Celebrating great writing and sharing ideas
I’m in the midst of writing my final Capstone submission for my MAPP (Master of Applied Positive Psychology) program at the University of Pennsylvania. I can’t believe the hundreds of research papers that I’ve scoured and reviewed, in order to come up with my own paper. It will eventually be posted on the Scholarly Commons and I will announce the link when that is available.
In the meantime, I’m extra-appreciative of excellent writing and how other positive psychology practitioners – those using the research and philosophy of positive psychology to enrich the “real lives” of people, organizations and societies – are able to share their ideas widely.
Two examples:
Paula Davis-Laack is a lawyer who is using positive psychology to help those in the legal profession. Her company, The Marie Elizabeth Company, is all about empowering “strengths-based and resilient living”. Her writing may be aimed at those in the legal profession, but her wisdom is something we can all learn from. Today’s celebration for Paula is special as she was published in the Wisconsin Lawyer , the official publication of the state bar of Wisconsin. When a publication like that is paying attention, you know it’s important!
(I would be remiss here if I didn’t mention someone who has been inspirational to Paula, and also to me, Dan Bowling. Dan is also a lawyer, but a really really nice one – though he never shies away from controversy and debate. Dan was recently interviewed by the ABA journal, the journal of the American Bar Association. If you want to see the reaction to his article, conduct a search for “vibrant stew” and “Dan Bowling” and see what bubbles up…)
The second example is someone I’ve actually never met in person, but I have been in constant awe at his ability to apply research and write clearly about the most convoluted ideas. His contributions and generosity are impressive. Jeremy McCarthy works in the spa industry, which I would think is perfectly suited to positive psychology – it’s all about flourishing and knowing that other people matter. Jeremy blogs at The Psychology of Wellbeing and his articles are always well-written and bring a smile to my face. Today’s celebration for Jeremy is that his reach just got a big boost from About.com, perhaps one of the most-referenced websites for anything you want to know anything about. Kudos to Jeremy!
Of course, there are many many more practitioners out there writing and sharing great ideas about the application of positive psychology. If you know of any blogs or newsletters, please send them my way! I’d love to highlight them. A well-deserved toast to you all.
Positive annual performance reviews
In my MAPP (Master of Applied Positive Psychology) program at the University of Pennsylvania, we took a course on Positive Psychology and Organizations. The course was largely focused around Appreciative Inquiry, which I use in my consulting practice, but there is so much more to a positive organization.
In my mind, a positive organization should encompass some, if not all, of the following characteristics: positive strategic vision, positive corporate mandate, positive work processes, positive leadership / management, positive teams, positive physical work environment (also sometimes referred to as physical health and safety, but I suggest that a “positive physical work environment” goes much, much further), and positive performance reviews.
Tara Parker-Pope, in a recent New York Times blog, cited authors and researchers who are petitioning to trash the annual performance review.
Thanks to Readers' Digest for this Banana Performance Review comic!
This argument has some merit to it: performance reviews are stressful for both parties (the manager and the employee), and may be completely meaningless with little or no impact on actual job performance.
I’m not entirely sure if we should completely abandon the annual performance review. Perhaps we should look at what works, and enhance it. Here are my two ideas on it:
1. Enhance the current system. Performance reviews, just like any summative evaluation, should not be a surprise. By the time the final test comes in a course, you should know what you are going to be tested on. Similarly, by the time the annual performance review comes about, you should know what is going to be discussed. So instead of abandoning the annual cycle, how about supplementing it with regular, on-going feedback between the manager and the employee, where both parties get to discuss what’s working, what isn’t working, and how both can work together to increase performance according to agreed-upon metrics? The summative performance review may influence bonus payments, promotional opportunities and so on, but the final outcome should not be a surprise.
In order for #1 to work, all employees and managers would need training on giving AND receiving feedback (because there are learnable skills on both sides of that equation). Training on coaching skills would also be helpful, and managers may benefit from on-going coaching circles, for example, to share best feedback practices amongst themselves.
2. Create a deliberate positive component to the performance review. At my son’s school when he was learning to print, he would print an entire page of capital letter As (for example). He could then circle his best A, and submit that for the teacher to review. This allowed him to do several things: he got to practice without penalty, he could critically appraise his own work, and he would then be assessed on his best performance. What would the work world be like if we all got to do that? Can you imagine a performance review where you get to choose your best projects, and discuss those with your supervisor? We know that we get better when we focus on success, and sports psychology and educational psychology researchers have borne this out with many audiences ranging from basketball players to elementary school children. Is it such a stretch to imagine that employees might also do better by focusing on their successes?
