coaches, parents, administrators and even athletes are frustrated by how mean girls are to each other.  But all that is said is “sometimes girls are like that.”  Is that really the best we can do for our young women?  We throw up our hands, say they are just like that and send them into the work world with no useful leadership, teamwork, communication or conflict resolution skills.  I personally think that is ridiculous!  We are failing young women and particularly young female athletes by not stepping up to the plate and challenging the idea that there is nothing we can do.

I am on a personal campaign to Stop The Drama! on girls’ teams and for young women everywhere.  To provide them with the ability to engage in productive conflict on their sports team so they can take those skills into the work world and succeed.  The reputation that women are mean, catty and unable to work together needs to be changed.  If there is a young woman in your life who you love, do her a favor and don’t leave her floundering around trying to figure out how to achieve more from her potential.  Give her the skills she so desperately needs.  Don’t you think you owe her at least that?

To learn more about the Stop The Drama! campaign and Doc Robyn’s new book on the subject, visit www.StopTheDramaNow.com

Next week: Should schools be providing a more practical education?

Last week: How a diva in your life will limit your success

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A Diva in Your Life Will Limit Your Success

October 3, 2011  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  1 Comment

You know who it is.  Could be a man or a woman, high maintenance, everything has to be done their way or there will be a price to pay.  You usually just decide to go along with whatever it is to keep the peace.  It is certainly easier than dealing with the drama and fallout of trying to go against his/her wishes.  But is having a friend or acquaintance worth the damage being done to you and your ability to succeed in life?

You might be wondering how it matters to your success when someone you know is a diva. It’s not like you are acting like a brat and throwing a fit to get your way.  How can are their actions be affecting you?  Obviously, if you are in the immediate vicinity when it happens you might receive some negative responses by association.  But being friends with a diva is actually affecting you on a much deeper level, even when that person isn’t around.

A diva will train you to subvert your needs to what they want.  It will become second nature for you to just go with whatever they are demanding to avoid the fight.  It is very likely that over time you won’t even bother to think about what you want because it doesn’t matter anyway.

Here is the problem with that – once you start ‘just going with the flow’ in one area of your life, you are likely to let that carry over in to other areas.  That type of “whatever works for you” behavior does not do you any favors on your team.  Other people’s thoughts and ideas will be heard, while yours go unspoken.  The more that happens the more you start to fade into the background.  You won’t be thought of for special projects or promotions.  You will simply become a worker bee who does what needs to be done but never provides any fresh ideas.

Your friends should be where you get to practice productive conflict so you can take those skills into work.  You have to ask yourself, is that diva worth becoming stuck in a dead-end job?  I think not.  Don’t let a diva get your life off track and stifle your potential.  Take ownership of your future and maximize your potential by only having friends who provide opportunities to practice effective communication and conflict resolution skills.

Do you have a diva in your life? What is he/she doing for you that you stay friends?  Do you agree or disagree that they are limiting your success?  Let us know in the comments.

Read last week’s post to learn why we need more conflict in our lives.

Next week: Why boys’ sports teams are better than girls

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Be Brave to be Successful

August 22, 2011  |  Posted by Doc Robyn |  No Comments

I worked with a field hockey team once who was so afraid of failure they were scared to try anything if they weren’t absolutely sure was the “right” thing to do in that moment.  The result was hesitation and constantly second guessing themselves.  It was not at all surprising that the team had very little success.  In order to win they had to learn to play brave.  The same is true in life.  If you are so afraid of making mistakes that you do nothing, you have no chance to succeed.

What can we do to help us play brave in the game of life?  I am SO glad you asked!

  • Know your goals. If you don’t know what you want to achieve how can you possibly know where to make brave choices to get there.  Make sure you are facing the direction you want to go.

  • Commit to playing offense. Success is reached by having a plan and executing it.  As they say in sports “You can’t score if you don’t have the ball.”

  • Surround yourself with a great team. It is so much easier to play brave and risk making mistakes when you know your team is there to catch you when you stretch just a little too far.  Will the people in your life help you up when you fall or laugh?  If your “friends” find humor instead of opportunity is your life challenges, you need different friends.

  • Tell yourself the truth. When an opportunity arises to be brave and you stutter-step ask yourself why.  You can’t fight a fear you don’t understand.

  • Go for it! Step out on the limb.  Take the plunge.  Use whatever cliché works for you but get that ball rolling toward your goal.

  • Evaluate quickly. Did the action you took move you in the right direction?  If yes, do it again!  If no, why not?  Is the action useless or improperly executed?

  • Be proud of yourself for being brave and do it again! When it comes to bravery, once is never enough.

There is no one who has ever been successful by doing nothing.  Decisions must be made.  Action must be taken.  Give yourself permission to make mistakes as long as you learn from them.  Something is only failure if it is the last action you take before giving up.

I have a quote by Mark Twain hanging on my office wall.  It reads:

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did.  So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor.  Catch the trade winds in your sails.  Explore. Dream.”

I would add, “Play brave!”

What would you accomplish if you just went for it?  How are you brave?  What is keeping you from living bravely?  Let us know in the comments?

Next week:  Panic is not a fallback plan

Last week we looked at why the jerk in your life might actually be good for you.  Read it here if you missed it.

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