the three laws of performance

Transformation in education will require some new ways of doing things. We will need to be open to looking at old problems in new ways.

An old Sufi parable (told by Zaffron and Logan in their book 'the three laws of performance') describes a man searching for his keys one night. A friend of his arrives to find him on his knees under a streetlamp. The friend joins him and starts searching. After a while the friend turns to the man and asks him where exactly he dropped the keys. The man points into the darkness and responds "over there". To which the friend asks why he is searching here. "Because this is where the light is."

This certainly rang a few bells for me. How much time do we spend searching for new solutions in the same old places? Hoping that we will get to a new place while walking the well trod path?

The three laws of performance sheds some light on how we can address some of the old leadership challenges in new ways. In particular it suggests that we (as individuals and organisations) get tied up in 'language knots' that need to resolved and replaced with future based or generative language. The three laws are:

1. How people perform correlates to how situations occur to them

2. How a situation occurs arises in language

3. Future-based language transforms how situations occur to people

According to Zaffron and Logan the challenge for leaders is to listen for what is not being said. To be willing to explore the 'unsaid'. In this way you shed light on areas often left in the dark. Organisational blind-spots.

It also provides leaders with a framework for thinking about their own or their teams performance. Taking the time to consider how the team is perceiving situations becomes time well spent, as does listening to the type of language that is being used. Is the team stuck in descriptive language of how things 'have always been around here', or is future based language transforming perceptions and releasing hope and motivation?

Why is this important? 

Because as leaders we are only as good as our teams. And our teams deserve work-places that draw out the best from them in order to give the best to our young people.

So.... how are you using words to shape your organisation's future?