CHAPTER 3

Behaving Like a Hyper-Learner

Hyper-Learning is behavioral. Good intentions are not enough.

Behaviors are granular. They are reflected in how you talk, your tone, your physical presence, your volume, how you connect with people, how you listen, how you think, how you manage your emotions, how you ask questions, and how you react. Behaviors have impact. Behaviors can be positive or negative. Behaviors are how you operationalize your values, beliefs, and purpose.

This chapter is about illuminating the key behaviors you’ll need to adopt or improve upon to increase your ability to become a Hyper-Learner and stay relevant in this rapidly progressing digital age.

Let’s reflect together. In the Prologue, we talked about how Hyper-Learning requires a New Way of Being and a New Way of Working that facilitates learning, unlearning, relearning, and continually updating your mental models to keep pace with technological change in the digital age.

I explained that I believe Hyper-Learning will be necessary for human beings to do the skills that technology will not be able to do well: higher-order thinking involving creativity, imagination, and innovation as well as critical thinking that is not linear or that involves moral judgments or little data. You also learned about the increasing importance of high emotional and social intelligence, not only because as the digital age progresses jobs requiring those skills will be even more prevalent but also because Hyper-Learning itself requires us to excel at socially and emotionally connecting with others who can help elevate our thinking and learning.

In chapter 1, we discussed the science of us—our typical way of being and the realities of how our minds and bodies interact and operate, much of which can compromise our ability to Hyper-Learn unless managed. We then discussed how to cultivate a state of Inner Peace as a first positive step toward Hyper-Learning.

In chapter 2, we discussed the need to change our beliefs and assumptions about how the world works and how best to manage ourselves in it to create a mindset conducive to Hyper-Learning. That chapter outlined certain theories and philosophies (e.g., about human existence, about how and why to manage one’s mind) that are relevant to developing a Hyper-Learning Mindset.

This chapter’s purpose is to drill down to the basic behaviors that enable Hyper-Learning and to give you the opportunity to actively participate in choosing the Hyper-Learning Behaviors that you believe are most crucial and important for you to adopt or improve upon to become a Hyper-Learner.

To do that, we are going to learn from a successful public company that specializes in the property and casualty insurance area, W. R. Berkley Corporation (WRBC). The leaders of WRBC decided that because of coming digital age advances, all employees must excel at continual innovation, and thus they developed a behavioral approach to innovation. You should walk away from this chapter with a plan for how you will improve your Hyper-Learning Behaviors and how you will measure your progress.

WHAT ARE LEARNING BEHAVIORS?

So far, you’ve read about how your brain, mind, body, and emotions are all interrelated and involved in how you learn, and you’ve also discovered that you learn best when others help you overcome your reflexive ways of being.

You’ve also read that as the digital age progresses, most human activities will be team-based, require collaboration, or involve the delivery of services that are emotionally laden.

You’ve learned how positive emotions are critical to effective collaboration and human engagement.

Learning behaviors, then, are broader than just linear thinking behaviors. They include the social behaviors that enable emotional engagement with others and high-performance collaboration.

They also include the behaviors that enable innovation, creativity, and emergent thinking (an activity you’ll learn more about in part 2).

All of those types of thinking require exploration and discovery and, in many cases, going into the “unknown.” Learning is much more than just memorizing facts or developing a skill.

WORKSHOP: IDENTIFYING HYPER-LEARNING BEHAVIORS

Step 1: Reflecting on the first part of this book and your experience as a learner, please make a list of behaviors that you think are necessary for you to become a Hyper-Learner. Yes, it could be a long list. Think of this as a brainstorming exercise. Don’t evaluate or critique. Just generate your list of behaviors. Behaviors should be observable by a third party.

Here are some ways to think about this. We have defined Hyper-Learning as learning, unlearning, and relearning.

What behaviors would help you learn?

What behaviors would help you unlearn? Be granular and keep it simple.

For example, one learning behavior might be “asking questions in order to understand why something is true.” Another learning behavior might be “refraining from being defensive when someone disagrees with you.”

This is important. This exercise is your introduction into thinking behaviorally. It is not an easy task because most of us have not been trained to think behaviorally.

I suggest you take 15 to 20 minutes for this exercise.

Okay. Here is a short list I created of possible Hyper-Learning Behaviors. I am not saying it is inclusive. It is the list I use in my teaching and consulting. You probably have some behaviors on your list that I don’t have and vice versa.

