Wooden's Wisdom | Leadership Resource Center

Issue 616 - "Pursue Perfection Without Tension" (Liz Wiseman and John Wooden)


Wooden's Wisdom - Volume 12	Issue 616
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"PURSUE PERFECTION WITHOUT TENSION" (LIZ WISEMAN AND JOHN WOODEN) John Wooden Video Clip (1 min. 54 sec.): Coach Wooden discusses "Faith and Patience". Great clip! Liz Wiseman is a bestselling author, researcher, and elite leadership coach. In her New York Times bestseller, Multipliers: she researched over 150 leaders worldwide. In her book, Wiseman describes how a leader can have the good quality of being a perfectionist but get the bad result of creating tension for the team: "The leader with perfectionist tendencies is ineffective when he just offers helpful critiques and points out little mistakes and flaws. While he is offering these suggestions for improvement, he is envisioning a masterpiece in the making, an A+ grade on an important assignment. But, while he sees an A+ in progress, others see nothing but red marks all over their work. They can easily become disengaged and disheartened. A better approach is to define the standards of excellence up front. Let people know what outstanding looks like and define the criteria for completeness. Ask people to self-assess by the standards. Sometimes a 90 percent solution executed with 100 percent ownership is better than getting it 100 percent right with a disengaged team." In his book Wooden, with Steve Jamison, Coach Wooden described his approach to the pursuit of perfection with his players: "Perfection is what you are striving for, but perfection is an impossibility. However, striving for perfection is not an impossibility. That was my challenge to them: how close can we get to perfection? When individuals are sincerely motivated to take up that challenge, the results are astonishing. The players were charged with trying to improve a little each day, trying to get closer to becoming their best. I removed stress - the kind that comes from a fear of losing or an overeager appetite to win - by focusing exclusively on improvement and teaching the team that ongoing and maximum progress was the standard, our daily goal." Is your team collaborating with you to strive for perfection or just following your instructions? Click here for personal development exercise: Issue 616. Click here for Printable Poetry: Issue 616. Yours in Coaching, Craig Impelman www.woodenswisdom.com Follow @woodenswisdom	COACH'S FAVORITE POETRY AND PROSE The Beauty Places Here she walked and romped about, And here beneath this apple tree Where all the grass is trampled out The swing she loved so used to be. This path is but a path to you, Because my child you never knew. 'Twas here she used to stoop to smell The first bright daffodil of spring; 'Twas here she often tripped and fell And here she heard the robins sing. You'd call this but a common place, But you have never seen her face. And it was here we used to meet. How beautiful a spot is this, To which she gayly raced to greet Her daddy with his evening kiss! You see here nothing grand or fine, But, Oh, what memories are mine! The people pass from day to day And never turn their heads to see The many charms along the way That mean so very much to me. For all things here are speaking of The babe that once was mine to love. Edgar Albert Guest (1881-1959)
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