This discussion challenges the conventional wisdom of SMART goals, advocating instead for setting "massive goals" driven by a strong "why" or purpose, supported by self-awareness, accountability, and a proactive approach to learning and growth.
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hi it's uh andy chell i'm director of
curriculum of the executive development
program at corndale and i've got the
real privilege the real pleasure today
of chatting with david heiner i'm going
to be speaking about
goal setting goals what a great subject
that is now it's an area that we speak
about in our um our level 7 executive
development program it's something that
our learners
talk about they learn about but um
because this is a masters level
qualification it's a level seven at the
end of the day
they've got to challenge theories we
need them to critique the theories now
when dave and i first spoke which is
probably about crikey three or four
years ago now probably and one of the
first things that dave told me was that
smart goals don't work and
and
once i had to pick myself up off the
floor because it's something we always
do um
craic it was just it was challenging
that accepted practice so it is going to
be a it's going to be a fascinating
discussion i think but as a brief
introduction dave um i said we've known
each other for a few years now and yeah
it's no exaggeration to say that you
changed my way of thinking certainly
when it comes to goal setting you know
you you really did um i know you as a
researcher i know he's an author a
celebrated author amazon number one
best-selling author um speaker it could
be uh we met i think we've probably
first met the professional speaking
association we both went um fundraiser
three-quarters million pounds or so so
far yeah loving husband of course and
most importantly cherry's dad as well
but before we get speaking about uh goals
goals
and how you did change my thinking just
give us a bit of a potted history of
your career today can you please where
were it where you're up to how you got
to this stage of talking about goal setting
setting
happily andy and thank you very much for
the privilege of this doing this session
with you um i am sadly
a failed high school student i got
average grades at best
and partly because i was immature partly
because i was too scared to have a go at
stuff in case i failed
and i'll be honest immaturity stopped me
from stepping up when i was younger you
know i'm quite in order of young people today
today
you know their level of maturity
compared to mine back then
so i left
school and throughout my teenage years
and 20s i kind of plodded
believing that i was average at best
and just accepting it i said well i say
that i was a dreamer i had these goals
dreams ambitions things i need to do
place on as to go things i wanted to achieve
achieve
but still too scared to have a go i woke
up on my 30th birthday and i don't know
if you like me but when i was a kid i
used to write lists you know christmas
wrote a list you know a birthday write
another list and one day when i was a
kid i must have written a list of things
i want to do
and on my 30th birthday or very close to it
it
i actually came across this list
and i looked at it
and i became ashamed because i hadn't
achieved a single one of them and nearly
all of them were still relative to me i
wanted them so
so
i i really thought hard for a couple of
days and then i drew a line in stone and
i said from now on i'm going to find out
if i can
i'm going to find out what's true rather
than just believe my own limiting
assumptions or other people's
assumptions of what i can do and
and
i i was so i was so scared of having a
go that i thought first of all i need to
find out how
how do i do more achieve more be more
successful and happy so my customers
because i was a chef at the time it's
where i get my wonderful kung fu panda
physique from um
my customers were the who's who of the
west midlands i was very very lucky and
i started interviewing them after we
chatted about their events
because they were friends and what they
were telling me about how they thought
how they behaved was
was
totally different to anything i'd ever read
read
learnt on a training course or believed
to be true myself or had been told
you know everybody was being taught to
set realistic and achievable goals or
the acronyms smart
not one person in now 24 years later
258 research interviews with mega w men
and women from all walks of life
not one of them have ever said when i've
asked them how do you set goals oh i set
realistic and achievable or smart goals
no one's not once said it so
so
when all these top achievers that i was
interviewing as a hobby
my wife would say an obsession
we're saying they set massive goals i
decided to have a go
and one of the first things i wanted to
do was
see if the goal setting model that i was
hearing from these top achievers would work
work
so i went to a charity in birmingham and
said i want to set a massive goal they
asked me how much i wanted to raise and
i said what in one event
about 50 grand
thankfully in that one moment in time
any other day
i would have probably walked away sulked
rocked in a corner crying
they didn't know though that i had a
reason why i must do
this um i was raising money for cancer
research i just lost my mom to cancer i
promised her i'm going to do something
big so when they left me out the room it
was the best
motivation i could have ever had i had a
and this is critical to massive goals i
had a reason why i must that was bigger
than my fears and insecurities
and i smashed it i mean we myself and a
friend we raised 288 grand in our very
first attempt at fundraising and we gave
82 people experience of a lifetime in
the process so
so
that's my potted history up until
35 years ago and then i'm now something
like 54 i think 55 i don't know stop
[Laughter]
so since then all i've done is had the
privilege and honour of sharing this as
a professional speaker the research
around goal setting memory skills how
top achievers think and behave so
behavioral understanding emotional intelligence
intelligence
