Providing Conditions for Peak Performance

Help Others Achieve and Succeed!

Disengaged employees often appear to lack commitment. In reality, many of them crave re-engagement. Many are high-achievers just waiting for the opportunity to step out in the spotlight and become Star Performers. No one enjoys working without passion or joy.

While many factors cause disengagement, the most prevalent is feeling overwhelmed (or, conversely, underwhelmed). Disconnection and overload pose obstacles to performance and yet often go undetected or ignored because neither qualifies as a disciplinary issue.

Meanwhile, business owners and executive leadership teams try to work around such problems, hoping for a miraculous turnaround or spark that re-ignites energy and drive. They try incentives, empowerment programs, or the management fad du jour.

I have seen many "quality", "customer-experience", and "employee-engagement" programs come and go in the past few decades.  As business owners and executive leadership teams search for the next best thing, they often overlook the essential key to making these programs deliver on promises - providing conditions that help people achieve and succeed.

Sparking Flow Moments in the Workplace

While it’s impossible to spark flow moments all day long, you can greatly improve your ability to help others achieve peak performance. In the 21st Century, you don't need carrots or sticks and command and control management is obsolete - that's progress!

You can't sprint to peak performance, the brain needs careful management and rest. Brain science tells us that as knowledge workers, we need to manage our thinking minds with care.  No surprise that workplace health and safety standards and programs now recognize mental and emotional health as a key to maintaining a productive workforce.

You cannot expect a human being to sit at a desk for hours and produce quality work without providing these essential elements:

• Food
• Rest
• Human engagement
• Physical movement and exercise - a physical stretch
• Challenge - a mental and intellectual stretch

We often forget that thinking is hard work. If you work too many hours, your brain’s supply of neurotransmitters will be depleted, and you won’t be able to sustain top performance. Without proper care, the brain will under-perform—and brain fatigue mimics disengagement and lack of commitment.

Emotional Intelligence and Peak Performance

Peak performance also depends on how we feel as individuals and is a by-product of our overall well-being.  The Well-Being Indicator in the EQ-i 2.0 Model of Emotional Intelligence includes self-regard, optimism, interpersonal relationships, and self-actualization.  Individuals with high levels of well-being exude cheerfulness at both work and play while participating in activities that they truly enjoy.  They experience and contribute passion and joy.  Add optimal working conditions and you have the ingredients for sparking flow moments.

What do you think about this?

1. Are you providing optimal working conditions for your people to find flow moments in their work? Are you bringing out the best in them?
2. What is the affect of individual well-being on your organization's well-being?  What is the toll of low well-being?
3. How would your employees and organization benefit from creating an environment that sparks flow moments and nurtures peak performance?

Related resources:

• National Standard - Mental Health Commission of Canada
• For resources related to the Emotional Intelligence, contact Patricia at [email protected]