How Focus Can Get Results

In a recent article on FOCUS, we outlined the five ways that focus can gain effective results. By aiming specifically at a goal, it’s like aiming a laser beam at a target; you go straight for the heart of the matter and identify how the means will achieve the end result.

Well, to back this up, let me ask you a question.

Do you remember the old circus with the lion tamer?

Of course you do. Now, of all the tools that the lion tamer has at his disposal, which one do you think is most effective? The whip? The gun? The chair?

Strangely, it’s this aspect of focus that comes to the forefront in this situation. Many people will assume it’s the whip or gun (the defensive items) that would be most valuable to the lion tamer.

Actually, it’s the chair. To us, it may seem just like a barrier between the tamer and the powerful lion. But there’s actually more to the chair than meets the eye. If you look at a chair that’s held up and pointed at you, you see four identical chair legs. People who know these things conjecture that when the lion sees all four identical legs, it can’t focus on any one in particular. Because of this lack of focus, it gets confused, and becomes afraid to attack, so doesn’t do so.

This may be wishful thinking, but if true, it shows that focus is really the key to getting results. Just like the lion, if we or our colleagues are confused as to what we are trying to achieve and why it’s so important to achieve it, we lose our focus. Have you ever in the past been bored or demotivated at work? Chances are your focus on whether what you are doing will help you achieve your goals has lost its clarity.

Focus, then, is key to achieving results. Without it, we meander, wandering from task to task, not identifying why we are doing something, or why we should continue to do it. Refocusing on the main purpose of achieving goals will help us achieve better results.

Many thanks

Sean McPheat

Managing Director

MTD Training   | Image courtesy by Danilo Rizzuti of FreeDigitalPhotos.Net