A Hyper-Learner exhibits these qualities and takes these actions:

   Curiosity, exploration, imagination

   Embraces uncertainty and ambiguity

   Open-mindedness

   Challenges the status quo

   Humility, a Quiet Ego

   Emotional and social intelligence

   Mindfulness, being fully present

   Stress-tests one’s thinking

   Empathy

   Effectively collaborates

   Courage and candor

   Uses data-driven decision-making

   Resilience

   Reflectively listens

   Manages self (mind, body, emotions, ego, and behaviors)

   Trustworthiness and integrity

Step 2: How does your list compare to mine? Please consolidate them.

Step 3: Now assume you have been asked to lead a team that will recommend seven key Hyper-Learning Behaviors from your consolidated list for a new initiative at your work.

Which behaviors are foundational?

Look for key behaviors that can be defined by several granular sub-behaviors that are actually observable.

For example, say you choose effectively collaborates as one of your key behaviors. That would be a good choice because you could probably easily identify several granular sub-behaviors of effective collaboration that could be observable by a third party and measured. It also would be a good choice because of the importance that collaboration plays in team activities.

This will take you some time. It requires thinking deeply about how best to learn and considering what you have learned so far about Inner Peace and a Hyper-Learning Mindset.

I highly recommend that you do this exercise together with someone—a work colleague, friend, or loved one. Do the exercise yourself first and then share it with someone and collaborate. That would be a wonderful and fun learning experience.

Step 4: Once you have identified your seven Hyper-Learning Behaviors, I want you to get granular by identifying the observable sub-behaviors that would evidence each of those desired behaviors and the observable sub-behaviors that would evidence the lack of each desired behavior. This is key.

Using my example of effectively collaborates, what granular sub-behaviors evidence that someone is an effective collaborator? Assume you say, “Being a good listener.” That is a good start. But how can you tell that someone is a good listener? How does a good listener behave? What can you observe that tells you it is highly likely that someone is a good listener? How about, before responding, she asks questions to make sure she understands what the other person is saying. Is that observable? Yes. Is that a good sub-behavior that would enable effective collaboration? Yes.

Okay, let’s come up with an observable sub-behavior that would indicate someone is an in effective collaborator. Got one? Please write it down. Is it observable?

Here’s one: a person who interrupts a speaker to tell the speaker why he or she is wrong would be an in effective collaborator. What do you think? Is that an observable sub-behavior that evidences poor collaboration?

Why is this exercise and its granularity so important?

Because to change behaviors, you need to measure yourself and hold yourself accountable. To do that you must be able to objectively confirm the data (your behavior).

What I mean by getting granular is directly and objectively observing behaviors without making any assumptions or guesses about why you are behaving or not behaving the desired way. And granular means observing the details: how you talk, the words you use, your tone, how you connect to people, your facial expressions, your presence, how you listen, and so on.

Here is another example. Many clients choose reflectively listens as a key behavior, and they tend to state that making eye contact is an observable sub-behavior that demonstrates listening. I ask them how they know a person making eye contact is really listening. Could the person be daydreaming or thinking about what he or she will say next instead of listening?

To help you understand how to do this, here is the result of a similar exercise I conducted in consultation with WRBC. The company identified courage as one of its key behaviors and identified a set of granular sub-behaviors that would evidence courage and a set of sub-behaviors that would evidence a lack of courage.

You will probably note that some of WRBC’s observable sub-behaviors may not be as observable as they think. But this is hard, and it was a good start for them.

Now it is your turn.

This exercise will take you about an hour. Please use your Learning Journal.

Please list your top seven desired Hyper-Learning Behaviors. Then, for each of those behaviors, list seven observable sub-behaviors that evidence the desired behavior and seven observable sub-behaviors that evidence a lack of the desired behavior. Some people find listing negative behaviors easier and then inverting the negative behavior into a positive behavior.

I suggest you make your list and then explain the objective to a friend or loved one and have them stress-test the granularity of the observable sub-behaviors you identified to see if they are granular enough.

Please save your work product. This is the first step.

You will have the opportunity to reevaluate your desired Hyper-Learning Behaviors after you read the WRBC story that follows and take the Hyper-Learning Behaviors Diagnostic at the end of the chapter. Now let’s look at how WRBC approached the need for every one of its 8,000 employees to become a Hyper-Learner. They took the approach that they would make “Innovation by All” a strategic business objective, and for that objective to happen, employees had to become, in effect, Hyper-Learners because innovation requires continual learning, unlearning, and relearning through experimentation. To operationalize “Innovation for All” they used the mindset and behaviors approach I’ve been describing.

