LEVELS OF FUNCTIONALITY
INTRODUCTION
 For
the past 20 years, I have been studying how people learn,
think, relate and create. While every person is unique,
I have found some common patterns that, if we paid enough
attention to and took actions, could dramatically improve
our growth in many areas.
Take a moment to reflect on your daily life -- both
at work and at home -- and ponder on these questions:
-
Which tasks or areas of work you are great at and
which are the ones where you are effective but greatness
still eludes you?
-
Where
do you function most efficiently and where are you
inefficient?
-
Where do you have just functional expertise but
nothing to write home about and where are you truly
dysfunctional
I
understand that these questions are not easy to answer.
But if you put your mind to it and write down various
activities that you go through day after day and reflect
on them, I am sure you will figure out your competency
level in each of those activities. Once you do become
aware of the areas in which you are great, effective
and efficient and areas in which you are functional,
ineffective, inefficient and dysfunctional, ask yourself:
Why am I this way? What makes me have a range of functionality
from greatness to dysfunction? What did I do to get
here and what can I do to get to a different level?
I would be very interested to hear your responses to
these questions.
Just by going through this exercise, I believe, you
will begin to experience more awareness and with focused
effort, in a short time, develop a higher level of functionality.
I did this exercise with about 100 executives in the
last two years and made some observations and want to
share and validate them with you.
AWARENESS OF LEVELS
 I
found that each of us operate from different levels
of functionality in different areas in different contexts.
I remember a doctor from Fresno mentioning to me last
year that many of his surgeon colleagues have difficulties
in letting go of their ‘doctor’ role socially!
He said that his own wife and kids remind him often
that they are his family and not patients or nurses
or professional colleagues.
I certainly could relate to him because there were times
when my wife mentioned to me that she did not want to
be coached (or taught or trained) and wanted to be treated
just as a wife and a partner. Did you ever have that
experience? Isn’t it interesting that we ‘carry
over’ what we are good at to areas where it is
not appropriate and get surprised that we don’t
get the same reception? Mindless application of skills
and competencies in inappropriate situations make us
ineffective in certain situations and dysfunctional
in others.
On reflection, I realized that this is a common issue
that I have encountered numerous times in my coaching.
Interestingly, instead of learning what we need to learn
in a context to become more effective or great, we usually
try to transfer skills and competencies mindlessly from
another context. How can we become aware of where we
are on the functionality scale and learn what we need
to learn in that context?
FIVE LEVELS OF FUNCTIONALITY
As
I thought about the different levels of functionality
we exhibit and what makes one level different from the
other, I realized that our ability to ‘feel’,
‘act,’ ‘think’ and ‘be’
are the building blocks of our functionality. Their
relationship to each other and how they affect our functionality
could be articulated in the following four equations:
-
Greatness
= being x feeling x thinking x acting
If any one element on the right side becomes zero
in a given area, our ability to be great in that
area becomes zero.
-
Effectiveness = feeling x thinking x acting
If any one element on the right side becomes zero
in a given area, our effectiveness in that area
becomes zero.
-
Efficiency = thinking x acting
If any one element on the right side becomes zero
in a given area, our efficiency in that area becomes
zero.
-
Functionality = acting consciously
If conscious and committed action is absent in a
given area, then what is present is mere activity
(going through the motions). We may not be dysfunctional
but we are yet to demonstrate out ability to function
meaningfully in that area.
- Dysfunctionality = non-action (stuckness)
If there is no perceivable activity in a particular
area irrespective of suggestions, input and help
from others, then we might be dysfunctional or stuck.
Based
on my own coaching experience and also on observing
people who did make transitions from one level to another,
I present here a description, method of intervention
and some questions for each level.
MOVING UP THE LEVELS OF FUNCTIONALITY
Dysfunctional to Functional
In the equations above, we say dysfunctionality = non-action.
What does it mean?
According to, Encarta® World English Dictionary,
dysfunctional (adj) means:
1. failing to perform the function that is normally
expected
2. unable to function normally as a result of disease
or impairment
 If I am fully or partially blind, then we can probably
say that my vision is dysfunctional. In terms of development,
a dysfunction shows up in a person’s behavior
or performance. For example, if I am consistently lazy,
I cannot be functional in tasks that require timeliness
and alertness. A dysfunction stops a person from constructively
participating in the task at hand. While the causes
of a behavioral dysfunction could be numerous, the reason
it persists is because at some point in life, we get
stuck in a behavior and lose the perspective.
Dysfunction can show up in two ways: we continue to
believe that we have no capability to act despite the
evidence to the contrary; or we behave as if what we
know and do 'just works' and we justify it with all
our energy. In the first case, we don’t improve
even if we put in a lot of effort and energy into making
things work because of our mindset. Expecting things
to be different or expecting things to fail sometimes
become a self-fulfilling prophecy. In the second case,
we might know a lot about what needs to be done and
how it needs to be done but we just don’t seem
to be able to produce results. When we are dysfunctional,
we see things in black and white and have no ability
to distinguish different levels of functionality.
Therapy is the most effective developmental intervention
for making rapid progress in the area we are dysfunctional.
What occurs through the therapy is not a new learning
(new functionality), but a unlearning of the past behavior
(reduced dysfunctionality). The more a person is able
to unlearn the stuck-behavior, the fuller one experiences
the present moment and is able to take action in that
area.
