Time
CAN be on Your Side with "Make Time for Success!" Discover
the 39 essential tools needed to map out your goals, maximize
your effectiveness, and win control of your time and your life.
Mind
Tools Career Coaches give you the focused personal help you
need to find direction, think through your goals, and make the
very most of your life and career.
With Mind Tools' "How to Lead: Discover the Leader Within You", learn the 48 essential skills needed to be a highly effective and well-respected leader.
Among the topics that young people study
before they enter the workforce is calculus, the mathematics of
change and motion. While training in calculus is undoubtedly
valuable, I believe that training in optimism is also important.
Just as it is good discipline to solve problems like the velocity
of a car at a certain moment in time, it is also crucial to figure
out what drives people to give us the very best that they have to
offer. Ironically, Leibniz, one of the inventors of calculus, is
also known for his philosophy of optimism. He was considered to be
an inveterate optimist, asserting that we live "in the best of all
possible worlds". Optimism is an emotional competence that can
help boost productivity, enhance employee morale, overcome
conflict and have a positive impact on the bottom line.
In writing about optimism, you face the danger of being seen as
advocating a "Pollyanna" or quixotic approach. The truth is,
however, optimism has been proven to be a powerful tool that will
pay dividends for your personal life and give you a competitive
advantage professionally in your career. There is a lot to be
gained, indeed, in cultivating an optimistic outlook.
Take leadership, for example. Nowhere is optimism more important
than in leading organizations. Highly effective leaders have a
transforming effect on their constituents: they have the gift of
being able to convince others that they have the ability to
achieve levels of performance beyond those they thought possible.
They are able to paint an optimistic and attainable view of the
future for their followers: They move others from being stuck with
"how things are done around here" and help them see "how things
could be done better". In The Leadership Advantage, an
essay from the Drucker Foundation's Leader to Leader Guide,
Warren Bennis tells us that optimism is one of the key things
people need from their leaders in order to achieve positive
results. Every "exemplary leader that I have met," writes Bennis,
"has what seems to be an unwarranted degree of optimism - and that
helps generate the energy and commitment necessary to achieve
results."
Consider, as well, the reverse: the effect that pessimistic
individuals can have on an organization's creativity and
innovation. To be innovative, you need to be open to new ideas,
wide open to seeing possibilities, willing to take risks and
encourage others to take risks - willing to challenge the process
in order to create new solutions or products or improve processes.
In short, you need to have a sense of adventure and an expectation
of success. Those who have a pessimistic outlook typically
approach changes to the status quo with the familiar: "We tried
this before", "It won't work", or "It will never fly". Such
individuals often label themselves as "devil's advocate". How can
someone who has a pessimistic outlook embrace change over the
safety of the known?
There are other areas which are impacted positively by optimism.
Take sales, for example: A study shows that new sales personnel at
Metropolitan Life who scored high on a test on optimism sold 37
percent more life insurance in their first two years than
pessimists (Seligman, 1990). In another study involving debt
collectors in a large collection agency, the most successful
collectors had significantly higher scores in the area of
self-actualization, independence and optimism. (Bachman et al,
2000, cited by Cary Cherniss.)
Perhaps more significant are the countless studies that have shown
that people with an optimistic outlook have healthier
relationships, enjoy better mental and physical health and live
longer. In The Wisdom of the Ego, Dr George E Vaillant,
Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, writes about
individuals who have "both the capacity to be bent without
breaking and the capacity, once bent, to spring back". Vaillant
mentions that, in addition to external sources of resilience (such
as good health or social supports), these individuals have
important internal sources which include a healthy self-esteem and
optimism.
These coping mechanisms are fully explored in Dr Valliant's
subsequent book: Aging Well: Surprising Guideposts to a Happier
Life, a truly fascinating study that will be particularly
interesting to fellow boomers. This is a compendium of three
studies involving over 800 individuals, men and women, rich and
poor, who were followed for more than 50 years, from adolescence
to old age. In it, we discover that one of the most powerful
predictors of successful aging is habitually using mature coping
mechanisms or defenses, what Vaillant calls the ability to "make
lemonade out of life's lemons." Vaillant's study discovered five
of these coping mechanisms: Altruism (doing for others what they
need, not what we want to do for them); Sublimation (diverting
energy to more constructive pursuits such as creativity, art,
sports); Suppression (postponement of stressors, not repression);
Humor and anticipation. Anticipation is realistic, hopeful
planning for the future. This means not operating in a pessimistic
crisis mode but preparing and adapting for whatever life brings.
So how do you recognize an optimist? Alan Loy McGinnis, author of
The Power of Optimism, studied the biographies of over 1000
famous people, and isolated 12 characteristics of the optimistic
personality. Among these is: "Optimists look for partial
solutions", that is, freed from the tyranny of perfectionism and
from paralysis by analysis, they are open to taking small steps
towards achieving success. Another characteristic of those who
have an optimistic nature is: "Optimists use their imagination to
rehearse success", in other words, they play positive mental
videos of preferred outcomes, much like sports figures do. Michael
Jordan, for example, once stated that he never plays a game that
he hasn't first visualized. Another trait is that "Optimists think
that they have great capacity for stretching" - they believe that
their personal best is yet to come.
Dr Martin E Seligman, the modern scholar most often associated
with studying the traits of optimists, and former president of the
American Psychological Association and Professor of Psychology at
the University of Pennsylvania, has devoted decades to studying
optimistic people and reports three traits that they have in
common: They view adversity in their lives as temporary, specific
and external, that is, not entirely their fault, as opposed to
pessimists who view adversity as unchangeable, pervasive, and more
personal. In the face of setbacks, challenges or difficult jobs,
pessimist are more likely to do worse than predicted and even give
up, while optimists will persevere. Optimism, therefore, is also
an important component of achievement, and is especially important
in times of chaos, change and turbulence. Those who have an
optimistic outlook will roll with the punches, will be more
proactive and persistent and will not abandon hope.
