Most of us have been taught that achieving success requires setting goals, working hard and remaining focused on a long-term plan.  

Based on hundreds of interviews with high achievers across a number of performance fields, John Eliot, a lecturer in kinesiology at Rice University and author of Overachievement: The New Model for Exceptional Performance, believes just the opposite is true. The most efficient path to success, he concludes, is the path that's least defined.

Q. What do you mean by overachievement?

A.   Overachievers are individuals who go beyond expectations and consistently perform at their best. The term has a negative connotation because we usually associate overachievers as individuals who seek to impress and gain approval from others.

Real overachievement, in my opinion, is a qualitative experience of happiness and fulfillment that's consistent, day in and day out.

Q. What are some of the myths you found in your research regarding the path to achievement and success?

A.   One myth is that success can only be obtained if you select your goals early on, know exactly where you're headed, develop a road map and focus on specific steps toward your long-term goal.  

The problem with that approach is that your path to success becomes very narrow. You can become so focused on a distant goal you lose your sense of creativity and your ability to overcome obstacles along the way.

Other myths include:

- The notion that those who try harder are more likely to be successful. I found that people who try less, who find a way to judge themselves a little less and allow themselves more freedom and flexibility in approach, are more apt to be successful.

- Thinking that stress or pressure is a bad thing. In fact, it's important during those times to relax. The most accomplished people don't take time out when tough assignments come knocking; they feed off the energy and know the difference between physiological arousal, which helps in critical moments, and psychological anxiety, which is a negative interpretation of the arousal.

- The belief that you need successes enroute to your goal to gain confidence. Confidence based on external feedback such as awards, trophies and good grades, risks being lost when you're not receiving some sort of external reinforcement.

For this reason, people should learn how to develop independent confidence, particularly in the absence of positive external feedback.

Developing independent confidence is particularly difficult for athletes, actors and musicians since their activity or performance is such a public, monetarily- and statistically-driven activity.

The key is for performers to make conscious decisions about how they evaluate will themselves, the view they have of their own potential and the elements of their work they will enjoy the most. 

Q. How important are qualitative measures of performance?

A. Unfortunately we have become preoccupied with such things as rankings and other quantitative measures of success, and this phenomenon has been a disservice to everyone.  

Whether it's an Olympic athlete, the head of a Fortune 500 company, or an award-winning actor or musician, people who perform at their highest levels are successful based on intangible abilities which can't be measured quantitatively.

People who judge themselves based on statistics and bottom line dollars not only impair the mindset they need to perform at their best, but they often are left with feelings of emptiness, post-success depression and a lack of pride.

Q. In your book you describe two different mindsets: a training mindset and a trusting mindset, which relate to one's success.

A. The training mindset is a byproduct of this country's “work ethic.” If you have such a mindset, you are usually very critical and judgmental; you are very focused on the technique and strategy of a task.

This orientation goes hand-in-hand with the conviction that success is measured by being the first to arrive at work and the last to leave, thereby logging in more hours than anyone else.

A trusting mindset is just the opposite. It is someone who is completely free of evaluation and judgment – someone who is rhythmic rather than methodical, focused intently on the purpose at hand with little concern for results and independently confident.

Using a trusting mindset and being in the present helps you get away from a goal-setting mentality and gives you a sense of freedom.

Any great performer has to be able to be in both the training and trusting mindset. You use your training mindset when you're improving your skills.

The trusting mindset is what you use under performance in the boardroom, on a sales call, on stage, in the operating room, on the athletic field.

Q . What is your advice for anyone striving for success and ultimately a sense of satisfaction and happiness?

A.   What I found in my interviews and focus groups is that regardless of whether I was talking with leading surgeons, executives, Olympic athletes, or musicians, they all described the same basic reasons behind their success and achievement: Those who had freed themselves from goals and judgments – the conventional prescriptions for achievement and success – had more freedom to express themselves and found they performed better.

From Rice University publication Research @ Rice 08/15/2004

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[Photos: 2004 Olympic gymnast Mohini Bhardwaj; Apple CEO Steve Jobs]

John Eliot, Ph.D., is an award-winning professor with expertise in business and psychology. He is on the faculty are Rice University, and an adjunct professor at SMU Cox School of Business Leadership Center and the University of Houston. In 2000, he co-founded The Milestone Group, which provides performance consultation, evaluation, and training to business executives, professional athletes, and corporations nationwide.

Dr. Eliot's clients have included Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, Adidas, NASA, the United States Olympic Committee, The Texas Medical Center, The Mayo Clinic, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Little League Baseball, and hundreds of elite individual performers.

Publications by John Eliot, PhD:

CD program: The Maverick Mindset: The New Science of Exceptional Achievement - "how the truly exceptional achievers in this world have - and HAVEN'T - attained their exalted heights of accomplishment."

Book: Overachievement: The New Model for Exceptional Performance

 

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