It is not that some of us are dysfunctional and others
are not. Many of us are dysfunctional in some area of
our life or another. Finding that dysfunctionality can
give us enormous freedom not just functionality.
While Dysfunctionality = non-action, functionality =
conscious action. There are two types of actions: one
is just being engaged in an activity as a task to be
performed without any emotional or intellectual involvement.
The second type is taking intentional, purposeful action.
If we take the first type of action, then we are in
dysfunctional domain because an activity without any
thought or emotional involvement amounts to non-action.
When we are capable of taking the second type of action,
we move into the functional level.
Are you dysfunctional in any area of your life?
Where are you "activity" focused instead of
"action" focused? By the way, others
around you might be more familiar with your dysfunctionality
than you are. If they feel that you are genuinely interested,
they might be willing to share with you their perspective
and help you break out of it!
Functional to Efficient
 To
become efficient, you have to think about the process
of implementation—like why, when, what, how and
where that action could be taken. In other words, conscious
execution with thoughts about cost, quality, delivery
and other job requirements distinguishes efficiency
from functionality.
In the equations give above, efficiency = thinking X
doing (action). When thinking is absent, efficiency
reduces to functionality. When doing also is missing,
it becomes dysfunctionality. So efficiency is about
both thinking and doing at the same time. When there
is a gap between them, it reduces efficiency.
How can we bridge the thinking-doing gap? Traditional
schooling gives us information and tools for thinking
whereas 'on the job' training or apprenticeship gives
us capacity for conscious execution.
Where
are you inefficient? Where do you normally bog down
or what activities seem to take a long time for you
to finish? What activities drain your energy? How do
you plan to bridge your thinking-doing gap this year?
Ask others around you about where you are efficient
and where you are not. You might be surprised. If you
have resistance to listening and accepting what they
say and come up with justifications, then chances are
high that you are inefficient but unable to accept it.
Efficient to Effective
 The
equation for effectiveness is thinking X doing X feeling.
When “feeling” is missing, we become over-efficient
and ineffective. We try to optimize everything and in
the process we loose respect of other people around
us because we focus too much on tools, processes and
tasks and ignore people and relationships. We tend to
become more objective and mechanical when we exclusively
focus on efficiency. When we begin to include feelings
of people into the equation, we might be inefficient
in a task but become effective in producing desired
results. So I believe that the feeling-doing gap needs
to be bridged for us to become effective and successful.
Let me give you an example. I bought a mini-van for
my wife several years ago. I took into consideration
the type of van, color, features and brand in buying
the right van for her. I thought I would surprise her
with my selection except that I was the one who was
surprised. She felt that minivan was “too big”
for her and I ended up with the mini-van while she was
“happy” to take over my car. I was making
sure that I got the best deal and right vehicle for
our family but did not take into consideration her preferences!
You cannot go to school or training program to develop
effectiveness. Personal coaching is the most effective
way to help us get out of “over optimizing”
mode and develop more emotional quotient (EQ). IQ may
get us the job but EQ keeps us in the job and helps
us become successful. EQ helps us become leaders and
learn to pay attention to people and relationships –
not just to task and efficiency parameters like cost,
quality, time etc. Successful leaders are effective
in getting things done – through others. How successful
are you as a leader?
Are you effective in your relationships? Do you
bring energy and joy in people around you? Do people
feel happy when you enter the room or when you leave
the room?
More intelligent you are and higher the IQ you have,
more attention you might want to pay in bridging the
feeling-doing gap and becoming effective. Finding the
right coach with whom you have good chemistry can help
you become more successful in not only producing results
but also developing leaders around you.
Effective to Great
 Have
you ever been in a room with a great human being? I
had an opportunity to be with His Holiness Dalai Lama
in a room with many other people. He listened to everybody
as if they are saying something very important and when
he looked at people they had his total attention. He
made all of us feel like we are very special in his
presence.
Presence is something that is unique to each one of
us but we hide our presence because we are so busy imitating
others whom we look up to. In fact, our greatness can
only come out to the extent that we allow our being,
our presence to be part of our expression and our personality.
In other words, when who we are informs what we do,
we leave our signature wherever we go. The greatness
equation has all our modes – doing, thinking,
feeling and being. It is the wholeness that allows people
to be authentic and others experience authenticity to
be part of ones greatness. Greatness is a matter of
bridging the being-doing gap.
The only way somebody else could help us tap into our
greatness is through mentoring. When the right mentor
allows us to drop our false façade and helps
us to ignite our genius within, we become confident
in being ourselves and allow our natural essence to
flow and grow. That is what allows us to tap into our
vitality, authenticity and greatness. It is about listening
to our own song, paying attention to our own story and
living our own lives and not becoming copies of people
we admire.
Greatness, I found is not a state of becoming but a
natural state of being. When we allow ourselves to be
fully present, when we accept ourselves (and others
around us) fully (warts and all) we gain freedom and
self expression. We don’t have to do anything to be great and bridge the being-doing gap.
Anthony De Mello said that ‘a bird sings because
it has a song and not because it is going to be on TV.’ How about you? What makes you – you? Are there
people around whom you are fully yourself?
Like somebody mentioned, transformation takes an instant
but living it takes a lifetime of practice. Through
appreciative inquiry, self-acceptance and increased
awareness, we can learn to become effective and even
tap into our greatness. Of course when we become arrogant,
our greatness, our signature strength can also turn
into our core incompetence. That is a topic of another article. |