and it's all research based so
so
i i have the privilege now unlike many
personal development speakers of being
able to stand there and go this is my opinion
opinion
try and argue with 258 top achievers
most of whom have said they do this and
and
now in the last 21 years sharing this as
a professional speaker with 1.2 million
people globally
we've got
thousands upon thousands of references
of normal people who have thought and
behaved the way the top achievers have
suggested they do and gone from there to
their in personal professional career
business academic goals
literally overnight
you you've hit upon so many subjects
there dave in that few minutes you
really haven't you know it's blown my
mind already so you talk about smart
goals you've talked about the why the
purpose talked about uh
to-do lists you know there's so with
things already if you've spoken i want
to touch on on all of those um and of
course raising money for charity as well
i mean i'm amazing 208 000 is absolutely
amazing for cancer research but smart
goals smart goals
we've been we've been using smart goals
from the year dot critical choice it
feels like it anyway in education um
when we do performance management
education we're told that i set smart
goals in the private sector we're told
we've got to set smart goals so
you you just said basically that top
achievers don't set smart goals so
why not then so just talk me through
just with your research your thoughts there
there
well i'm on being from birmingham in the
uk i'm by nature a bit of a skeptic so
so
my wife would say cynic but no i'm a bit
of a skeptic and
so when all the top achievers said they
set massive goals that's the most common
word in their answer
and we're being taught smart or
realistic goals i thought well
smart is taught on mbas business school
management programs leadership
development programs there must be some
foundation to this and yes
forgive me i say this with a wry smile
on my face because i love doing this if
ever i work in a business store and
people go well smart goals work
i go what's it based on
and there's this tumbleweed because
the very few people who have actually
bothered to check assume that it was
started by a guy called peter drucker
entrepreneur personal development guru
for breakfast yeah yep now he quotes
smart goals but he was not the creator
of it the creator of the acronym smart
was a guy called george t duran who was
a project manager in the united states
and university lecturer he worked on
multi-billion dollar water utility projects
projects
they say the the most common quote found
is your goal should be smart
i've never once read
read
seen or heard anything of george t
duran's saying that
what i hear him say or allude to
frequently is that if you're working on
really big projects the steps to your
goal should be smart and that is different
different yeah
yeah
that reinforces totally what my research
has proven that top achievers set
to quell to quote tim watts founder of
pertemps recruitment
big fat hairy goals and they break them
break them down into realistic and
achievable steps until every single step
that will take them to the massive goal
is both realistic and achievable or smart
smart
that's uh those big fat hairy goals um
so a few people say that i mean you and
i both they were doctor andy coe parts
of buddies and he saw the hooks doesn't
he huge completely great goals and i get
that so this concept of great goals is
massive goals then so so just talk me
through what that actually means because
that might scare some people
i love the fact that you mentioned andy
cope they're a dear friend of mine who
became a best-selling author on the back
of using our massive goal process so
that's where he gets hugs from [Laughter]
[Laughter] so
so
so the actual
sorry just to clarify so you want the
actual process of massive goal setting
yeah what what does it what does that
actually mean you know okay
we are looking to change people's
mindsets here from from setting goals
which are
specific measurable achievable realistic
i mean that just that word achievable
you know to start with is just a bit
there you know so so now to go from
achievable to massive that for some
people that could be quite a step change
and that community
and and this is very important that some
people say oh you're just preaching a
materialistic um capitalist mental
actually no because every single
person's goal
is a measurement by their own perception
so what might be a massive goal to me
might for you seem realistic and achievable
achievable
and vice versa yeah so if someone says
to me my massive goal is just to be the
best mom or dad i can be i go fantastic
if someone says i want to be a
billionaire i go fantastic
you know to me when i first started
writing writing a book let alone one
that became a subject number one on
amazon was after being told by an
english teacher you're never going to
write a book higher shut up um
the thought was like impossible let
alone unrealistic goal and yet now 30
books later five of them amazon subject
number ones to me writing a book is
realistic and achievable yeah so
so
all we need is first of all for
ourselves to determine what a massive
goal is this can be personal
professional career business related
academic related any part of your life i
normally suggest
that people set a personal goal first
because if they achieve something
massive personally then they will be
motivated to take it into their
workplace or business
if people
once they see how simple the model is
some people are hesitant to take it into
their workplace or business because they
that's interesting yeah and so so every
every goal must be relative to us as an individual
individual
our massive is different to somebody
else's so once you've got what the
massive goal is
most not all of the top achievers have a
very clear reasoning or rationale of
what their way is their purpose their
their cause their res on detroit their
reason to do the goal
too many people mistake a purpose with a
goal a goal is the what and the purpose
is the reason why you're doing it
and and those were the reason why
