*** What’s in your System? ***

This was one of the questions we explored yesterday as we kicked-off our High Stakes Conversations programme for the 2021 NZ GovTech Accelerator.

We started the workshop with System, as that’s the engine room for high performance. If we want to do better in our tricky conversations and negotiations it pays to examine our systems. As James Clear explains:

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”

If you want to consider your own systems, here are a few thoughts to prime the pump:

➜ Awareness

We all bring our own system to the conversation. However, we’re not always aware of what that system is. This lack of awareness can mean that we sleep-walk through our important conversations… going with the flow until we wake up in a place we would rather not be. Instead, we can step back and consider our system. If we identify what we normally do, what we typically think about, and why we do those things, it helps us to baseline our system. We can then more readily add, subtract and adapt.

➜ Alignment

We get the most ROI from our system when we align our habitual ways of thinking and doing with the principles that are at play in the event. This prompts two avenues of enquiry: an effort to understand the underlying principles that apply + a focus on what is within our control (i.e. the levers we can pull to harness those principles).

➜ Application

Our system is only as good as its application. The challenge here is that we often find ourselves in the space of the simple but hard. The most effective levers we can pull are not complicated (e.g. the simple act of keeping our mouth closed), but they are hard as they fight against years of conditioning and habitual responses. We make it easier on ourselves by starting small and deliberately practicing some mini-behaviours to get the ball rolling.

The bottom line: Your systems unlock your performance. Inspect them, align them, apply them.