How To Get Your Team To Do The Impossible
How To Get Your Team To Do The Impossible
Have you ever had to motivate your team to do what seemed absolutely impossible? If you have, you have most likely run in to resistance, frustration, heroic acts, and burn out.
When you are faced with something that you feel will take more out of your team then they think capable of, it is your job to set the tone and create the atmosphere that gets them to look past their fears, frustrations and desire to not change and instead inspires them to do more than they thought they could.
Here is one way I as a leader may inspire my team to go beyond.
What would you say are the essential necessities if someone if going to play golf and be a 10 or under handicap? What would they look like? What kind of equipment would they have? What kind of temperament?
Then I would let the group list all that would be necessary and I would put it up on a flip chart.
Once done I would ask them to star the top three they think are necessary in order to be a top notch player.
After that I would say, what if I told you, you had to become a top golfer but you couldn’t do it with arms?
Well meet Butch Lumpkin. He was born with no arms and today is a 9 handicap golfer. You would think that would be impossible or that he must use prosthetics. Here is how he does it, watch the video clip now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC4SwgRuWuM
So today what we have on our plates to accomplish may seem impossible. Just like we thought playing golf, let alone being great at golf, would be impossible without arms. So let’s shift from what seems impossible to thinking about how to make it happen.
When you use an example that defies what people think is possible, it shifts their brain off of protection to thinking about what they can do.
TAKE ACTION: Think of three examples you can use to shift a person’s thinking off the impossible to the probable.
Learn more about strategic communication at www.impressionmanagement.com.