New Business Ideas 4 U

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Hi again. Here is a second idea from the book Performance Intelligence at Work by Dr Julie Bell, and Robin Pou ( McGraw-Hill, 2009). It made me think, and I am sure it will do the same for you.

How do you feel when you are termed ‘average’? Many people – including me – bristle a bit at the term, because we feel that we are above average – even outstanding! But the way Dr Julie – as she likes to be called – explains ‘average’ makes good sense. She defines average as ‘the place where you perform on a consistent basis today’.

If we are totally honest with ourselves we do not perform at an outstanding level all the time. We certainly don’t perform perfectly, since perfection is not standard practice among mortals. Dr Julie suggests that we shouldn’t even strive for perfection, because we are setting ourselves up for failure, and that doesn’t seem like a sensible thing for us to do. Rather we should assess our day-to-day performance as average, and rate ourselves on a scale similar to the one below.

There are several important implications from thinking this way:

According to the scale, there is considerable room for improvement. Now that’s a positive!

The average we are talking about is a personal average. It is your present level of performance.

The average is a moving target. The more you perform above your present average – the more you succeed, according to the diagram – the  higher your average becomes.

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