THE WRBC STORY

WRBC was founded by Bill Berkley in 1967 when he was a student at Harvard Business School. In 2019, the company’s estimated revenue was $7.7 billion, and it had a market capitalization of $13 billion. Bill Berkley is now the company’s executive chairman, and his son, Rob Berkley, is president and CEO.

WRBC is an entrepreneurial company with a decentralized, parent holding company structure and 53 market-facing subsidiaries—46 of which were created internally. Each subsidiary has lots of autonomy over daily operations because its people are closest to the customer and the market.

WRBC’s strong people-centric culture is common across all subsidiaries. Two quotes from the company’s 2018 annual report illustrate this:

“The culture of our Company emphasizes that everything we do and every person who participates is important to our enterprise, and that always doing the right thing is the cornerstone of our success.

“Our values and principles are demonstrated every day at each of our operating units in the way we conduct our business, engage with our team members and give back to our communities. We exist as part of a greater society and have always believed in being supportive of the communities that we are part of because in the long run our enterprises and all its stakeholders’ benefit.”

In 2018, WRBC’s leaders decided that because of the disruption likely to arise from continued technological advances, the company needed to develop a culture of innovation throughout the organization. This is the story of how they went about doing it, bringing to life the importance of cultivating an inclusive, people-centric culture conducive to Hyper-Learning. As you read, think about the autonomy given to WRBC’s people and think about the invitation the company’s leaders are making. Notice how they talk about “feeling safe” and the “failure of innovation ideas.” Relate their words to what you learned from the first two chapters.

What the leadership is asking of everybody is that they embrace both a New Way of Being and a New Way of Working. Chairman Bill Berkley and CEO Rob Berkley explain as much in their own words below.

I suggest you now imagine yourself to be a WRBC employee reading or hearing these words from your chairman and your CEO.

I invite you to read slowly and savor each sentence.

Please underline phrases or sentences that resonate with you.

There is so much learning in their words. Let each sentence sink in and feel it. They are sharing with the entire company how they have made meaning of coming digital age challenges, and they are inviting every team member to join them on a journey to innovation as a core way of learning and staying relevant in the digital age.

THE WHY

Bill Berkley: Change is always a constant, and technology sort of put steroids in it because it makes change not only faster, it makes change in different ways. Artificial intelligence doesn’t just change how you look at things, it totally speeds up the process for decision making. Innovation is something that is constantly going on, and the idea isn’t necessarily to just try and be ahead of it, but try to recognize directionally—where things are going so you can be open-minded to understanding how things get built one upon the next.

Rob Berkley: I think as it’s been said in the past by our chairman, we as an organization have to have a constant discontent or dissatisfaction with the status quo. In order for us to be the company that we want to be in the future, we need to not only accept disruption, but we need to find ways to create it for ourselves, which is a hard thing to do.

When you’re a successful organization and what you’ve been doing, not just in the past but today, has worked well, trying to find ways to reinvent yourself, and challenge and question what you’ve been doing is not easy.

But, undoubtedly, just as sure as the world is changing, our industry is going to need to continue to change, and we as a company are going to need to find ways to change and innovate and disrupt what we’ve been doing in the past.

Well, certainly from our perspective, when people ask us, “What is the culture of W. R. Berkley Corporation?” our response is there are 53 different cultures, but our expectation is that throughout those 53 different cultures, there is a handful of common values that serve as a common theme or a common thread throughout.

Our view is one of those values needs to be innovation, that finding ways to reinvent one’s self, finding ways to adapt your business model to a new reality that we’re facing every day, that’s part of the challenge, but that’s part of the opportunity.

What Is Innovation?

Bill Berkley: I think innovation is solving problems in a new way, doing things that are required to meet your customers’ needs in a way that is different using technology, using communications. It’s doing things in ways that are different. That’s really what innovation is all about. It’s helping to meet those customers’ needs, it’s helping to fulfill their expectations, and doing it better, faster, more efficiently and effectively at a lower price.

Rob Berkley: The employees are a key to this happening. The idea of innovation, this is not something that is going to come about by one or two people sitting in a room full of whiteboards. The ideas, the opportunities, and converting those ideas and opportunities into a reality, that is going to come from every member of the team. Some of the best ideas are going to come from people at all levels throughout the organization. This is a team sport, this is a team effort. This is not about any one individual. This is about us all working together in pursuit of a common goal.

