Manage-Wise

Shaping up the right stuff

How do we get good at what we do? Excellent behavior doesn’t happen overnight. Think back to when you learned how to do something new. Did you learn to ski well overnight? Did you ace your serve the first time you played tennis? Were you a great speaker the first time you had to talk in front of a large group?

So, how do we learn complex, advanced behaviors? Conventional wisdom tells us that “practice makes perfect.” But we all know that isn’t necessarily the case. If you grip your tennis racket incorrectly and bend your wrist while hitting the ball, all the practice in the world won’t help your game. So sometimes we say, “perfect practice makes perfect.” But that really isn’t the case, either.

Behavioral Science tells us that practice—even perfect practice—is not the main ingredient for developing behaviors. The recipe is a process called shaping. Its ingredients are behavior, feedback, and increasingly challenging behavioral goals.

Here is a shaping story…

Randy is an engaging and energetic public speaker. He makes eye contact with everyone, smiles, rarely relies on notes, and uses humor at appropriate points. After watching Randy deliver a presentation at a company conference, I complimented him. He smiled shyly. “You know, it took me a long time to become this comfortable in front of a large of people.” He shared his story…

I started my career in technology. My job was to interface with our customers and understand their issues with our products. I had a wonderful supervisor, Karl. We used to have long talks about issues in our department and how to address them.

One day Karl asked me to organize my thoughts and present them at a staff meeting. I was terrified! There were only five people in the meeting, but it felt like 500! I scripted my presentation and read it word-for-word as fast as I could. I don’t think I even looked up from my paper.

Soon after, Karl complimented me on my presentation. Then, in a very caring way, he asked why I was so nervous.

We had a great talk. He thought my ideas were great, and went precisely in the right direction for our department. In fact, he suggested I could play a major leadership role in helping us get there. But it would require me to become more comfortable with public speaking and communicating to groups. So, I began my journey, with Karl’s help.

Our technology and product sales folks gather annually for a two-day conference. Karl and I set my goal: to give a short presentation to about 50 people at one meeting. I had three months to prepare. He said my content was on target and didn’t need much coaching.

I would focus on three areas: use of notes, eye contact, and voice projection. We also looked for relatively safe opportunities for me to speak, like weekly staff meetings, customer calls, etc.

It wasn’t easy, but with Karl’s help, I made a lot of progress. I went from scripting and reading my presentation, to putting key points in large type on paper, to using slides with note cards. Karl was often there to provide feedback.

I will never forget the meeting when I looked up and saw my coworkers smiling. What a rush! I felt they were really on my side. A little later, I took a risk and told a joke. People laughed! I couldn’t believe it. I started to get hooked. People were actually listening and appreciating what I said.

Well, I gave my presentation at that yearly conference. I couldn’t eat for two days before it. But I did well. My goal was to use slides and only look at my note cards if I absolutely needed to. In fact, I only brought two note cards.

After my presentation, Karl went wild—he was so proud of me. And the head nods throughout my talk were reinforcing as well. Since then, I have really worked on my presentation skills. I have learned to identify an area to work on, and then take it slow. I have used coaches to give me feedback. And I always look at the audience to see if I am getting a positive reaction to what I am doing. It’s made all the difference in the world.

Clearly, Randy was not a born public speaker. He had to shape his presentation skills. No wonder he is now such an effective speaker! He applied shaping and worked on his skills over time. Here are some things Randy did:

• Bits and pieces. He broke the complex behavior of speaking at the conference into “behavioral chunks,” or bite-sized pieces he could work on. He focused on his use of notes, eye contact, and voice projection.
• Just within reach. Randy set a goal for himself—to give his presentation using only slides. That was a stretch, considering his starting point was reading from a script. But he didn’t make the mistake of leaping toward his goal all at once. He set small, attainable sub-goals toward which to work. He put key points on paper in very large type that he could see easily, so he could turn back to his audience. Later, he started to use slides with note cards. Eventually, he used fewer note cards and referenced them less.
• Practice and feedback. Randy and Karl identified plenty of practice opportunities. Randy received feedback during and after every opportunity. He saw people smiling and nodding—a natural consequence of making eye contact with the audience. He also experienced a very powerful natural consequence when people laughed at his joke. In addition to natural consequences, Randy received social consequences from Karl in the form of feedback. And Randy gave himself feedback on his performance.
• Upping the ante. Randy kept pushing himself. Once he reached the goal, he raised the bar a little more and found ways to get feedback about his performance.

Excerpt from ‘Unlock Behavior, Unleash Profits’ by Leslie Wilk Braksick, Ph.D. Reproduced with permission © 2008, Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited. Price: Rs 575. Vishwanath_Ghanekar@mcgraw-hill.com