In order for #2 to work, we need to abandon, or at least modify, our current deficit-based thinking. We tend to believe that we can correct errors by analyzing them and fixing the problem. What if we could correct errors by focusing on the successes and creating more enabling environments and opportunities for more success?
What is your experience like with performance reviews? Are you aware of any companies using any positive performance review techniques or processes? And if not, would you like to learn more about the possibilities? Please comment and share your ideas. Thank you.
(And a very big THANK YOU to my MAPP classmate Paula Davis-Laack who posted the link to the NYT blog in a LinkedIn group that we both belong to. I’m truly fortunate to have such a great positive community that is always sharing ideas and support!)
Heightened sensitivity
Ah the joys of new awareness. I find that, since embarking on my MAPP (Masters in Applied Positive Psychology), I am now more aware of the
positive potential, and more sensitive when that is not embraced – or worse, when it is given lip-service but not followed through.
Three recent examples…
1. a meeting in which a client wished to “brainstorm” possibilities, and then shot down every idea that was raised immediately after it was voiced.
2. a class of college students that I’m teaching know all about their weaknesses, but no one has ever shown them their strengths (until my class)
3. a teacher’s “communication book” that comes home only when there is bad news to report on the child’s behaviour.
I’m learning – so slowly – how to balance between allowing the status quo and comfort zone, and moving myself and others forward into the brand new world of positive psychology.
I know, for example, that brainstorming can be a hugely positive and opening experience, but the first rule of true brainstorming is to defer judgement, allow off-beat ideas, and build on what’s been presented. You don’t get the full scope of possibilities otherwise. And if you want to shoot down ideas, that’s fine, but don’t expect creative solutions, don’t expect collaboration, and certainly don’t expect positive forthcomingness! (Yes, I just made up that word…)
I also realize that we are inclined to focus on the negatives. Whether that’s nature or nurture, I’m not sure – though I’m leaning towards nature – but it’s so sad to stand in front of a class of 40 college students, and ask “Who knows their strengths?” and see only 2 or 3 tentative hands rise. Yet when I ask, “Who knows their weaknesses?”, nearly every hand goes up, and most of them confidently with knowing nods. I am hoping to plant a few positive seeds and allow my students to acknowledge and apply their unique sets of strengths.
And finally, a personal quirk with teachers. I used to be one – I taught high school for seven years. I know that doesn’t exactly qualify me as an expert, but it was my first career, and it does provide me with some insight. I know how tough it is to stay positive, and how easy it is to spend 90% of your time on the handful of students who make life difficult. But I also know, from my own experience, how rewarding it is to focus on the positive, and to include the parents in shining that positive light on the students.
When the teacher sends home a notebook that is titled “Communications Book”, I honestly expect that to be used for parent-teacher communications. However, in reality, it is a “bad news book”. As I look back over the pages, the book has come home only about 4 times in the past 5 months, and each page has a bad news story on it – about something my child did wrong. I appreciate knowing that, and I want to know that so I can help set things right. But what’s even more compelling – and more important – is the other (majority of) days when the child has done something right. Another teacher understands this and sends home a mini report-card weekly, and my child enjoys getting “happy face” stickers on a regular basis.
So it’s a balancing act. As a college instructor, my role is clearer, but as a consultant and parent, there’s much more gray.
How do you manage it? How do you decide when to push for the positive, and when to settle for the status quo deficit-thinking? Or maybe you never settle… and how does that work for you? Looking forward to hearing what you have to share.
MAPP term 2
Celebrating having a few minutes to get back to this blog! Rather than lamenting the time that has passed and the busy-ness that has taken me away from it… I’m going for the positive approach! I find that I spend more time on Twitter (@LVSConsulting) and I enjoy posting snippits of articles that I’m reading, along with the bit.ly link. I’m able to get quite a few click-throughs that way, and I enjoy spreading the work that’s being done in Positive Psychology.
However, my mind right now is on two things: 1. an assignment I will be writing about character strengths in The Wizard of Oz (1939, starring Judy Garland) and 2. all the new books I have for this term on my new bookshelf.
Let me start with #2.
For the Spring MAPP term (for some reason, the University of Pennsylvania optimistically calls the Jan-April term “spring” term, even though it’s predominantly in winter, but perhaps that’s why I’m studying positive psychology there, and not at a “winter term” university?), I had to order quite a few new books – I have probably spent around $300, and that figure is lower than expected because I already owned some of the books. I’m also probably forgetting an online order or two…
Some of the books that I’m looking forward to:
Rath, T. & Conchie, B. (2008). Strengths-based leadership. Gallup Press: New York. (ISBN: 978-1595620255) – This aligns very nicely with a course that I’m now teaching to third year college / university students on Organizational Leadership. The course is Wednesday nights for 3 hours at a stretch, and it turns out that while almost all of my students know their weaknesses, almost none of them know their strengths. This week, they are taking the StrengthsFinder assessment and this week’s course will make use of what they’ve discovered. Stay tuned….
