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“I must learn to love the fool in me – the one who feels too much, talks too much, takes too many chances, wins sometimes and loses often, lacks self-control, loves and hates, hurts and gets hurt, promises and breaks promises, laughs and cries.” ~ Theodore Isaac Rubin
Leaders, both professionally and personally, get “stung” by people whom they’ve extended their help, resources, love, commitments, etc. This can truly hurt!
Do you know what hurts 10+ times more?
Not extending your help, resources, love, commitment, etc., to people who could be “amazing” or “spectacular”!
Why should you consider, intentionally making yourself vulnerable to getting “stung”? Succinctly; in order to lead an “amazing” or “spectacular” life, that doesn’t lead to “mediocre-ville”.
I point out in my leadership book, we don’t have a crystal ball to provide us with guaranteed outcomes. However, we do have Decision Making Quality (DMQ) to help us increase (not guarantee) our probability of success.
Employees, business partners, significant others, etc., do not come with guarantees. What I’ve discovered, people whom I’d rate their DMQ as an 8.0 or lower (0.0 to 10.0, 10.0=highest), are relatively consistent. Many decisions are good while an appropriate percentage aren’t so good.
On the other hand, once the person’s DMQ goes above an 8.0, other competencies such as integrity, mental health, gut, etc., become much more important in predicting the probability of the person making good decisions. They have the capacity to make good decisions; but, other factors tend to disproportionately drive their DMQ.
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Overall, this is a fascinating topic for me because I’ve tended to attract extremely talented people, both professionally and personally. Let’s take a more in-depth look at the benefits and pains, of attempting to attract Top-7% people. We need to first, fully acknowledge, we’re “attempting” to attract Top-7%’ers. However, only over time will we be able to determine if they’re Top-7%’ers or Top-20%’ers.
The key differentiators between Top-20%’ers and Top-7%’ers include:
- DMQ – Do they consistently make Top-7% decisions on jugular issues (not just routine issues)?
- Execution-Excellence – (Ex-Ex) Are they able to execute their decisions effectively?
- Integrity – Do they demonstrate a high-degree of integrity in their DMQ and Ex-Ex?
- Bullet-Taking – Are they willing to consistently take bullets for others when things go wrong?
Attracting Top-7%’ers professionally is much easier than attracting Top-7%’ers personally. This is simply due to the limited “range” of interaction we’ll have in professional relationships. Roughly 80%+ of our interactions are focused on a professional level, which is relatively narrow in scope.
Our multi-dimensional Talent Approval Index (TAI) and Talent Hiring Index (THI) systems (overviews are provided in my leadership book) greatly simplifies the objective evaluation of talent. If top talent is consistently “hurting” you by leaving, that’s a problem. However, if top talent periodically “hurts” you by leaving your organization, I believe this is okay (albeit not preferred), since you were able to attract and retain Top-7% talent for a period of time. The key problem arises when you believe you’ve hired Top-7%’ers, but they’re really Top-50%’ers, and they don’t leave.
From a personal perspective, attracting Top-7%’ers can be quite painful, given the depth and breadth of interactions we experience coupled with the time and appreciation levels required to determine if they’re consistently a Top-7%’er. The Talent Portfolio required to be a personal Top-7%’er is broad and challenging. I won’t go into those many, talents, roles, etc., in this blog. However, I’ll share my macro beliefs on this topic, acquired from my own experience; ranging from spectacular to gut-wrenchingly painful.
If you don’t make yourself optimally, intelligently vulnerable, one of two things is likely to happen:
- Good – You’ll prevent yourself from getting hurt badly.
- Agonizing – You’ll prevent yourself from experiencing “amazing” or “spectacular”.
Choose well … write your own “scripts” because it’s your life, not anyone else’s… and finally, fast forward to watch the 5-Minute Highlight Video of Your Life that you’ll watch at the end of it, to make the jugular decisions you need to make today, that helps “write” the Life-Video you’ll love watching in the future!!!
Who changes the world? I believe it’s almost exclusively the Top-7%. They are the only ones with the Talent Portfolios and social consciences needed to actually implement significant positive social impact.
If you believe you’re one of these executives, we’d love to explore possible opportunities.
Get Making A Difference! ~ JR