typically out massively out achieve
so they go about determining why they
want or must achieve this goal
and and again i refer back to my earlier
statements if you've got a why that is
bigger than your fears and insecurity
you become unstoppable
unstoppable you do and i guess that
comes back to what you talk about about
raising money for charity and yeah it's
great to say i want to raise 50 000
pounds for charity but that's not really
going to drive you forward is it really
and i remember hearing you talk about um
people who train in the rain for example
you know yeah in the rain you know and
uh and
it's so easy to go to the pub with your
mates you know it's a bit rainy it's a
bit cold but that's what sets people
apart isn't it
absolutely and the the person you're
quoting there is a guy called mark
eccleston who hardly anyone's ever heard
of and the world should know his name he
was he was actually i think britain's
first world number one tennis champion
he was a wheelchair tennis player and
he's represented britain and i think
three or maybe four
sports at international level you know
the gut the guy is a genius and i said
what's the one thing you do differently
he said my mates went to the pub and
parties i went training in the rain
i still i now go to the pub but i've got
part of that is around
determining for yourself what it is
you're prepared if necessary to
sacrifice to achieve your goal
so we've got a massive goal we've got a
reason why we've looked at the potential
threats or sacrifices we've got to make
you then brainstorm
brainstorm
what it is you might need to do or have
to do if you're going to achieve the goal
goal
are you missing knowledge skills
finance resource ability in some cases
do you need team do you need expertise
do you need support and accountability
do you need financial acumen man
management skills presentation skills
what are the gaps and what are the
things you need to do
then and a lot of this will sound like
sound bite psychology but i i beg people
to understand everything i'm telling you
honestly has come from top achievers men
and women whose achievements it's
impossible to argue with
what they look for and seek are two
things that most of us run away from andy
andy
most of us run away from asking for help
and support
and we're very good at not asking for
accountability or when accountability is
thrust upon us we're very good at
getting off the hook
saying oh i haven't done it yet but i
will sorry these things happened
really effective people top achievers
they seek support and accountability
they welcome it they thrive on it and
they don't get scared of what they don't
understand or don't know
it's so simple but it's just a reverse
flipping psychology they see it as an
opportunity because that's where the win is
is now
now
people listening or watching this will say
say obviously
obviously
but how many of us obvi all the time
go great i don't know that
great i don't understand that yet
i think that's done
yeah that's fascinating because quite
often when when senior leaders get
promoted within organizations they've
got this knowledge haven't they and
they're they almost they're expected to
be the experts in that field
and actually if they're constantly the
experts in their field well hey they're
not developing themselves
true because they're getting exhausted
by being the one with all the answers
but secondly they're not developing
others and
there's a lot of research around reverse
mentoring isn't there yeah about
listening to your people one or two
rungs below you and learning from them
you know and and being admitting that i
haven't got all the answers the um i
remember goodness me you put me on the
spot now and i couldn't press
multi i think her name was the ceo xerox
many years ago uh when xerox were really
lost making and apologies about i've
mispronounced her surname um and the one
thing she did she said in the first 90
hundred days six months is she didn't do
anything she stopped she looked and she
listened and if people came to and said
how do they i don't know
you know and just having that admitting
that you don't know the answers i think
is is a vital leadership skill isn't it
it it cannot be underestimated how
important it is and again
what you've mentioned there this the
leader perception of i'm i have to know
everything that's what's forcing a lot
of imposter syndrome happening these
days because they push push push get a
business or an organization to a certain
level then and i see it all the time
when i work with executive chief exec
peer groups they get to a certain level
and wake up one day and go
i'm responsible for all this
how did i get here i'm gonna get found
out i'm just a normal person and and
then they start playing safe and
protecting what they've got rather than
pushing which has got them to where
they've got
yes and and it just causes this massive
sort of inner turmoil and clash so
you're absolutely right that that
listening being able to put our hands i
mean i don't want to date this in any
way but as we're recording this we just
sort of hopefully tail end of the pandemic
pandemic and
and
i seen effective business leaders
they're coming out they're doing three things
things
number one they're visible
they're not hiding in their office
pretending to make phone calls and
playing solid air you know they're
visible they're out there pushing their
company their team
we're here we're here to help number two
they're empathic
yeah they genuinely want to care for
both their team their suppliers and
their customers
those who pretend or don't care will get
found out
and the last thing is the one you picked
up on is they're courageous they're
courageous enough to do two things
number one you said
i haven't got all the answers let's do
this together let's find out what we can
do and the second thing is is in this
massive time of turmoil and change and
change at a pace never seen before in history
history
they're saying well there's so much change
change
a little bit more won't hurt so they're
pushing massive goals huge projects that
normally other people would be going oh