Bill Berkley: You need everyone on your team to be working on it, looking at it, examining it, and be committed to embracing change, to embracing innovative ways of doing things to do better, and not to be afraid of failure just because you tried something new. If you try something new and it doesn’t work, you set it aside and you move ahead.

Rob Berkley: Our view is that innovation, again, is not about one person with one idea, but this is about everyone pulling together to really grapple with, “How do we make this a better business? How do we bring more value to customers?” Ultimately, that is something that we need everyone engaged in at all levels of the organization.

Innovation is not just about the one brilliant idea. Innovation is a constant effort of questioning the status quo, and, in every action and activity that we’re engaged in, “How do we do it better? How do we reinvent ourselves? How do we bring more value to customers?” That, undoubtedly, has to be something that is happening at all levels of the organization. If we want to have the future that we would all like to have, then we all as a team need to engage in this effort.

How Do You Innovate?

Bill Berkley: I think you have to make an environment that’s receptive to other people’s ideas. You have to make an environment that accepts the fact that failure is inevitable when you try new things. You have to make an environment where it’s much better to try something that’s thoughtful and have it fail than be afraid to try things. If you don’t try things, you can’t bring about change, you can’t be on that leading edge, you can’t do the best job for your customers, you can’t possibly optimize risk-adjusted return.

From our point of view, it’s the whole thing. You get there as a team because the team has to embrace each person’s contribution and make them feel like, “I value what you do, and if it doesn’t work out, it’s okay. Let’s look for the next thing.”

Rob Berkley: There are no failed initiatives, there are no failed experiments. They may be unexpected outcomes, they may be not at all what we had anticipated, but what we are very focused on is trying to create an environment where people are encouraged to experiment, they’re encouraged to question, they’re encouraged to try and find new and different ways to do what we have been doing all along.

I think the idea of innovation through people, or that tagline or title has really come about as a recognition that this progress, this opportunity is not going to be driven by anything other than the collaboration of the team, working, yes, as individuals but as a team to try and move the business forward. Innovation does not come through computers. Innovation comes through people with new ideas and doing something with those ideas.

Bill Berkley: It’s even more than that. It’s that people need to be accepting of those ideas. As Rob pointed out, they can’t say, “This failed.” They have to say, “Okay, what did we learn?” because every time you try something new, you learn something, and then you build on it.

You may try something else new that’s a little different that succeeds, and that wouldn’t have happened if you didn’t try something else that didn’t succeed. It’s really all about people benefiting from what each other’s trials and efforts are, so it’s really a team effort. That innovation comes about over a period of time with process, lots of the pieces of innovation are small, and every now and then it’s, “Eureka! I found it.” It’s a wonderful thing, and it makes a big change.

Rob Berkley: This is a call to participation, not just a call to action but a call to participation throughout the organization. Regardless of your role, regardless of your position, we need your engagement, we need your support, we need your participation in order to help move this forward. The best ideas are often found in cubicles and not corner offices. It’s a key ingredient in what our future will be.

Bill Berkley: Ten or twelve years ago, we put in our annual report that, “Everything counts, everyone matters.” That was really something that’s not far from this idea, and that is that every single person in our company an contribute to this process. Everyone has an idea, because they know their job, they know their particular place in our universe better than anyone else. They can contribute. They can make a difference. The reason it’s so important for everyone to contribute is because they have that expertise and that knowledge. For us to really succeed, we need all those people to have innovative ideas that let us reach that star.

Everyone has a place to contribute. Everyone has your own place, your idea. I think that starting from a blank sheet is really the optimization of innovation, is you start with a blank sheet and say, “Okay, if knowing what we know today and knowing what the world is today, how would we create an insurance company to do the very best for our customers, for our shareholders, for our employees for the society we operate in? What would it look like? What are the things that would make it extraordinary? How could we give the very best returns and, at the same time, give the best value to our customers?” Maybe you would think of things in a different light altogether.

Rob Berkley: We are so encumbered by our day-to-day life and the process, and how we operate every day. What we’re looking to do in this effort around innovation is to almost unencumber ourselves, and, as suggested, stare at the blank sheet of paper, and if you were going to start from scratch, what would you build?

In May 2018, WRBC’s senior leadership began as a team designing the system that would support an innovation culture. That system responded to the following three questions about innovation: Why innovation? What is innovation? How do you innovate? Answering those questions required new mindsets, behaviors, and processes.

