1. Commit to running The Big Apple Experiment within your company. This provides you with a unique and memorable way to highlight the importance of your employee’s attitude. People are often stunned that they have affected the rate of decay of an apple and this then opens their mind to the importance of being positive. For more information about doing your own experiment visit The Big Apple Experiment on Facebook.
2. Recognise that your emotional state at the beginning of the day will affect everyone you come into contact with, even those people you speak to by phone. The best way to optimise your energy and emotional outlook is to take up meditation. Meditation, which is an ancient practice and part of Eastern spiritual philosophy, involves sitting, usually in silence, and focusing on one thing, such as your breathing. According to Mark Williams, Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Oxford, brain scans have proved that meditation breaks the loop of feelings that trigger self-defeating thoughts and depression. A positive self-image energises you and others. A negative self-image drains you and others.
3. Operate in the NOW and be really ‘present’ with people. According to Nancy Kline, author of The Thinking Organisation “the quality of our listening, determines how intelligently the person responds to you’. Charismatic people are able to connect deeply with others in just a few seconds and are genuinely interested in what the other person is saying. Imagine that everyone you meet has an interesting insight for you to learn. When you look at them really see them and focus your concentration on them.
4. Speak from your heart. The world of business has drummed into us that we need to assert ourselves, think logically and trust only the facts and the evidence presented to us. The ability to inspire and ignite interest requires high levels of energy. People who are in touch with their emotions generate a strong electro-magnetic force field around them that is unconsciously ‘felt’ by others. People who disassociate from their emotions also disconnect interest. When you listen to your Emotional Guidance System and speak from your heart you become authentic and real.
5. Generate balanced energy for communication flow. At the tiniest, subatomic level, in the Quantum Field we are all pulsating atoms of energy, constantly interacting with the energy fields of those around us. In 1997, Cranfield University produced a thought-provoking report proving the impact of energy on performance and contribution. People with low energy are tired, depressed, stressed, angry or ill. In contrast, people with high energy levels are positive, creative, confident, healthy and in-balance. People with high energy are more attractive than people with low energy. Energy is addictive. We naturally crave it to make us feel better and unconsciously seek to steal it from others in 4 main ways:
• Intimidation – people like to hold the balance of power because the hold the balance of energy.
• Interrogation – when people fire many questions it is a form of energetic attack that will drain the energy of the person they are speaking with.
• Aloof – when people disassociate they erect an invisible wall around themselves that stops the flow of their energy towards others.
• Poor Me – being a victim will often trigger the concern of others causing energy to flow one-way towards the victim.
Balance your conversation so that your energies flow between you and the other person. If you start to feel drained, take control of the conversation until your energy builds again.
6. Identify the influences within your own business that are likely to create resistance in your workforce. For example:
• Have you recently downsized, cut operating costs and/or out-sourced services?
• Have you introduced and implemented significant changes in the last 12 months?
• Have sales revenues dropped recently?
If you answered ‘yes’ to any of the above questions then it is likely your employees are feeling scared and insecure. As a Charismatic Leader your role is to create a working environment where people feel safe. This reduces their resistance and enables them to optimise their performance.
7. Identify 3 issues you are experiencing within your business right now. For each one ask yourself the following questions:
• If this issue was a metaphor, what would it represent?
• How does this metaphor relate to me personally?
• What other areas or occasions in my life have I experienced this metaphor?
• What’s the emotional reaction this metaphor creates within me?
• What’s really the issue here?
Charismatic Leaders accept 100% responsibility for everything that happens in their life. Because we cannot consciously know reality (2 million bits of information every second) the only reality that is true to us is the one we create inside our own heads. If you change your inner reality this naturally changes your external reality. This way of looking at things can be summarised as Perception is Projection. What you perceive you will project onto others.