maybe now's not the time
you know they're not procrastinating so
you picked up on some great things there so
so
uh sorry do you want me to carry on with
the the goal setting process or
dave yeah i think i think i sidelined
you a bit didn't i sorry oh i do that
myself i don't need your help andy
you've set me off now you've just warmed
me up i'm off now but um
so we got as far as uh the why uh
brainstorming supporting accountability
uh reasonably well documented that
that
mastermind groups or peer support groups
push leaders upwards and onwards so
they're very selective about where they
get their knowledge and skills from so
so
a mastermind group is a group of
like-minded men and women who are
equally driven to achieve big goals and
they meet each other on a regular basis
they they work towards massive goals for
each other and they support and hold
each other accountable
from here they get that support and
accountability to keep taking action on
the massive goals and not get easily distracted
distracted
um i mean i'm sure you're much better
than i but i'm very oh look a shiny
thing kind of a person you know
even as a kid in high school i remember
sitting in class going focused oh look a
squirrel and you know i'd just be gone
for the next 10 minutes
a good support and accountability team
really hold your feet to the flames to
you absolutely do yeah on that point
sorry i couldn't request you to
apologize but
on the program that we do then all of
our learners are in are in cohorts
including clubhouse somewhere in open
cohorts across different companies uh
some are enclosed cohorts and there's
one thing that we encourage them to do
is get together those cohorts and create
their own mastermind groups effectively
right the power of doing that i don't
think could be underestimated because
i often say when i talk to senior
leaders it's lonely it's lonely being a
senior leader you know because you are
expected to know the answers
and and actually who can you talk to
really who can you talk to because
you're not friends with people you work
with generally your your colleagues are
they come across the other side of the
world you know people in the same
position so to have that that closed
cohort ready built i don't think could
be underestimated it it's incredibly
powerful incredibly powerful
so you you take your to-do list to your
mastermind team and you commit on a
regular basis to do two or three actions
towards your massive goal
the group support you and hold you
accountable to do the tasks therefore we
get stuff done
because especially with business leaders
the ilk of in your cohorts it's very
easy for them to get off the hook no one
holds the no one eyeballs them and go
really andy yeah that's right really
you know because no one dares do that to
them at work so
we brainstorm a list of all the things
we've got to do
we then prioritize the list again sounds
simple do not mistake it as simplistic hardly
hardly
most people do to-do lists hardly anyone
prioritizes them
those that do frequently will do the
easy stuff first just to feel good about themselves
themselves
quick wins make us feel good stroke the
ego at the end of the day you've still
got the sprouts left to eat on your
to-do list
so again it it is so obvious but this
really helped my feed to the fire
toppings they flip it all they do is
prioritize the list
and i use a pyramid but it doesn't
matter what kind of plan structure you
have for your goal setting or planning i
use a pyramid with rows and blocks in
and i put the number one most important
or i know i would put it off because
it's scary task in the bottom rows and
blocks of the pyramid and the least
important towards the top
and i then think of it as a construction
a building
so if i do and cross off the easy tasks
there's no stability no foundation it's
going to collapse
so whilst whilst our time energy
resource and let's be honest level of
motivation is at its greatest at the
beginning of a project or massive goal
you absolutely give every ounce of time
energy and resource you've got to doing
the hard things first at the bottom of
the pyramid
that way when everybody else's goal gets
harder or day if you do a to-do list for
a day
as only get easier and in fact the
momentum builds and
it this sounds a bit cliche and i cannot
demonstrate any research that backs this
off other than thousands of people
saying you're right dave this happens
a momentum is good things almost start
crossing themselves off
and i'm not saying that i'm not saying
it's not hard work it's still a massive
amount of work to set and achieve a big goal
goal but
but
would you rather succeed and fail
realistically most of the time or would
you rather fail occasionally but succeed
massively most of the time
i know i spent 30 years being average at
best and the last 24 succeeding and
failing occasionally massively and i
know which i prefer
i think you've hit the nail the head is
that that latter which is which is more
more more satisfying isn't it really
because i think to-do list i think your
army they take on a life of their own
don't they yes and everybody starts the
day with the best intentions don't know
if you do list is daily weekly it
doesn't really matter what it is
and i think it's human nature to look
through it and thinking i like that one
i'll do that one next you know that's
true i like that one you know because
you say you know you can take off some
some nice some nice ones but actually
you're not achieving not going to get
through that massive goal are you really
in fact effective if i can show you i've
just i'm just quite proud of you we just
had these printed right um
instead of workbooks it's looking like
an environmentally friendly thing so
in this pyramid here you put the most
important tasks in the bottom blocks of
your pyramid least important up here
towards the top you take action crossing
off the bottom rows and blocks first but
but
if you if you're if anyone watching this
is afraid to have a go at a massive goal
for whatever reason please
please
try and prove this wrong
what i'd ask you to do is do a goal
setting pyramid just for your daily or