We started with the senior leadership team, about 16 people, in a two-day workshop. They made meaning of the questions together in small teams and created a short list of Berkley Innovation Behaviors doing the same process that you recently did—defining observable sub-behaviors that evidence the desired behavior and sub-behaviors that evidence a lack of the desired behavior. Then that list of observable sub-behaviors was iterated by a team over a month.

On my recommendation, they adopted a growth mindset and NewSmart mindset and agreed to the principles of psychological safety, self-determination theory, and an idea meritocracy.

Their work produced seven key innovation behaviors.

Berkley Innovation Behaviors:

1. Managing Self

2. Reflective Listening

3. Courage

4. Evidence-Based Decision-Making

5. Effective Collaboration

6. Challenging the Status Quo

7. Resilience

A note to employees announcing the seven Berkley Innovation Behaviors described them as “the foundation for the new ways of thinking and working together that will lead to better outcomes. Practiced with daily rigor and discipline, they will help us infuse our culture with a new spirit of curiosity, collaboration, and positive action.”

In August 2018, the company held three-day workshops for approximately six subsidiaries at time. Each subsidiary president came with a diverse team of four or five colleagues to participate in various experiential, making-meaning workshops. The workshops focused on the needed mindsets and behaviors and on how to use innovation processes. The following is a copy of the letter from senior leadership that served as the workshop invitation.

Please read this letter as if you were an employee of WRBC. Please underline the points that resonate with you.

Dear Colleagues:

As many of you are already aware, over the past year we have launched a comprehensive company-wide effort to incorporate a strategy of innovation into our culture and our operations. We would like to share with you our reasons for embarking upon such a wide-reaching initiative, and ask you for your participation in these efforts. We are pleased to share with you the enclosed video expressing those thoughts.

Our world is continually changing. As consumers, we are aware that technology is changing the way we conduct our daily lives, whether it is how we order groceries, buy tickets, watch movies, or conduct our banking. What may not be as readily apparent is that our industry is in the early stages of the same type of disruption. We are historically a traditional, transaction-based business that until now has succeeded, or failed, in a significant way on the basis of operational excellence. But we are now in an era where performing as we once did—albeit at a very high level of quality—will no longer be enough. We must learn to perform the day-to-day functional aspects of running our businesses while generating the creative thinking that leads to innovations both big and small. And we must institutionalize the processes, mindsets, and behaviors that will allow us to sustain this momentum. Innovation must become an ongoing, sustainable part of our culture.

We are not changing who we are—we are enriching our culture with a new element. Our core values, with a constant focus on Accountability; People-Oriented Strategy; Responsible Financial Practices; Risk-Adjusted Returns; and Transparency, remain steadfast. What we hope to do now is enhance our existing strengths with a new drive for innovation, building on the competitive advantages of our decentralized model and our greatest asset—you, our people.

This will be an ongoing process that will require new ways of thinking and doing from each and every one of us, from running our daily operations to meeting customer needs and to anticipating the “next big thing” on the horizon. It will require new behaviors, built on collegiality and collaboration in a psychologically safe environment. And it must be a commitment by all to a new, and better, way of growing our business as we strive for even better outcomes through risk-adjusted return. But most of all, it will require the participation and the contributions of those at every level of the organization—the very best ideas are more often born not to those in the corner offices, but to people who are close to the task, the customer, and the communities in which they live and serve. This has been the cornerstone of our competitive advantage since our inception.

This is an exciting time. Change is always a daunting prospect, but with it also comes unlimited opportunity—an opportunity for all of us to improve how we work and how we live. This is our investment not just in our business but in each of you. Our model, with its autonomous, decentralized structure, is ideally positioned to allow for each individual to think outside the normal structures and barriers and contribute the unique solutions that will make us better as employees, as operating units, and as an enterprise that strives to make a difference.

Over the coming weeks, you will be hearing more from your team leaders and colleagues about the ways in which you can add your voice and the significant value you bring to our enterprise to this initiative. This is above all a team effort—and it will succeed only to the extent that every member of our W. R. Berkley family lends their ideas, their energy, and their commitment.

We invite you to join us as we build the company of the future.

Bill Berkley and Rob Berkley

WRBC Behaviors

Here again are the seven Berkley Innovation Behaviors that senior leadership identified as crucial to creating a culture of innovation along with observable sub-behaviors that can be used to assess whether the main behavior is being achieved. The following is WRBC’s actual work product that they use in all their companies. It reflects a very good behavioral approach to Hyper-Learning.

For each desired behavior, two sets of measurements are required:

   What observable actions evidence that the behavior is present?

   What observable actions evidence that the behavior is not present?

