This deception also often comes disguised as “The American Dream”. It is the idea that most anyone can do anything they want to. It’s roots are deeply imbedded in Tabula Rasa (Latin: blank slate)which refers to the thesis that individual human beings are born with no built-in mental content, in a word, "blank", and that their entire resource of knowledge is built up gradually from their experiences and sensory perceptions of the outside world. It is supported by many psychological theories including American psychologist-educator-inventor-poet B.F Skinner who established his own philosophy called Radical Behaviorism.
Skinner believed and taught immediate positive and negative reinforcement and supported the idea that with proper behavioral objectives and feedback everyone should be able to learn anything and everything. Strengths in Education expert Jennifer Fox suggests, “this philosophy permeates education today and given the right amount of learning in a small enough dose, everyone can master the entire curriculum.”
It only follows that this idea is also deeply imbedded in the work place. Motivational experts now espouse a program called Nuero Linguistic Programming (Brain Language Programming) which canonizes a primary pre-supposition, “If one person can do something, anyone can do it”. It is rampant in all kinds of sales organizations and network marketing organizations that often teach that with hard work, anyone can be successful at selling.
A new brand of behaviorism is being led by Florida State psychology professor K. Anders Ericcson with authors Geoff Colvin, Daniel Coyle, David Shenk lining up behind him with books more suited for the masses. If you want to study their positions more closely I recommend:
The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance by K. Anders Ericcson
Talent Is Overrated by Geoff Colvin
The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle
The Genius In All Of Us by Daniel Coyle
It is also well articulated in Malcolm Gladwell's recent work "Outliers".
If you want a free quick primer of the philosophy try the Harvard Business Review article:
http://www.coachingmanagement.nl/The%20Making%20of%20an%20Expert.pdf
They take positions that are extremely well reasoned, thought out, and articulated. The research is so extensive it seems to present almost incontrovertible evidence for the conclusions presented. Much or even most of the work has a strong factual and even in many cases helpful basis. But it is woefully incomplete more than it is wrong!
The problem in my opinion is that they seem to be ignoring loads of evidence and research that balance and complete the conclusions they present. Let me sum up this new body of work on behaviorism: “Talent and innate aptitude is of very little or no importance when it comes to world class performance. Desire, deliberate practice, and supportive environments over time alone lead to world class performance.”
In other words, they take a checkers position in a chess world! In some ways this simplifies management and throws us back into a world of “If you’re not performing, you either have a bad attitude or aren’t working hard or smart enough”. The problem is that this line of thinking is simply incomplete and will lead millions to frustration and often failure.
I believe that scholars Skinner and Ericcson, along with a host of motivators have significant value in inspiring people to reach their full potential and I am indebted to many of them. But we must move from the checkers mentality to a chess mentality. What is the essential difference between checkers and chess? Many would answer, “Chess is more complicated than Checkers”. Surely this is one right answer but why? One reason is that there are multiple pieces in chess with each one having different abilities to move on the board. The Rook moves in straight lines. The Bishop moves diagonally and the Knight moves in an “L” shape. In checkers all the pieces are the same. We live in a chess world and always have.
Motivator Zig Ziglar acknowledged this in some of his talks around the country. Often Zig has shared, “I don’t believe I could get in the ring with Mohammed Ali and win a boxing match no matter how hard I train… I’m too old, too slow, and too fat.” Most of us recognize this truth in the realm of physical talent. We don’t try to put 7 foot basketball players on horses and make them jockeys. We don’t try to make basketball centers out of 5 foot jockeys. We just need to realize that it extends far more widely than most of us realize. Zig rightly inspires us:
“Man is designed for accomplishment, engineered for success, endowed with the seeds of greatness.”
I couldn’t agree more. But we are designed differently, engineered uniquely, and each endowed with seeds that bloom in different shades and colors and hues.
My position is aptitude and talent based but completed and summarized well by the title of John Maxwell’s book, Talent Is Never Enough. Over the next few weeks we’ll be working through this critical foundational philosophy I first heard simplified by Dallas Theological Seminary Professor Howard Hendricks many years ago. It is generally supported by scores of leading edge educators including massive research by Harvard University Professor Howard Gardner, business authors Stephen Covey, Jim Collins, Marcus Buckingham, and Tom Rath, the Gallup Organization and the father of Strengths Psychology Don O. Clifton. It has deep spiritual roots in the Bible and deep historical roots in the writings of Buddha, Aristotle, Plato, Seneca, Rumi, Balthasar Gracian, Benjamin Franklin and P.T. Barnum himself.
It simply states “Success comes when we:
1. Discover our unique gifts, talents, aptitudes, and abilities
2. Develop those gifts, talents, and aptitudes with attitudes, skills, training, coaching, and supportive environments
3. Deploy or Deliver those gifts and abilities to a place that intersects with a need in the marketplace
It is actually in step two that the work of Anders Ericcson and the others becomes extremely useful. When built solidly on the foundation of step one and flowing into step three they have identified the “heart” of performance.... insanely great performance!
But first, we’ll look at a few more deceptions...
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