weekly to-do list
because we've had four large
organizations two business two academic
over the years test and measure its impact
impact
the average increase in productivity is
twenty six and a half percent wow
wow
like that's i mean that's that's
equivalent to getting more than a day of
day a week back
that's big money in business that's big money
money
huge huge numbers yeah and how many
senior leaders wouldn't uh want
well say a day and a half a week back in
their time yeah
we had
there's a there's a company up north in
blackburn um called hakeem group they're
an optical franchise um you won't know
the name hakeem group but they they get
independent opticians to buy into the
franchise they get their name on the
front of the door still and all the
hacking group infrastructure is behind
the door and
and
in the last four or five years they've
gone from 20 retail outlets to over 200
from 250 staff to over 1200 swept the
boards at the sunday times best business
awards and all they did
set massive goals
massive goals
yeah which is amazing isn't it
we've also we've touched on the subject
you talked about purpose why and you
talked about the difference between the
what and the how you know and that so
just talk me through a bit more about
the importance of of the purpose then
with goal setting okay
okay
this is a deep dive and you know this
don't you yeah
we could sit down for this one
we could do a whole day just on this
right i again i i
i'm ashamed to say i initially dismissed
this stuff as fluffy wally nonsense
but when
so many people at the very highest level
sit across a table from you
and say this is what i do
it becomes impossible to argue with and
so many were saying i'm purpose driven i
have this purpose that i live by and i
thought nothing of it kind of dismissed it
it
and then one day i interviewed a guy
called professor adrian fernand by any
measurement europe's leading business
psychologist and
he said i do this as long as it's in
line with my purpose or i do that as
long as it's congruent with my purpose
and eventually i said mr fernand
you say
you're a psychologist i thought
psychologists like things that were
black and white with a label onion box
that's what it is
and he said
yes i said but you talk about purpose i
said yeah yeah yeah
so you have a clearly defined purpose
you went yes
i said are you where most people go to
their graves worrying if what they've
been doing all their life has been the
right thing he says i know what you're
gonna do anyway in the following 20
minutes he shared this little model with me
me
that helps people identify if something
is right for them to be doing
now it is a deep dive i mean it's like a
psychometric test on steroids
but if you're courageous enough to use
the outcome as a decision-making tool
life gets easier
because you do things congruent with who
you really are
and on the subject of purpose a lot of people
people
um when i say a lot of people
people who have made stuff up because it
works for them
and i don't
i'm not dismissing that because if it
works for somebody it works for somebody
you can't argue with that but when
people put forward a theory
without it being based on anything at
all other than their own
effectiveness you know i i am a little
challenged so what i see in the top
achievers reinforced by fernam's model
is that most people sadly mistake or um
a purpose as living in in sync with your
core values
yeah and our core values is critical to
our purpose
but it's only in equal
importance to our insecurities
you see who we really are you and i and
i know you haven't got any insecurities
whatsoever andy i've got loads of them
i've got a whole list mate and but
but
all of us are two things we are our
values and our weaknesses our
insecurities and if we make major
decisions without taking both into account
account
our insecurities are always going to
crop up or our core values will be compromised
compromised
how many people have we ever met who i
bet some people watching this will go me
me
they go and take a job in a new team in
a new organization or company
because the job's good they think they
can do it and there's a higher hiking
pay and the conditions are good because
you get free gym membership and a pension
pension
within three weeks
you realize everyone in the team wears
black and you like bright colors you
like the window open they have it shut
they're quiet you're loud and all of a
sudden there's just this mismatch
either your insecurities are having a
stick poked at them or your core values
are being trodden on you know you you've
got an autocratic leader and you don't
like autocrats and all of a sudden
things go pear-shaped yeah
if you know who you are your values and
your insecurities and this is a
challenging statement
and fernam suggests you do things where
most if not all of your values will be met
met
and your insecurities will be satisfied
and i said so you give in to your weaknesses
weaknesses yes
yes
because it's who you are
he said sure you could go and get
coaching therapy or whatever to sort
them out he says but most british people won't
won't
so if you're not going to deal with them
accept them and use them as a strength
and that was just like
pow for me
you know it was it was
it was one of the most profound things
i'd ever heard and i've i've used it
ever since i remember watching a video
of yours dave which you kindly shared
and you said that we all have
insecurities and that and all our
insecurities are of or fears are a fear
of acceptance security or control and
yeah one of those those three camps and
that that stuck with me and i remember
i am going to put the sideline now i
remember talking to um i was coaching a
young lady goodness me two or so years
ago now after watched your video and all
through the conversation she was talking
about honesty truth that that those
words were coming through all the time
and i thought
i'm going to try what dave what dave
told me
i started to explore
fear's insecurities and um
and what she divulged was that
all through her childhood she felt like
she was being lied to she couldn't know
