[MUSIC] In the last video we discussed the first three elements of the thought model, circumstance, thought, and feeling. In this video, part two, we'll finish up with the thought model by discussing the last two elements, action and results. And really tie together how the thought model influences you both as a manager and as a coach. Our feelings drive how we act. If I feel happy, I might smile, I might be engaged, I might make eye contact, I will listen. If I feel irritated, I might be short, I might be abrupt, I might be rude, I might be dismissive. If I feel frustrated, think about frustrated just for yourself. How do you act when you're frustrated? Some people go inward, they shut down. Other people yell or quick to make judgments about things. So how you feel drives your behavior, but again, this is one that a lot of people don't see that way. A lot of people believe that their circumstances drive their behavior. Well, you know, he yelled at me so I had to yell back. She missed a deadline so I had to reassign the project. He insulted me at work so I had to give him two cents of my mind. When we work together, he always interrupts me, so the only way I can deal with that is to shut him down. In fact in the last meeting what I did is I shushed him. So interesting, my kids do this kind of stuff, you can see this, children are the best examples of all of these things. Because they're all just trying to figure it out when they're young. But it always inevitably happens that I've got a quiet house and then all of a sudden, it's not quiet and people yell, scream, doors slam. And I'm like, what the heck happened? And so I will ask what's going on? Well, he took my journal so I had to throw it at him. [LAUGH] Right, no, not really. See what happens is he took your journal. You had a thought that said that's not fair. You felt angry, so you threw the journal. That's what happened. You have a boss who asks you to finish a project, you think the request is not reasonable. You feel resentful, so you avoid the project. That's what happened. The boss asking you to do the project does not make you feel resentful. And it certainly doesn't make you avoid it. What makes you avoid it really starts with what you think about it. So our actions are our responsibility. Now you might imagine that this is when I teach this, on a regular basis, that I might start having some arms crossed in the classroom. Might have some people look at me a weird way. I hear things like you haven't met my boss, or you haven't met my employee, or you don't work in my company. You don't know how it is. Well actually I probably do, [LAUGH] but that's beside the point. What I really want people to get is that's not really relevant. Your behavior is your behavior, always. But, some people don't want to accept responsibility for their behavior. Some people like to really believe that their behavior, the things that they do in the world, have everything to do with what other people do or don't do. That it really doesn't have anything to do with them. And this model, when I teach this model, it really is about personal accountability. I'm sure you can see that at this point. In some folks that's just tough to swallow. That really ultimately the way that I've shown up in the world may not necessarily be because of other people. But maybe because of what I've been telling myself, what I've been believing in my mind about things. So the last step in the Thought Model, is our results. Our results will always prove the originating thought true. So if I have a thought that my employee is lazy, then I will what, feel irritated, angry, frustrated? And how does that mean I might show up with a lazy employee if I believe that's what they are? Means I might avoid them, I might micro manage them, either one is potential. And if I do that if I avoid an employee, tell me how that's not being lazy as a manager. If I micromanage an employee, tell me how that's not really managing and developing. So what happens is the way that we think, drives the results that we get. This isn't about other people. A lot of times what happens is people think, I can change my thinking and now my employee won't be lazy anymore. [LAUGH] No, that's not what I'm talking about. What I'm saying is that the thoughts that you have drive the relationships and the outcomes that you get for yourself. So for example I was just having a conversation with a client today. And he's in a situation with a boss who his boss has some significant concerns about how he acts at work. And as a result his boss is not comfortable giving him feedback. But when I talk to the employee, the employee's like I don't mind feedback I don't have any problem with feedback. But he doesn't trust me, he doesn't think I do a good job. So then their conversations, here's how it goes down. So if the boss does give feedback, guess who is really defensive? The employee, so if the employee's original thought is, my boss doesn't trust me or my boss doesn't think I'm performing well. He feels frustrated, his action is to be defensive. So his result is that my boss doesn't trust me, because guess what? We're not building a relationship here when we act defensively. Nobody's building any relationship based on defensiveness, that's just not happening. And the same thing could be true for the boss. If the boss has a thought that says this guy doesn't want to learn, doesn't want to improve,he feels frustrated. His action is to lecture the employee, and the result is the employee shuts him down, doesn't listen to him. And, frankly, he's probably just talking to air, it's not effective. So how we think will drive the results that we get, always. So if we want to change our results we have to change what we choose to think about. So in this lesson, here's an image of this model. So circumstances can trigger thoughts, which cause feelings, which cause our actions or our behavior. Which leads to our results and our results become evidence for the originating thought. See, I told you and you can fit in. You can even use it for yourself. If you have a thought that says I'm not going to do well on this project, I'm not going to on this presentation. So that makes you feel nervous. You feel nervous, you might be disconnected, unfocused, distracted. And so then you a result, whatever that might be. And you're still going to come back and say, see I told you, told you I wasn't going to do well. It's crazy, it's really crazy when you recognize that so much of your success or failures, challenges have to with what you tell yourself in your mind. They have very little to do with the actual circumstances that you're working in. Which I think is really, really powerful because that gives you so much more room. There's so many opportunities now as a result. But it also means there's a lot more personal accountability, which I think some people don't like. So I'm going to give you a couple more examples of this model in action just to play it out. So one of them is my employee is late to work. That's the circumstance. So we could write that on a piece of paper and say, the circumstance is my employee is late to work. The thought I have about that is that my employee does not care about his or her job. The feeling I have is resentment. My behavior then, from resentment is I ignore the employee. And the result is, I'm not holding the employee accountable. And I'm also not expressing concern or care for the employee being late. I'm disconnected from my employee. Which is additional evidence for, they don't care about their job, because I'm not building a relationship. The next example, my employee asks me a question. My thought is, they should know better. This is a big one for managers. I feel impatient, my action is to be short and abrupt with my employee. And the result is I don't invest time in my employee, I don't teach them. And guess what, they don't know any better because I have not spent any time helping them. So we have a lot of opportunity here with our thought model to recognize that so much of how we're interacting with the world. Has to do with what we tell ourselves about what's happening in the world, [LAUGH] not necessarily what is actually happening. And so if we want to change the results we're getting, first for ourselves, but then ultimately what you'll be learning in future modules. Is how this really applies also to performance and performance management with employees. And how we use this as a coaching tool to help employees improve their performance.