So, where does optimism come from? Is it something we are born
with or is it learned? For some lucky individuals, being
optimistic comes naturally. The good news is that, for those who
don't have it naturally, optimism is an attitude that can be
learned and practiced. Here are some strategies you can consider
in your journey to becoming more optimistic or in helping someone
else who suffers from pessimism:
Avoid negative environments. If this is not
realistic, make every effort to seek the company of positive
individuals in your organization. Sometimes this may mean
fraternizing with peers in other departments. Stay away from the
professional complainer.
Celebrate your strengths. The key to high achievement and
happiness is to play out your strengths, not correct your
weaknesses. Focus on what you do well. (If you are not sure what
your signature strengths are, consider reading Now Discover Your
Strengths which includes a web-based questionnaire that helps you
discover your own top-five inborn talents.)
Take care of your spiritual and emotional well being by reading
inspirational material on a daily basis. This may be different for
each person. Some may be inspired by daily quotations, others by
reading biographies of successful people in their field and yet
others may derive inspiration from reading about all the
innovations that we are graced with. A useful website for this is
the World Future Society, which keeps up with new inventions.
Manage or ignore what you cannot change. When faced with
setbacks, identify what you can change and proactively try to find
ways to do something about it. We have often heard this advice -
it bears repeating. Be inspired by Benjamin Franklin's words:
"While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we
can control what happens inside us."
Learn to reframe. This involved deliberately shifting
perspective and looking for the hidden positive in a negative
situation: the proverbial silver lining. Look for the gift in the
adversity.
If you are serious about developing greater optimism, there is no
better book than Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and
Your Life by Dr Martin E Seligman. Learn Dr Seligman's ABCDE model
for disputing pessimistic thoughts. This is a very useful and
powerful tool to help you change the way you explain events that
trouble you from pessimistic to optimistic.
Adapt your language and outlook
Consider how a simple shift in the language you use can make a
difference in your outlook: Do you frequently say: "yes, but...."
in response to your constituents' suggestions? The "but"
automatically negates anything you have said in the beginning part
of the sentence. A simple shift to "yes, and..." might make a
positive difference. Check the emails you have sent recently.
Count the proportion of negative to positive words. It could be
enlightening.
Become aware of your stance in business meetings. Are you known as
the "devil's advocate", the one who is quick to shoot down others'
ideas? Jumping in too quickly to negate an idea can derail the
creative process. Often valuable ideas are the result of an
initial "crazy" thought. At meetings, even when we don't have the
floor, we are under a magnifying glass. Practice being more
upbeat, practice speaking last, and see what happens.
Focus outside yourself, on important people in your life, on
pursuits and projects that fire you up. Bertrand Russell once said
that the quickest way to make ourselves miserable is to
continually focus on ourselves. It was his love of mathematics
that kept him going.
Nurture a culture of optimism when you are in charge of other
people at work. Expect people to succeed. Even when they
occasionally fail to achieve what they set out to do, encourage
them so that they can tackle the next challenge. A simple: "I know
you'll do better the next time" can have very positive effects.
Cultivate spontaneity. Consider putting aside all your plans
once in a while to take a walk with your kids, play a game or
catch a show. Getting out of your comfort zone by being
spontaneous helps to develop your optimistic muscle, as
spontaneity essentially involves an expectation of having a
pleasurable experience.
Consider the health benefits. If you need an extra motivation
for practicing optimism, consider the statistics linking optimism
to greater health. As Dr Seligman explains, there is evidence to
believe that immune systems among optimistic people are stronger
than among pessimists.
This paper would not be balanced if we did not
address the benefits of pessimism.
Pessimists, as Seligman explains, may be more realistic and
accurate about dangers and risks. At times, when there is a risk
of serious negative consequences, a cautious, risk-avoiding
evaluation is appropriate and desirable. But the positive effects
of being optimistic - fighting depression, aiding in professional,
academic and sports achievement, and boosting mental and physical
health - outweigh the benefits of being a career pessimist. The
answer then is, as Seligman explains, "flexible optimism", i.e.
having the wisdom to assess situations and identify those that
require a pessimistic inquisition, and those that call for
optimism, for having a "can do" attitude" and taking a chance.
Winston Churchill had a reason for saying: "A pessimist sees the
difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity
in every difficulty." Practice seeing the opportunity.
We welcome appropriate reprinting and reuse of Mind Tools material,
however, you must
get our permission first!
To do this, please visit our Permissions Center.
MindTools.com is one of the Internet's most-visited career skills resources. Click here to see analysis.
Mind Tools
Free eNewsletter
New Career Skills - twice a month PLUS Leadership Styles Workbook Free!
Subscribe to our free e-newsletter, and get
new skill-builder tools every two weeks. Plus get our Leadership Styles Workbook worth US$9.99 free when you subscribe!
"Great
newsletter. Simple and not too long. Great articles. Thank you."
Mandi J Luis, Burlington, Ontario, Canada
What People Say
About Mind Tools...
"Been meaning to pop off a note to
your Team and yourself to say how appreciative I am of your
erudite grasp of business tooling. I do, deeply appreciate your
efforts."
Dorian Glass, Rhine Road,
South Africa
"Thanks so much. I am
so happy to have access to your newsletter. Great tool!"
Fami Sharif-Pour,
Woodland
Hills,
USA
"I am a avid reader of
your newsletters and articles. I am from the island of Jamaica
and do find your articles quite informative, inspring, motivating,
creative and just GREAT. The style of writing is one which lures
you to read more and more and even more. I would like to be
able to write like that one day. Keep it up."
Time
Management
