Commitment is Meaningless without Belief
Recently, I was in a discussion with an executive about the lack of commitment he felt was present in his staff. As we continued the discussion it became very evident that he was in the middle of a major change initiative within his group and it was not working well. As we continued our discussion one key factor became evident – he really didn’t believe it would work.
So, I visited with several of his key people and discussed the new initiative. Again, on the surface, everyone stated they were committed to the initiative however they felt two things. First, they felt their leader was not sincere since he continually did things that did not help their move forward. Second, they did not really feel it would work for various reasons.
Therefore, the initiative was doomed from the beginning. There appeared to be commitment, yet, few really believed in the success of the initiative. Thus, Commitment is Meaningless without Belief!
So what really happened? The Commitment was Meaningless without Belief. Here is what we found out…
First, commitment is the new brain or rational brain talking which is significant in the logical world only. Let me ask you a question, how often do you or did you do something that you knew not to do? Or, you knew what to do and you did something else?
The thinking brain can and will be overridden by your emotional brain since the emotional brain can process data and respond to stimulation at a rate to 100 to 200,000 times faster than our thinking brain can function. While the thinking brain is fast, it is slow compared to the emotional brain – the source of decisions. But that is a topic for another day.
Second, when conflicting beliefs are established and have a strong emotional charge in your memory banks – then all decisions and actions related to the belief is influenced by your belief system. Thus, new actions or decisions defer to the old belief.
What this means to you is all your decisions are heavily influenced by both emotion and your beliefs. This explains why certain things happen in your life and others around you – especially employees and staff at your organizations. This is the key to why most traditional training done for both new skills or new change initiatives are resisted during the actual implementation or execution.
In summary, the reason commitment is meaningless in most cases is due to a lack of awareness about current belief structures of the people expected to implement the commitment. Got it? If this is still unclear, please contact us at 901-757-4434 and we will be happy to discuss it. Just remember that beliefs rule the world of decisions, actions and commitments.
Voss Graham
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Tags: Beliefs, Commitment, Emotional Brain, Execution, major change, Power of Beliefs, Thinking Brain, Voss Graham
