What’s your motivation?

I absolutely HATE cleaning house so to motivate myself, I put in my Alice Cooper “The Alice Cooper Show” CD from 1977 and listen to the concert.  While listening to music, I couldn’t help but think about Alice Cooper in his sixties, still out there performing. Interestingly enough, you can watch the same band today and he attacks the stage and with the same energy.   It’s almost as if he’s playing to people who have never seen them live and he wants to make the experience unforgettable, AND to those who’ve seen them many times before.  In both cases, the concerts are outstanding. Alice Cooper plays like it’s the first time anyone has seen them.

It became very clear to me that the music is infectious and my motivation.  What’s yours?  Is there something that you do routinely and are finding yourself getting bored with?  If so, remember, the routine you do might be the first experience somebody has with you.  For them, they would expect to see you performing with the enthusiasm of it being your first time “on stage.”  If people have dealt with your or your organization before, they expect you to top the last performance.

Jimmy Buffet must be absolutely SICK of singing Margaritaville, but it’s his signature song.  He needs to perform it as if the audience has never heard it before.  For them, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience to see him.  If I ever get to see Alice Cooper in concert, I’ll expect to hear all the classics performed with the energy I see in my 1977 CD, anything less would be a letdown.  You can’t afford any of the people you contact to have a letdown either.  What’s your motivation?

This week, think about what you can do to treat your job, audience, task, or performance as if it’s the first in front of a new audience or in front of someone who’s seen it numerous times.  It will definitely cause you to ramp up your game.  I’m up for it.  Are you?