Chapter 14

Are You In, or Aren’t You?

Have you ever received a gift from a friend, family member, or other such generous person and realized upon opening it that you just didn’t like it? Years ago I received a Christmas present from my girlfriend at the time. It was . . . special. She made me wait to open it last. She told me it was her favorite gift and the one she was most excited about giving me. It was wrapped nicely, about the size of a piece of paper, and I had no idea what it was. I eagerly unwrapped it and realized that it was a gift certificate—and not just any gift certificate. It said, “You are hereby entitled to one free skydiving adventure!”

I remember looking at her and thinking, did I ask to jump out of a plane for Christmas? She said, “Isn’t it great? Aren’t you excited?” I was not really all that fired up about the idea, but when I expressed my lack of enthusiasm she said, “Come on! I’ve jumped out of a plane twice, and I’m a girl! You aren’t going to let a girl outdo you, are you?”

“Um, yes, actually,” I thought. “I think I’m cool with that!” She gave enough, well, encouragment, until finally I agreed. I don’t think there is a better illustration of taking action than what I experienced on that adventure.

When we arrived at the skydiving airport about two hours from my home, I was escorted into a room where I was shown a video of a lawyer. He shared with me that what I was about to do was very dangerous and that they had no insurance—zero, zip, nada. In order to jump, I had to release any and all liability by signing a small mountain of paperwork they placed in front of me. “Nice,” I thought. “I may die and there’s nothing that can be done about it. That’s always the best way to start an experience.”

I was then escorted to a room where other adventurists sat waiting to be instructed on the best practices for leaping out of a perfectly good airplane. In came the chief instructor, who gave us very detailed instructions about how to survive and enjoy a jump from 12,000 feet. He told us that we would be introduced to our instructors. Then we would get on a plane and climb to 12,000 feet. At the appropriate time, we would walk to the back of the airplane, hook up to our instructors, and, when directed to do so, we would rock three times and gently roll out of the airplane. “Right,” I thought. “Just gently roll out of the plane.” Immediately upon jumping, the instructor would tap us on the shoulders, indicating it was time to spread our arms and legs. When we got down to 5,000 feet, our instructors would tap us twice on the right hip. This was our cue to pull the orange rip cords attached to our jump suits that would, in turn, open our parachutes.

After this quick lesson in skydiving, we were escorted to a garage-like room where we were equipped with jump suits (very tight), altimeters (devices that tell you your altitude), and goggles. I hired a videographer to tape my demise and out we went to watch another group jump.

As we stood looking skyward, I asked the instructor what we were watching. He said we were waiting for that teeny, tiny spec in the sky (apparently an airplane) to fly over so the people could jump and we could watch. Right on cue, tiny little human dots started coming out of the bigger dot. Seconds later, parachutes starting opening.

All except one. I looked at the instructor and said, “Uh, this isn’t what the brochure promised!”

He said, “That guy is crazy. He jumps here all the time and he’s a competitive jumper.” Seconds passed. Parachute still not open. I started to get worried. Then, finally, at what seemed like the last second, the chute spread out above the jumper’s head.

As the group landed, they walked over to us. The crazy guy with the late parachute walked right up to me. “Is your name Mike Staver?”

I got a sick feeling in my stomach and said, “Nope.”

He said, “Yes it is. I’m your instructor.” This was the man who was going to be strapped to my back and tell me when to pull the cord to open my parachute to make sure I didn’t die. Wonderful.

We got on the plane and hooked ourselves up to our instructors, and as the plane reached 12,000 feet, we lined up to exit the nice, safe airplane. My crazy instructor and I were third in line. The first pair jumped with no worries. As the second pair, a female instructor and a female student, got to the door, the student started screaming, “I’ve changed my mind! I’ve changed mind! I’ve changed my mind!”

“Too late!” her instructor yelled. Out they went.

Now it was my turn. My instructor asks, “Do you want to do the regular jump, or do you want to have some fun?”

“Uhh . . .” I’m on video, so what am I supposed to say? “Of course I want to have some fun.” Remember now, we were supposed to rock three times and gently roll out of the airplane. Well, apparently, “having some fun” did not include “gently rolling out of the airplane.” He yelled, “Let’s go!” With that, he did three huge, abrupt rocks, spun us around backward, and out we went, plummeting through the air with nothing beneath us but the ground. As we left the plane, we did a backflip and three somersaults. You know that feeling that you have when you are on a roller coaster or go over a hill in the car—the feeling of butterflies in your stomach, like you’re falling? When you jump out of an airplane, you feel that same feeling, but only for a second. Then you have the sensation of flying. It’s an exhilarating experience. We flew from 12,000 feet to 5,000 feet in seconds. I later learned that we were going almost 100 mph. Talk about wind in your face! What a rush! I highly recommend it.

You may be thinking, what does that have to do with action? It has everything to do with it! It all comes down to the differences between the jump of the woman in front of me and my own jump. These two examples are illustrations of how you can approach action.

In her case, she was prepared, she was safe, and she had an experienced mentor, and yet when it came to the moment of truth, she didn’t want to do it. As we discussed in the last chapter, her perception of danger was high and she wasn’t particularly confident that the plan she had was enough to protect her. The instructor basically said, “Your fear is irrelevant to me. You are going, and I am going with you,” and forced her out of the plane. She required external action to drive her behavior.

In my case, I too was prepared, had my safety gear and had an experienced, if a bit crazy, mentor. If I didn’t trust myself, I trusted him. In fact, my instructor (read: leader) asked me if I wanted to take it up a notch. He assessed whether or not I was willing to increase my performance. While I’m not sure if the flips and turns increased the danger, I am very certain that they increased the intensity of the experience! They required different choices and different behaviors than a regular jump, but they enhanced it and made it better. All it took was my willingness to try. Where the woman who went before me required external action to motivate her, I used a process of internal action to drive my performance to new levels.

The difference between internal action and external action is the foundation for high performance and success. You as the leader must assess which type of action your direct reports need in order to perform at the highest levels. Do you need to encourage them to achieve, or do you just need to ask them, “How much better do you want to be?” and let their own decisions do the rest? You may have a follower who needs to learn to give better presentations to advance his career, yet his fear of public speaking has prevented him from taking that next step. That would require your external action to direct him to take a presentation skills class. You may have a customer service rep who is hesitant in making decisions to satisfy customers, for fear of making the wrong decision. You would need to tell her to take risks while reassuring her that she won’t be punished. Alternatively, you may have a direct report who is highly motivated, but a bit confused, and just needs to be pointed in the right direction.

My bias is that if your followers don’t eventually learn to be motivated by internal action, then they will be compliant with expectations while never fully committing and engaging. They will adopt a wait-for-direction mindset rather than a take-initiative mindset, and it will be hard to prompt them to take action in anything.

Internal action has to do with resolve, choice, determination, commitment, surrender, and learning, while external action requires the simple physical achievement of tasks. If you are asked to do something by your boss that you don’t really want to do or that you think is a waste of time, you may do it, but internally you will not be committed. Your external actions align with the request, but your internal action does not. External action without internal action usually appears as the result of a request, expectation, or demand from some external source. The highest level of performance requires both external and internal action to be in alignment. While the woman who jumped out in front of me got the job done, I am not certain she enjoyed it.

It is not always necessary that you or your direct reports take internal action. Sometimes you just have to do what you...