any anything any truth to that any
concrete evidence i'm sorry but she just
felt she's been lied to so this truth is
honesty was such a strong value and we
start to explore this i said well so
your insecurity of feeling you being
lied to is actually driving a value
that's driving the way you you live your
life i thought and i thought back to
what you said dave i thought that's so
powerful that is what you said it's so
powerful it
it it is truly life-changing i mean
literally in this office sat in a chair
with his back to that right i have had a
billionaire in tears once he found out
who he really was because there is not a
psychometric test in the world that goes
as deep as you understanding yourself
because no one knows you better
yeah you know yourself better than any
algorithm the question is is are we
honest enough to find out and then work
with it
and not fight it
typically when things go wrong for any
of us it's when our insecurities crop up
or our values are being compromised if
we do things where they're met and
they're satisfied
yeah no-brainer no-brainer it is yeah um
nothing you just touched on actually you
spoke about we didn't use this word culture
culture
but actually when the example you're
given that um
all the other people wear black you wear
bright colors that comes down to the
culture of the organization so so how does
does
goal setting purpose culture how do they
all because they're all they're good bed
buddies aren't they really they're very
much home good head buddies so how do
they all intertwine with each other okay
okay
what what i see in the top achievers is
that they're very very good at saying i
don't know you alluded to this earlier
you know the best of the best say i
don't know and
and i
i
i have a good friend who used to sit at
the board table with sir richard branson
okay yeah yeah and he said you know
branson was masterful at knowing what he
was good at and accepting what he wasn't
you know and if he needed to do
something and it involved his
insecurities cropping up
he said okay it's critical that we do
that but i'm not doing that so i'm going
to find the very best person i can find
with that skill set and drive that
forward and so
it's it's critical that we are brutally
honest with ourselves and each other
because if if we surround ourselves with
yes people and people just like us and
this is a this is one of the challenges
with some culture work in that they you
know they say all you need everybody
thinking on the same page actually no
what we need is everybody going after
the same goal with the same enthusiasm
drive and purpose with totally diverse
skill sets and personalities
so that we can properly
give different perceptions to our
challenges and opportunities and and
that's where the mastermind group comes in
in
you know if if we if we meet regularly
with people just like us and our best
friends turns into a coffee and a
fireside chat and a muffin we go oh nice
meeting once you get done nothing really
you know if if you surround yourself
with people with totally different skill
sets and personalities
they challenge they provoke they stimulate
stimulate
thought behavior emotion and action that
otherwise we just never would experience
it brings me to or it reminds me of a
phrase i heard ages ago that in in what
leaders when they're i'm talking about
recruitment now when you're recruiting
you should hide for attitude and train
for skills yeah you can train you can
train anybody to get the skills and what
you said they can have a whole bunch of
people with totally diverse skills
but they've got to have the right
attitude but if you can't train for
attitude you've either got it or you haven't
haven't
i used to hire chefs in my catering
little business and there's a thing in
the catering industry is going in when
you're interviewing for a chef go and
make them cookies cook you an omelette
because it's a it's a basic skill but to
get it right is quite difficult and
i used to get them to go and cut me an
omelette but i didn't judge them on the
omelette because i can teach them how to
make an omelette i judged them on what
state they left the kitchen in
what's their attitude you know what what
was their attitude did they just throw
stuff in the sink and bring me a nicely
presented omelet or did they bring me
the best omelet they could do at that time
time
but the place was spotless afterwards yeah
yeah
yeah no it's it
attitude is everything it really is
really is i guess that's that comes back
to when we think about goal setting is
having that right
mindset that frame of mind that's that
attitude to say
yes i'm going to do this and what you
said what do i need to stop doing to
help me achieve that
yeah and again it's a bit of a
consultancy cliche but i've heard it so
many times in my interviews
frequently the achievers will stop
themselves and say okay what do i need
to start doing what do i need to stop
doing what do i need to keep doing
because i'm doing it really well and but
most of us don't we just carry on
regardless plodding yeah
i heard an interview a while ago now
whether the dalai lama was interviewed
and uh one of the questions that he was
asked is what's the purpose of life
what's the meaning of life and um he
stopped and he he actually chuckled a
little while um because they said to me
you're the wisest man on the planet mr
dalai llama he said the meaning of life
is to be useful and happy
you see i i
i love the useful bit i would have
guessed it'd have said happy
um you know how the pursuit of happiness
is the ultimate goal
the ultimate goal and if we can and if
we can bring that into our work
you know an old school friend of mine
graham graham hickens you know smashing
lad at school did really really well for
himself i mean really well for himself and
and
his whole ethos around success is are
the team happy
yeah are the suppliers happy are the
customers happy
they can do anything then yeah yeah
absolutely agree yeah there's
there's
some some people watching this may have
heard of a company called casato um they
make what they call um their their ethos
is manufacturing
baby furniture um
