Moving Beyond Performance

Making the transition?

What is “performance” anyway?

Holding the World Cup as we enter late Autumn in the Northern Hemisphere seems to offer a pleasing juxtaposition.

On one hand, the frantic effort to win a tournament and the associated circus of those who want to be associated with it, whatever it takes (finding a serious causal link between sponsor’s products and “winning” is a challenge).

On the other, a graceful move into preparing for another Spring. Those trees, some of them several hundred years old, that I can see from my window do not seem too obsessed with performance, and even as they drop their leaves know that they will very probably be here next year. They have a different take on winning.

We worship performance. It has become a lens through which we look at organisations from venture capital funds to schools as though performance is some common denominator. Performance mindsets correlate short-term and temporary measures with meaningful long-term contributions. It’s a fallacy.

Tim Gallwey, argua…