Organizational Psychology - 3 Key Strategies For Creating Organizational Momentum
About the Author
Ben Foodman is a licensed psychotherapist & performance specialist. He owns his private practice located in Charlotte North Carolina where he specializes in working with athletes to help them overcome mental blocks (the yips), PTSD, ADD / ADHD and achieve flow states through the techniques of Brainspotting & Neurofeedback. If you are interested in services, use the link here! Enjoy the article below!
Introduction: Organizational Psychology & Corporate Athletes
Through my consulting work with corporate organizations and sports teams, one strategy that is always being developed is how to create more organizational momentum quickly and efficiently. While there are no doubt nuanced approaches that need to be considered for each organization there are many common features of organizational momentum that both corporate and sport teams share. Often times in my experience when I focus on helping organizations and teams identify and harness these features of momentum, they experience significant gains on both a macro and micro level of performance.
For this Training Report I want to discuss what these common features of organizational momentum are and how different teams (from both the sport and corporate world) can identify and harness these capabilities. First we will explore the aligning narrative and how to truly conceptualize a mission statement. Next we will discuss extreme ownership dispositions that leaders need to cultivate when creating organizational momentum. Finally, we will discuss what organizational cross-training is, and why it is a key feature in developing organizational momentum. First, let’s review what the aligning narrative is and how to incorporate it on your team.
Part I. Organizational Psychology Strategies
I have previously discussed different concepts that are related to the aligning narrative in earlier Training Reports. The term originally coined by Chris Fussell, author of One Mission, How Leaders Build A Team Of Teams, can be summarized from the following passage in the book “Our overarching goal now was not to simply ‘defeat Al Qaeda in Iraq’ but to become the type of culture that could beat a complex enemy. Our process was as important as our end goal, and defining our process was the equation introduced in chapter 1: Credibility = Proven Competence + Integrity + Relationships. By emphasizing our new priorities to create relationships, to reach across boundaries, and to form the network half of our hybrid model, the equation changed our narrative in one important way. Instead of talking only about winning, we would talk about changing how we operated in order to win. Our alignment triangle would now reflect this change”. There are many different approaches one could take when trying to apply the aligning narrative within corporate organizations and sports teams, but I have found there are some basic first steps that can be applied with this mindset.
In order to effectively convey this strategy to the organizations I work with, I emphasize two evaluation steps: first, is your mission statement really your mission?; second, what is the core process that keeps your organization flexible but also brings everyone together on a unified front. In regards to the first step, oftentimes what I have found is that there is a deeper layer to the idea of a team’s mission statement. Saying you ‘want to win a championship’ or you ‘want to be the most profitable business’ are not ideal mission statements. Your mission statement should connect with individuals on a deeper, more primitive level. Why do you want to do what you are doing? These can be difficult but necessary conversations to have in order to create new momentum. Finally, in regards to step number two, organizations need to regularly be communicating with team members as to how they are accomplishing the mission statement. Having a core process in place is crucial to both macro and micro level success. Remember, the process of establishing an aligning narrative is not about finally arriving at the last destination but rather always developing the process that will hopefully bring you success. Now that we have reviewed this topic, let’s discuss the what extreme ownership is.
Part II. Authentic Leadership For Corporate Athletes
While it is not my intention to exclusively site former military personnel, I have found that their applied experience and problem solving strategies are both highly effective and most importantly, transferable to the private sector. One source that I have consistently promoted is the book Extreme Ownership, by former Navy Seals Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. Essentially, the book argues for individuals to take more accountability and ownership over their team’s mistakes even when a conceivable argument could be made as to why the leader was not at fault. There are many reasons why leaders should strongly consider adopting this approach within their evaluation of their team’s performance, but for now let’s explore two key arguments for adopting extreme ownership.
First, if leaders within an organization are truly committed to their mission statement then individual egos should not come into consideration. An authentic, truly inspiring mission statement (or aligning narrative) should naturally inspire unified commitment across the leadership hierarchy. If not, then the aligning narrative most likely needs to be re-evaluated. Second, in order for leaders to extract the highest quality of creativity and tactical level work efficiency from team members, leaders need to lead by example. By taking extreme ownership of the team’s mistakes, the message is loud and clear that everyone within the organization needs to hold themselves accountable to the mission statement. Now that we have covered extreme ownership, let’s review the final generator of momentum.
Part III. Organizational Psychology, Corporate Athletes & Cross Training
Another common problem that I run into with organizations is that while the aligning narrative and mission statement are sound, and the leaders within the team hold themselves extremely accountable, there is a ‘lack of ‘energy’ within the group. This usually is an indication that leaders need to be more creative in how they are communicating with team members and need to find more effective ways to generate excitement within the organization. An analogy I like to make in these situations is to the cite the importance of cross training in strength & conditioning. If you train with the same exercises over and over again, eventually the body will develop an immunity to those exercises, thus preventing individuals from gaining muscle and strength.
Likewise, humans within teams and organizations need a form of organizational cross-training. Even though cross-training is an exercise concept, there are core principles within this concept that are relevant to organizational success. Organizations can consistently create new, dynamic, & individualized missions where team members have personalized tasks, responsibilities, and goals, but are always working towards the completion of the mission statement. This application can help individuals utilize their own creativity which can be leveraged towards the organization’s success. While these are all introductory topics, these three concepts need to be present when teams are evaluating how to generate organizational momentum. Whether you need to rethink your model, or you are wildly successful, being able to generate macro level momentum is key towards overall success.
Note To Reader:
If you are an athlete reading this segment of the TRAINING REPORT, hopefully this content was helpful! I put the Training Report together because I felt like many of the discussions on issues such as the Yips/mental blocks, strength training & other subject matter on athlete performance concepts were really missing the mark on these ideas (e.g. how trauma is the direct cause of the Yips). If you are interested in learning more, make sure to subscribe below for when I put out new content on issues related to sport psychology & athlete performance! Also, if you are looking to work with a mental performance specialist, you are in the right place! USE THIS LINK to reach out to me to see if my services are the right fit for your goals!
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