How Superachievers Outperform Their Peers

For as long as human beings have stood in awe of a few superachievers, professional managers, motivators and researchers have tried to formulate the superachievers’ secret paths to success.

In recent years, a science called “anthropo-maximology” has emerged which promises to increase understanding of the outer limits of outstanding human achievement.

Some of the world’s best scientists are pooling their resources to develop new investigative tools and research methods to pinpoint the most important characteristics of ultrasuccessful salespeople.

Dr. Charles Garfield, a leading U.S. scientist, says: “We know that any human skill, no matter how complex or vital, has a structure. We now have the means to understand the structures and teach them to others.”

Top Soviet scientists also predict that we’ll soon see the day when we can “clone” the key characteristics of superachievers.

Empathy and Ego Drive

In the field of selling, one of the first studies covering high performance behavior characteristics was published in the Harvard Business Review (July/August 1964). The authors, David Mayer and Herbert Greenberg, studied over 7,000 salespeople. They found two key characteristics among top performers: empathy and ego drive.

Empathy refers to the ability to understand the prospect’s feelings and to use that knowledge for a successful presentation. Ego drive refers to a special need to conquer – a need which motivates the top achiever to close the sale.

Mayer and Greenberg also found that creativity played a central role. They concluded that due to lack of creativity and outdated sales training, many salespeople are actually held back from achieving their potentials.

In the last ten years, a number of significant studies have been conducted to identify additional characteristics of high-performance people. Dr. Sidney Lecker, who taught psychiatry at Yale University, focused his research on the planning and performance of successful people in business and politics.

Dr. Lecker identified eight abilities leading to high performance:

1. High performance people know what they want and reject any activities which might distract them from their goal.

2. High performance people develop macro-attention to deal with giant undertakings, but, at the same time, efficiently solve many small day-to-day problems.

3. These people have the power of contrary thinking and can operate almost independently of what is happening in their environments. They create success environments.

4. High performance people can tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty. They can deal with confused situations that others would flee from.

5. These successful people set a winning pace in the marathon of life and thus avoid burning out, “hitting the wall,” and stress-related problems.

6. These people manage their emotions successfully and have all the characteristics of sound emotional health.

7. High performance people know how to use other people to get ahead, how to delegate, how to network with other high-performance people, and how to work cooperatively.

8. High-performance people understand and know how to use principles of human communication.

Jacqueline Thompson, a New York researcher and author, has studied some of the most successful entrepreneurs, salespeople and business leaders in the United States today. She lists seven traits of these superachievers in her book, The Very Rich Book:

1. High performance people are very competitive.

2. Work is the favorite hobby of high performance people. They draw few distinctions between work and play.

3. High performance people are social extroverts. At parties they try to talk to almost everyone.

4. These ultrasuccessful people are neither pessimists nor optimists. They are open minded, have few prejudices or preconceived notions, and are practical.

5. High performance people are rarely sick and very seldom take a day off.

6. Highly successful people seek constant change, avoid the status quo and dull routines.

7. High performance people have an almost unlimited attention span when they are doing something they enjoy.

Dr. Adele Scheele, a career strategist with a Ph.D. in Change Management, has been studying high performance people since 1969. In her book, Skills for Success, A Guide to the Top for Men and Women, she presents a unique set of guidelines for people who wish to reach their potential. She takes an unorthodox – but profound – approach to success by dividing people into two groups: The Sustainers – those who do a competent job but wait for recognition, and The Achievers – those who work harder and set up contributions and rewards.

Dr. Scheele identifies three main career skills:

1. Self presentation – Visibly getting and giving necessary attention.

2. Positioning – Taking risks with people.

3. Connecting – With colleagues, mentors and associates.

Dr. Charles Garfield, whom we introduced at the beginning, holds doctorate degrees in mathematics and psychology and has spent a considerable amount of effort researching many fields of high performance, including sports, business and selling. He is known for his innovative interviewing methods. (He asks his subjects targeted questions to test their earlier answers.)

Dr. Garfield describes the six key characteristics he has found in almost all high performers:

1. High performers are able to transcend their previous levels of achievement.

2. They avoid comfort zones where others get stuck.

3. They are guided by internal goals.

4. They solve problems rather than place blame.

5. They confidently take risks – after examining the worst consequences of an action.

6. They mentally rehearse coming events.

Profile of Success

Although many researchers have made significant progress in identifying behavior characteristics of top performers, only a few have been able to create ready-to-use, diagnostic tools for sales managers.

Among these pioneers, the Chally Group of Dayton, Ohio, has developed a “Successful Sales Profile Comparison” form which evaluates 17 success characteristics of salespeople selling to consumers. The form tests personality traits like assertiveness, persuasion skills, the desire to meet new people, level of energy, etc.

The ultimate challenge to be met by “success scientists” is to translate the research findings into effective training programs and thus to achieve the ultimate goal – to transplant successful performance characteristics.

Many training groups like DDI, Wilson, Mohr and in-house training professionals are using modern techniques such as behavior modeling or interactive video or computer learning techniques.

However, Dr. Garfield claims that achieving high performance goes far beyond the everyday training of basic job skills. He has created a unique seminar for business professionals on how to surpass their current limits.

“The development of high performance,” says Dr. Garfield, “is partially a matter of fine tuning knowledge and aptitudes that we already possess.”

In selling, it is also a careful blend of empathy and ego drive.

Dr. Donald J. Moine, a noted sales psychologist, neuro-linguistic selling expert and coauthor of The Sales Script Book as well as numerous other books and papers in the sales field, is offering the first and only sales training course to teach salespeople how to use the power of story telling to outperform their peers. For more information, please write Dr. Donald J. Moine, 904 Silver Spur Rd., Rolling Hills Estates, CA 90274, or call 213/378-2666.