The world is inside so much change right now and many leaders and organizations are looking for solutions to help their teams thrive and maximize their potential. Great leaders work to inspire their teams to perform at their highest level. And when they don’t, they might get frustrated by the lack of results. Why aren’t they performing, executing, and delivering better? But oftentimes it’s not a performance problem; it’s a mindset problem.
How Mindset Can Impact Performance
As a sports agent for nearly two decades, I had a front-row seat to peak performers—and what happens when they hit a slump. Sometimes it is a technical problem that can be adjusted, but more often the root of the problem is mental.
For example, a baseball player goes hitless in a few at bats and then it begins to spiral. He’s in his head because he hasn’t gotten a hit off this pitcher all night and the unintentional story he starts telling himself is that he can’t.
Or maybe it’s a golfer who double bogeys a hole. An average golfer doesn’t recover. A great golfer resets mentally. The best golfers in the world, they’re going to bogey golf holes for sure. But you know what they do? They step up to that next tee box after that bogey and they say, “I’ve got this; I know that I’m good enough to be here.”
The best athletes in the world recognize that strengthening your mindset requires training just like a physical skill. We can all learn to improve our performance by leveraging the right mindset.
Tell Yourself The Right Story To Shift Your Mindset
Self-talk is integral to how we perform. Sometimes we think we have a performance problem, but we actually have a mindset problem. The right mindset is what differentiates the best from the rest, and it starts with the story you tell yourself.
Think about Tom Brady. He was not supposed to be this good. Brady was the 199th pick in the draft and was pegged as a career backup, but he prepared for his opportunity before it arrived. During his second season in the NFL when the starting quarterback went down, Brady stepped on the field behind that center, and told himself, “I’m never giving this job back.”
And he’d didn’t! We know the rest of the story as Brady is now a 7x Super Bowl Champion and one of the greatest ever to play the sport. For leaders, the takeaway is that you have to make sure that you’re telling yourself the right story. You have to help the people you lead shift their stories. Self-talk is key when it comes to shifting your mindset for peak performance.
Surround Yourself With The Right People
You can’t control everything, but you can ensure that you surround yourself and your team with people who reinforce your positive self-talk. Be the kind of leader and build the kind of team that takes ownership of the narrative instead of making excuses. Toxic thinking and self-imposed limits can crush any culture. As a leader, you must ensure that the circle of influence around the people that you lead and around yourself is one that moves you forward, not holds you back.
Allow Your People To Be Part Of The Vision
Right now it’s especially important for leaders to actively make team members part of the vision. Your team members are navigating immense change and they are grinding it. They have to understand the “why” around it. How do you make sure that they are buying into and believing in the vision? That they truly believe in it, and that they see the benefit of what they’re trying to accomplish? When you invite them to be a part of the process, it helps them understand the why behind it.
A Leader With A Limited Mindset Lowers The Bar For Their Team
As a leader, if you are showing up with a limited mindset, guess what? It lowers the bar for everyone that you lead. If you don’t lead and inspire with a limitless mindset, you’re automatically lowering the bar for everyone’s performance.
Inspire possibility in the people that you lead. Think about where you or your team have a performance issue. What’s really holding you back? Shift that story inside of yourself. You’ll be amazed by how many “performance” issues can be eliminated by focusing on the right mindset.
More Resources For Leaders
Looking for more resources to help you and your team shift your mindset? I’d like to invite you to join my Leadership Huddles. Each month you’ll join me and a huddle of peers for a specifically chosen relevant personal development topic, safe-space conversations, and sharing of best practices. The huddles are presented live with opportunities for feedback and interaction and over the next few months, we will be digging in deeper about what it means to have a limitless mindset and how leaders can help their teams unleash their potential.
Inspiring Conversations on Limitless Mindset
- Simon Sinek on How to Lead With an Infinite Mindset
- Steven Kotler on The Science of Peak Performance
- Alex Guerrero on How Tom Brady Sustains Peak Performance
The Molly Fletcher Company inspires leaders, teams, and organizations to kick-start growth. A keynote speaker and author, Molly draws on her decades of experiences working as a sports agent. The Energized Leader Training helps you and your team align your energy with the important and avoid costly burnout. Game Changer Negotiation Training workshops teach business people the framework for successful negotiating so that you can close more deals while building stronger relationships. Her Leadership Huddles are a monthly group coaching community to guide you towards your full potential. Sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter and subscribe to the Game Changers with Molly Fletcher podcast on iTunes.