I am very grateful to Bill Berkley and Rob Berkley for sharing their approach and their Innovation Behaviors with you. They are a powerful learning tool.

I am sure you realize by now that their Innovation Behaviors are the same behaviors at which a Hyper-Learner needs to excel.

Now I invite you to do the following workshop as the capstone for this chapter. This will help you finalize your list of desired Hyper-Learning Behaviors and will help you focus on which desired behaviors you should prioritize for improvement.

WORKSHOP: HYPER-LEARNING BEHAVIORS DIAGNOSTIC

I invite you to take the following Hyper-Learning Behaviors Diagnostic to help you focus on creating your personal Hyper-Learning Behaviors Development Plan. Please answer the questions honestly. I have used most of this content with over 3,000 senior executives. When people are honest, there are very few grades of 4 or 5 (or for negatively stated questions, grades of 1 or 2) because most of us have not been trained in learning behaviors. The most common score is a 3.

Use this diagnostic to create your Hyper-Learning Behaviors Development Plan, including the behaviors you need to improve and your strategy for doing so. This plan together with your Daily Intentions and your Hyper-Learning Mindset are your Hyper-Learning enablers.

WHAT’S NEXT?

How do you change behaviors? Improve behaviors?

I won’t go into theories of behavior change in too much depth here (chapter 8 of my previous book, Humility Is the New Smart, discusses them in detail), but here is a short primer for you.

1. For successful people like you to change your behavior, you first need to change your story about how you define yourself. You are being asked to become a Hyper-Learner. That likely requires behaviors different from the behaviors that have brought you success so far. If you want to remain successful, you need new behaviors—a New Way of Being that enables Hyper-Learning. You need to create a new story by asking yourself, what would happen if I adopted the needed Hyper-Learning Behaviors? How will these behaviors benefit me?

2. Hopefully, the Daily Intentions and Hyper-Learning Mindset principles you identified in chapters 1 and 2, respectively, will help you change your behaviors. Their purpose is to help you create and operationalize your new story. You should go back and review your Daily Intentions and your Hyper-Learning Mindset principles and make changes based on your learnings from this chapter. You should do that throughout this book as you continue to learn.

3. The third key part is that your personal story has to deal with your FEAR. What concerns you about the need to become a Hyper-Learner? What concerns you about trying to achieve Inner Peace? Does it seem too hard? Does it seem like it takes too much time? Are you fearful of not being able to do this? Are you fearful of being transparent and honest with others about what you need to improve? What is holding you back?

4. You will be able to change your behaviors when you become convinced that the upside of changing outweighs the downside of not changing. Think about that. What is the downside? Well, if the scientists and thought leaders are correct, the downside is huge. At least I think so. Why do I believe it is huge? Think about what could happen if you can’t excel at doing the skills that smart technology can’t do. I am not trying to scare you. I am trying to invite you to think deeply about the content in this book, assess your situation, and make the best judgment you can using critical thinking processes.

5. After you have created your new story, take the following steps to change your behavior:

   (a) Start with a foundational behavior—one that enables other behaviors. Pick one or two sub-behaviors with respect to which you scored the lowest. Reflect upon why you behave the way you do. What benefit does it give you? What negative effect could it be creating? Why should you change that behavior? How do you specifically propose to change? What will you do behaviorally?

   (b) Find an accountability partner or partners from trusted teammates at work and, ideally, also at home. Tell your partner that you want him or her to observe you and appropriately “call you out” when you behave in the nondesired way.

   (c) Measure yourself daily. Use visualization techniques to see yourself behaving differently before each meeting. My experience is that you will change when you become fully committed to changing.

6. Have a behavioral checklist that you review before each meeting. Take two minutes before each meeting and take deep breadths to calm down and be fully present. Then say relevant mantras such as: “I am not my ideas.” “Listen to learn, not to confirm.” “Collaboration is not a competition.” “Ask questions before telling.”

7. After meetings, mentally replay your performance. If you behaved inappropriately, think about how you felt then. What triggered your behavior? Is that an early warning sign? How can you improve?

8. If you are having difficulty, talk it out with a trusted other and seek the advice of an expert, someone who is good at the desired behavior. Ask that person how he or she learned to behave the desired way. Get advice. Change is hard but doable. And you will never run out of behaviors to change or improve. It is a JOURNEY—part of the journey to your Best Self. Make the journey fun. Celebrate your successes and do not get down when the journey gets hard. Mental visualization and deep reflection are very helpful.

ONWARD!