Saboteur Winning Edge
Saboteur Winning Edge
Saboteur Winning Edge
Have you noticed how you can sabotage your own success? Every human being has their own personal version of a saboteur. Meet yours and learn how to diminish its power.
Whilst the chances are that you and I haven't met, I could make a guess that you have at least two different sides to yourself. Perhaps one part of you is primarily happy, successful and productive and you have another side that can be quite the opposite. How much of the time you exist in the empowering mode and how much time in the disempowering mode will vary, depending on you natural disposition and what is going on in your life. Yet in my experience, every individual has the ability to move between these two modes. The more time spent in the empowering mode, the greater the benefit for your business, and of course vice versa.
The seemingly disempowered side of the human psyche has come to be known by some as the saboteur. Everyone has a saboteur, and every business is subject to saboteur like-behaviours demonstrated by everyone through out the organisation including the leaders of the organisation.
Both on an individual level and an organisational level, the purpose of the saboteur is the same: to resist change whilst also presenting us with a learning opportunity. Whilst individuals usually feel safe with their familiar behaviours, both they and the organisation are likely to be missing out on some opportunities.
Saboteur-like behaviour comes in various guises. As a first step, it is important to simply notice these behaviours. Here are some of the most common ones which you may recognise in yourself or in your team:
Procrastination especially putting off the difficult stuff, not going for something in case you fail, lack of confidence, inertia, apathy, expecting disappointment, being distracted, feeling confused.
Putting others first: not asking for support, not saying "no".
Doing too much: being driven, getting overwhelmed, poor time management.
Not believing in yourself: letting people dominate you
Needing to be perfect
Beating yourself up: negative self talk
Being impulsive, giving up too soon.
The list goes on
If you recognise some of these behaviours in yourself, don't despair! There are many ways to disarm your saboteur.
You may wish to start by making your saboteur-like behaviour your friend. Whilst this may sound strange, he/she or it is certainly not your enemy, or a part of you that would benefit from being killed, as I have heard some clients initially say. Accept these behaviours as a normal part of being a human being. You may even be able to laugh at them. Your next move is to set an intention of being willing and open to change.
Converse with your saboteur
Whilst this may sound too "new age" to some, I do recommend you give it a try. Tune into your saboteur and have a conversation with him, her or it. You can do this by writing (using your non-dominant hand for the saboteur), have a direct conversation in your imagination, or you can do chair work (whereby you become the saboteur in chair one, and then yourself in chair two, and keep switching chairs as necessary).
Start by finding out his name, or does he identify himself by his behaviour e.g. victim ("Help me!"), or rescuer ("I'll look after you"!). You can ask questions such as
What are you here for?
What are the positive payoffs of your behaviours?
What shall I do?
When you have the answers take the necessary action. If you don't get any specific answers, a guess will often be bang on!
Fran's story illustrates how this can work. Fran started in a new high-powered role which she enjoyed but there was excessive work for her department and tight deadlines. Before long she had put on a huge amount of weight. When she asked her saboteur what this was all about the answer came back. She was given a bigger body so she would feel more powerful, and so that she could register her discontent and make appropriate requests. All she needed to do was a combination of saying "no" to excess work, insist on reasonable deadlines, and explain why it was beneficial to recruit new resources. She did put all this into action, and low and behold, her weight did drop off.
When you have your answers, it might sound strange but do say "thank-you" to your saboteur. Be kind and understanding towards yourself. Experiment with using these processes, whenever you need to. I promise you, they work!
Down to earth approach
Sometimes we find that are unhelpful beliefs cause our saboteur to show up.
I have a client, a Managing Director of a communications agency who used to have a deeply ingrained belief: "If you want something doing well, does it yourself". He knew he could come across as controlling and wanted to be an effective leader, without resorting to control". Not only that but his self imposed workload meant he was constantly feeling under pressure, as well as alienating some members of his team.
When I asked him which what other approaches would be worth trying, the following range of alternatives emerged from our coaching conversation:
He could challenge himself by asking himself: "Am I really the best person to do this?" and "Is this the best use of my time/resources?"
He could challenge his own definition of doing something properly by comparing it with doing something differently
Whilst he might not have naturally trusted others, it immediately came to him as a wise path to follow.
The idea of training and coaching his team also made sense
Finally we looked into the possibility that others might may able to do an even better job than he could. He soon realised that one of his directors was already doing just that in the area of business development. He now had evidence that perhaps his old disempowering belief was really not true. When he took on board the new evidence and started experimenting with new ways of being a leader, his old belief became redundant. Instead, a new belief took effect: "I get the best results by trusting and delegating!"
Back to your saboteur. You can be fairly certain that your saboteur will show up in your life next week (or over the next few weeks). My invitation to you is start working with some of the actions I have suggested here. Start wherever you feel most drawn. Do remember that different approaches work for different people, so be prepared to experiment. I'd love to hear how you get on. Do drop me an email telling me what does and doesn't work for you, or if you have any questions you would like answered, I'd be happy to help.
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