um
they're on a mission to remove boring
baby furniture from the planet so push
chairs and things like that but it's
like top end uber designer stuff
and that their office their offices is
on the
first floor
the ground floor is a showroom the top
floor is the staff play room now
everyone's idea of staff player normally
ends up as a dart board a vending
machine and a bean bag in the corner right
right
this is a play room
this is one serious play room
the beauty of it you can walk up the
stairs or go up in the lift but you
can't go down that way you have to use
the the slide
and they've got a slide go from the top
floor all the way down to the bottom
even the inland revenue when they
visited had to go down the slide and
you know it it's we can all talk the
talk about engaging fun and happiness in
the workplace or we can do it yeah yeah
that's the difference isn't it yeah
yeah that's a difference and it it can't
just go back to values isn't it you know
the values can't just be written on the
wall when you enter reception you've got
to live those values haven't you really
and what better way of of getting your
team involved with the the furniture
than getting to play with it oh you've
said something they're very deep actually
actually
can i comment on it yeah please
you talk about motivational quotes on an
office wall we've all seen them some of
us have got them
yeah most of us like them some of us
think of them as trite semantics
top achievers live by them yes they
so many of them have a quote that is
there it is their mantra
and that there's a wonderful old friend
of mine called carl george who's a top
he was a former top 10 accountant in
birmingham um top 10
martial arts top everything in life he
set out to do was i want to be in the
top ten
smashing guy
the title of his book and his purpose
for life
and they
imagine the pressure
to live your life by this quote
wow that's powerful isn't it now that's
a nice little poster on the office wall
by itself but to live by it and that's
the difference between most of them and
most of us we go that's nice they go i'm
using it i do it
and that's the difference yeah we can say
say
glib statement or we can say
that's my reason
and it's about doing yeah it is yeah
so this program dave it's it's for
senior leaders so these these guys are
on this uh guys and girls sorry who are
on this program they are
they're they're up there
already um
what do you think differentiates
senior leaders from people who are maybe
one or two rungs below them what's the
no i nearly said that they're they're
very driven and they're fearless but
actually what i mean by that is that
they are still human beings they have
every emotion that ever all the rest of
us do it's just that they are prepared
to do stuff despite
it appearing scary um i heard a martial
arts world champion eugene contrerington
once said seven times seven times world
team karate champion eugene eugene said
to me once he said he says david it's
okay to be afraid
but it is not okay to be so scared that
and and
and
actually the same same guy eugene he
said something to me that has stuck with
me for my life i love this quote he said
really successful people they expect
to fail occasionally most of us won't do
anything in case we fail
he says in the world of martial arts i
said what's the one thing that made you
number one seven times he said dave
honestly he said i knew i was going to
get knocked down
i said sorry he said my opponent never
thought they were going to get knocked down
down
in my head i knew
that when i get knocked down i am
getting up again
when they get knocked down they weren't
expecting to so frequently they never
got up
and that it is such
simple simple logic but it's the same in
business personal life
all areas of life if we know and and
importantly accept because i mean
especially any academics
watching this will say oh yes there's a
difference between understanding
something and accepting it but
but
if we accept the fact
that occasionally we're going to stumble
trip fall and face plant in the corridor
and fail
but that's okay because our reason to do
it is bigger than our fears
we know we're going to get up brush
ourselves down look the problem or the
opportunity there and go is that all you
got and you'll go again and again and again
again
again again i'll go back to the top of
the call when we said it can make you
borderline unstoppable yeah
yeah
it's it yeah again as always through
this you you've hit upon so many
different things uh in just what you
said there and i think that that's not
having a fear of failure it's that
culture again it's that culture of
psychological safety that yeah
psychologically where you can take risks
and if they don't come off
so what
what does it matter what does it mean
you'll just get back up again and you'll
keep running
there's a lot of cliches around the
world of engineering science invention
and and design around you know or you've
got to fail 10 000 times before you
discover that one bit of genius well
it's actually true you know i mean i i
could name names in the world of
invention design and engineering who
i've interviewed who who've said dave
i've failed
thousands of times and they the and the
beauty is they go i don't understand why
people are afraid of
they they actually go
literally great one one more way of that
not working i'm closer to finding the
way it does and and it just sounds so
simple but
everything i've learned from top
achievers is simple yeah
yeah
you know
they are no better than us they all they
do is think and behave differently
that's it
i think i saw an interview with jeff
bezos at amazon it was a civil sort of
thing you know fail fast and often
that's what that's what
i like that yeah but it's right isn't it
really but i don't know if this is right
by the way but it could just because
it's third hand but apparently when
amazon launched their phone their mobile
phone which was an unmitigated disaster
because it's crowded market they uh
rather than persevering persevering they
called it immediately and then turned it
into alexa amazon alexa
so they they just take that failure and