Prilleltensky, I. & Prilleltensky, O. (2006). Promoting Well-Being: Linking Personal, Organizational and Community Change. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. (ISBN: 978-0471719267) – I haven’t had the time to really get into this tome yet, but the title is inspirational. Especially when one considered the newly-emerging theories of social contagion. Well, there’s a lot of potential here!
Reivich, K. & Shatte, A. (2002). The Resilience Factor: 7 Essential Skills for Overcoming Life’s Inevitable Obstacles. New York: Broadway Books (ISBN: 978-0767911900) – Dr. Karen Reivich is one of our professors this term, and she’s also leading the US Army resilience training program. A highly impressive individual, as well as a ground-breaking movement into resilience research and application. I do hope to become certified in the Penn Resiliency Program after my MAPP work is done. Great implications for children, families, parents, and, of course, in organizational life with leaders and employees.
Cooperrider, D. & Whitney, D. (2007). Appreciative Inquiry Handbook, 2nd Edition. Crown Custom Publishing. (ISBN: 978-1933403199) – As I’ve already mentioned, David Cooperrider came to lecture in our first MAPP class and it was amazing. I have some familiarity with Appreciative Inquiry, and I’m looking forward to deepening my understanding. This topic is of special interest because my service learning project involved helping to create (and possibly run) an AI Summit for organizational and community change. Completely thrilling and meaningful.
There are also several books that I bought “just because” – usually because a professor or classmate highly recommended it. I figure this puts my entire book-buying total for the MAPP program well over $1000, but it’s been well-spent! Although it might be 2011 before I get to read all of them…
As to #1 above, I’m writing a paper about character strengths as demonstrated in the movie The Wizard of Oz.
We know, for example, that the cowardly lion isn’t really cowardly, and that the TinMan really has a heart, and the Scarecrow is really quite intelligent – but what does this indicate for positive psychology? I’ll leave you to reflect on that yourself, or else here’s a list of PPND articles that might get your grey stuff going. PPND is the Positive Psychology News Daily, and if you’re at all interested in what’s on the cutting edge of Positive Psychology, I highly recommend an email subscription! I read every single one each day.
And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to ease on down the road (remember The Wiz? with Diana Ross as Dorothy and Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow?) and put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard, and ponder character strengths and the Yellow Brick Road… Hope I don’t fall into the poppies!
2010 starts – and it’s back to the blog
Well I ended up taking quite a bit of a pause from this blog. The last time I wrote was about three weeks ago, and in that time I finished the final assignments of the Fall term of my MAPP (Masters in Applied Positive Psychology) program – which is both good and bad. Good to have assignments done (and my final grades are looking quite good, thank you very much!) and good to have one term done, but bad because it means I only have four months of this amazing experience left!
However, these four months are going to be great and this first class weekend back was a great start with David Cooperrider’s course on Positive Organizations.
If you follow me on Twitter (@LVSConsulting) then today you would have read a series of tweets of David Cooperrider quotes. Here’s a selection of some of my favourites:
All change begins in the imagination.
Simple face to face conversations can change the world.
Changing the envisioned image of the future can change the future.
What a gift it is to be around someone who sees you with an appreciative eye.
The vision of the future of an organization resides in its inner dialogue.
Positive change is in the art of the question. Unconditional positive questions.
when you focus on the good, a new richness of vocabulary emerges.
through an assumption of deficit-based change, we have created the model of organizations as problems to be solved. // but deficit-based change is exhausting, results in more hierarchy, fewer images of possibility, breakdowns in relations.
Why not study what you really want to see created in the organization? // study moments of great engagement instead of moments of low morale.
Human systems move in the direction of their inquiry.
Ask positive questions that SOAR: strengths, opportunities, aspirations, results.
Overall, it was a fabulous day and a half with an amazing man. The way he talks is inspirational, and although he can run Appreciative Inquiry summit with hundreds or thousands of people, he has a dynamically personal touch as he lectured to our class of 45.
The recent holidays were relaxing, and I was happy not to set an alarm for two weeks, but now I’m all positively energized again about my consulting and coaching work – and the positive change that can be created in the organizations around us.
