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Leaders & Success

Molly Fletcher Studies The Best In Sports, Business

By MICHAEL MINK 

To reach the top, follow the steps of those who've made the trek. Molly Fletcher, a sports agent dubbed the female Jerry Maguire, did just that — going into the locker rooms and boardrooms of upper-echelon performers in sports and business to find their commonalities. One result is her book "The Business of Being the Best."

• Be yourself. Top performers are real. That's what Fletcher found with legends such as college basketball title coach Tom Izzo, Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach, Home Depot (HD) founder Arthur Blank and Cy Young-winning pitcher John Smoltz. "Be authentic and anchor everything you do against that," she told IBD. "Being the best is about being you, but the very, very best you can be."

• Tune in. Top performers are "always looking to learn and ask questions," said Fletcher. "They want to pull anything they can out of every experience, conversation and interaction."
Ken Kam, CEO of Marketocracy, which identifies top-flight money managers, advises people to ask why good decisions worked out. "That's how opportunities for value are discovered. Too many people aren't curious, so they never ask those questions. They're too willing to accept the way things are. Successful companies are all about trying to improve, looking for the ways things could be made better," he said.

• Be courageous. Fletcher found the best performers aren't afraid to fail or take risks. They want the most responsibility in the most important situations. Then "they have the ability to focus on execution," she said, and come through.

• Know your purpose. The best "understand that activity doesn't equal execution or success. Proper execution is what equals success," Fletcher said.

• Embrace urgency. Top leaders, Fletcher says, have a solid sense of it. While they can create an environment of calm, "they're proactively doing what they need to do to be the best," she said.

• Be exacting. Heidi Grant Halvorson, an associate director for the Motivation Science Center at the Columbia University Business School, says successful people are specific about what they want to accomplish and plan in detail how they will do so. "Knowing (precisely) what you want to achieve keeps you motivated until you get there," Halvorson, author of "Succeed," wrote in a chapter in the book titled "Nine Things Successful People Do Differently."

• Develop grit. Top achievers are mentally prepared to overcome obstacles on the path to the top, says Halvorson.

Enneagram

People say you have to love your self to love someone else.  True. I believe you also have to know yourself to really be able to really know others.  You have to know your tendencies, your quirks, your strengths and weakness.  You have to know what depletes your energy and what strengthens your energy. You have to know what inspires you and how you best inspire others.  You have to know your WHY.  Why do you do what you do?

Through my YPO (Young Presidents Organization) I was asked to take an "Enneagram Type Indicator."  It is a "personality test."  But it is the the one I have found to be the best.  The best because so many people I work with in YPO who facilitate retreats for executives use this as their primary indicator for personality types. And I found it to be the most practical from my personal experience as well.  It is ten bucks and takes 30 minutes to take the test (and no I am not paid or asked in anyway to endorse this product).  I took my first one last week and within just a few minutes I had an email in my in box telling me all about myself.  I shared it with my husband and he said, "wow, freaky, this thing nailed it." The best part isn't that it tells you what you know, the best part is it shows you your blind spots.  I always say (as do many - I certainly didn't think of it) - our greatest area of exposure as individuals in not knowing what we don't know.

www.enneagraminstitute.com is their site. 

Not that you care, but I am a type 3 with my second highest score was a type 2.  At the risk of being a little vulnerable - which I always recommend to people, I thought I would be vulnerable myself and tell you just who I am.

If you can skip a latte for a couple days and spend that money on the Enneagram test, I am confident you will find it helpful.  It will help you know what you need to work on and better understand the formula for you to be your BEST!

Cheers!