say right how can we get to that failure
how can we learn from it and how can we
move on which i think that's what sets
some top achievers
apart from others that if they fail it
really does knock them down you know and
they will not do that again well
actually you've got to do it again and
and again this this is in danger of
sounding trite you know all all of us
have have got this hang up around
failure when
the truth is that 99 of the things we
worry about happening
will never be as bad yes as we we assume
never you know the the truth is that all
of us and our teams and our businesses
are far more capable
than we dare imagine you know most of us
and and i mean this literally not rudely
most of us just play at this yeah
yeah
we play at it
and and if we are one of the naught
point something percent who are
genuinely happy with their lot
then full respect to those people you
know they've got it sussed life's about
being content and happy contentment
breed security confidence and happiness
what i see is that loads of people say
oh i'm happy with my last i know i'm all
right just as i am only in their next
breath to harp on i wish we could do
that wish i could have gone there wish i
could do that wish we could achieve this
we're kidding ourselves and we're hiding
through nothing more than fear yeah
yeah
and and this then this this is where
society is evolving because we've gone
from a very iq led society god we've
gone deep haven't we
to a society
eq emotionally intelligent led society
and again the current pandemic has
forced people into
facing up to feelings emotions and
and
the business leaders who do not spot that
that
they're going to have no workforce in
the next 20 years
because the young people entering the
workplace now are emotionally led
you're right you're right this
generation zed they're coming into the
workplace thirty percent of the
workforce will be will be sorry thirty
percent of the workforce will be
generation said by the year twenty
thirty so they are the argument and
you're right they've got different
values they've got different aspirations
yep and it's our generation we're going
to change
we've got to change
we're going to accept that you know it's
all very well us you know sydney saying
oh the youth are today that that's just
that's not going to cut it that's not
going to cut it they are going to be
paid for our pensions
as the dinos one dinosaur said to the
other meteor for never land here [Laughter]
[Laughter]
smart goals are smart goes out the last
sort of bit of a subject i want to touch
on please is is um is performance
management and an appraisal right it's
something that we uh that we we do you
know we've been trained to do haven't we
we're doing performance management and
if you if you hit your smart goal you
get a pay rise if you haven't hit your
smart goal then you don't need to get
your pay rise and i remember
you saying to me ages ago the smart
goals can set people up for mediocrity
at best
which is right that gets another thing
which really struck with me and so
taking that into performance management
management then does that mean that
people are setting themselves mediocre
goals knowing they're going to achieve them
them
so they never stretch themselves 100 100
100
so does that mean the performance
far from had its day it just needs to evolve
evolve
it it just needs to evolve into a bigger
mindset you know we in
in
let's go back to the top and so talk
about fundraising for charity as an example
example
if i was to say to you you've got to
raise a thousand pounds for charity now
most people would go right i'll do
two car boot sales
i'll do a um
a sponsored uh
pub walkathon thing
and i'll i don't know wash cars or sell
stuff on ebay
and what we'll do is we'll work out how
we're going to raise a thousand pounds
and we might hit a thousand we might get
a bit more or we might struggle to get
to a thousand
if we say
okay we've got to raise a thousand so
let's plan to raise ten
ten thousand pounds you're forced to
think bigger yeah
um and
what what's that ridiculous quote about
you know if you shoot for the moon
you'll end up amongst the stars yeah
but actually the truth is that if you
plan to achieve 10 when the goal was won
you might not get 10. you might beat 10
you might get 10 but you'll smash one
because instead of doing a car boot
you'll organize the car
and get five or ten pounds a car plus
your own car that's there
in instead of doing a sponsored walk
you'll organize a sponsored walk and get
a hundred people to raise a hundred
pounds each
it is just a totally different mindset so
so
and again
i have no data to back this next
sentence up but what i see and hear
consistently is true that if you sit
down and they understand the goal and
they understand why they need to achieve it
it
and they know how to do it typically
typically
people will set bigger goals than any
manager would set them
i think that's that's really right
because i think that that links in
nicely with a lot of things we spoke
about because i i believe this is the
world according to andy davis i believe
that all people all team members want to
do they want to believe that their
contribution is making a difference to
the purpose of the organization yes
oh they believe that then the
organization will become unstoppable
hundred percent you won't need power get
you on any of that because they'll set
their own targets at their own goals the
the silo mentality in a lot of very
large organizations and corporates in particular
it's about control and it limits
impact and effectiveness as soon as
people understand the impact it has on
every part of the business the supply
chain the customer what they do with the
product or service and they understand
as i said what to do
how to do it and why they need to do it
people become unstoppable yeah
brilliant dave on that note
absolutely fantastic always a pleasure
talking to you really really appreciate it
it
i've enjoyed it andy enjoyed it i hope
it's of value to you and the people
watching it certainly has
thanks very much cheers
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