As we become more specific about our goals and begin to acquire more knowledge and skills to develop others, our chances of success will greatly increase. The clearer we are about what we want, the more power we will have to achieve it. We all have the means within us to free ourselves from the limitations of early negative conditioning. The change in attitude is the result of internal understanding and acceptance.

Once you can begin the process of helping people develop positive attitudes and possibility, you create even more possibilities. It is more like knowledge and learning. Generally, the more you know and learn, the more you realize that there is to be learned. The more you focus on the possibilities, the more possibilities seem to be possible. High expectations and positive attitudes lead to high performance. High performance generates higher expectations. Individuals and teams go through four stages of development before becoming high achievers.

Stage 1: At first, you may find that as people enter unfamiliar waters and begin to perform new tasks and decisions, they will need a lot of attention from you. Whenever new knowledge or apprehension about results is needed, people will need guidance. Many will have to be taught how to perform a particular task. Others will need explanation, information, and instruction. Most will continue to come to you for decisions and priorities. Your behavior at this stage should be very directive. You will need to provide knowledge and model behavior to help people learn, understand and develop their competence. This takes time and patience. However, that result is more time for you because as you become proficient, you are more willing to perform functions that previously took your time.

Stage 2: As people become more competent in their roles and their attitudes become more positive, the need for highly directive supervision and instruction decreases. So his role becomes that of coach. Coaches are still providing guidance, suggestions and input, but they are starting to get more feedback and decisions are often made jointly. As confidence and competition grow, people will start to make suggestions and provide you with input and ideas. Your demeanor should be supportive and focus on mutual goal setting, high recognition, and praise for accomplishments. This two-way process creates a great opportunity to take people to even higher levels of performance.

Stage 3: As people become more confident in their ability to do their jobs successfully, you can empower them to make decisions that influence results. Delegate authority to solve problems and make improvements. Improve personal responsibility and accountability. Create additional opportunities. Be very supportive but less directive. People need to feel that they have control over the factors that affect their destiny. As they control more of your activities, you can spend less time managing people and processes and more time growing your business. The development of people has immense benefits for the future.

Stage 4: In this final stage, people want to do their job and have developed the competence and confidence to know that they can do it. They can be counted on to make decisions, implement changes, achieve your business goals, and have a positive impact on the success of the organization. They will require very little supervision on your part. Provide support, but refrain from over managing what they know how to do. Instead, your greatest need will be your leadership. They will look to you for direction, values, and behaviors that they can emulate to help build their divisions, departments, and people. They will look for new and better ways of doing business.

Look for potential customers in your organization. Create an environment, develop personal skills, and nurture innovation that can ensure your competitive advantage. Tackling the challenges you will face tomorrow will require you to drive leadership qualities throughout your organization because it will require everyone to see beyond traditional methods and expected results. The future belongs to those who create it!