Sorry to start with a heading that sounds a bit scandalous on what is otherwise a scribe on business and People strategies J
I have had very interesting past few days. We were preparing for some large initiative and pretty much drove ourselves crazy preparing for that. We worked from like 7am everyday (which is almost like sunrise for many of usJ) to well past midnight. There was not a single moment when we were not thinking about adding something to our preparation.
Friday was supposed to be the big day for us (I have ofcourse gathered timer and energy post that getting completed today, phew!!). Thursday was the final show down of preparation. Locked inside a room for the entire day…..my mind I think had stopped working beyond that initiative that day. At one point I had to take my father to the doctor for some check up…I vividly remember him telling me about it the previous night…but somehow it didn’t register beyond a blank data point. Its like the tiny little intelligence cell in my brain had stopped taking any other data beyond that work. Next morning he sat there ready in front of me while I had my breakfast. Somehow I knew why he was sitting there but had no idea of what am I supposed to do/say. Finally I realized I was getting late and the mind was working overtime on work and I better start executing…it’s at that point I told him we will have to do this after few days.
In office we were all laughing, pushing each other for further improvements, almost on verge of pulling out each others hair. By that time I reached back home it was 1am or so. Like a 80s computer my brain took a long time to switch off.
It would be fair to say we were like robots in those couple of days. And to tell you the truth I quite enjoyed that period. We screwed up finally, that’s a different matterJ. But I felt nice actually. I had stuck quite a few multi million deals with one tenth effort…many of them were through luck, some through some intelligence I assume J
As we finished and set out to get ourselves a break I started to think how this effort was correlated to performance. What does this term ‘Performance’ means anyways. I guess the final test lies in emotional orgasm for lack of any better term. There were many greater achievements with lesser efforts…did that feel better or this….? The answer was reasonable simple actually in my mind. This felt much better.
Think of all those artists who perform, those sportsman who put their best in their games…what was common about them and this experience:
· There was tremendous amount of focus in every situation…to the point they hear and see nothing else
· They all leave you completely exhausted
· They all keep you very involved and you feel a mix emotion of fatigue and fun while doing it
· Almost in each of these situations you feel stretched
· Interestingly it had nothing to do with winning and loosing
Well pardon my using this language it’s like a great orgasm during sex….it leaves you exhausted, excited, involved and feeling stretched and touched new limits (ok it does come out very corny when I read this…..J)
It sets me thinking when we talk about creating ‘High Performing Organizations” what do we mean…..is there a difference between organization performance (which might be achievements of tangible goals many times) and individual performance. Should we look at inspiring employees for performance where we see business results or performance where they see themselves going beyond their limits?
On a final note I am thinking there is so much talk about changing education system. Providing pressure free environment to a child and help him achieve his dreams….I wonder if we can apply the same principle in business without making it a non profit organization…?
~~Rohit~~
Rohit Jain