Why How What of High Performance

Over the weekend, I learnt a very powerful lesson from Simon Sinek at TED: the WHY HOW WHAT model of high performance

Most people are very good in explaining WHAT, like a manager telling his team member what are the things to do to get a job done right.

Many managers are even better in detailing the HOW, like all the SOPs and procedures to do the WHAT.

Almost no mangers bother to explain the WHY: the purpose and reason behind the reason for doing the task. We all know that without a strong WHY, there is little push for a person to do a job well. That’s why many people produce mediocre work: they just go through the motion and getting all the steps done right but you as a manager know that something is missing.

It’s the little thing that’s missing that is causing performance to be average and not great. That little thing is the WHY.

You sell, Apple's Steve Jobs did not go out to tell people what are its products, their features and how good they are. Steve Jobs went straight to the WHY: because Apple wants to re-invent the phone and change the way we communicate. (that’s how he launched the legendary touch-phone iPhone in 2007).

So my readers, the following course is important to you because you can get much higher performance in your team if you’re able to lead and manage them effectively.

By Andy Ng of Asia Trainers, details at here.

Comments

What an Executive Coach and Business Coach Does

The Secret Under the Mattress: Why would a 79-year Man Bet So Big on 4D?

It was 2007 when we discovered his secret. While moving my father’s mattress, we found them: heaps and heaps of Singapore Pools 4D tickets. They were stacked in layers, a paper trail of lost hopes. What shocked us most wasn’t just the volume, but the stakes. He wasn’t betting a few dollars for fun. He was punting hundreds of dollars per draw—nearly ten times a month. At the time, my siblings and I were furious. Our father was a 79-year-old retiree. We wondered, with a mix of anger and confusion, why a man at his stage of life would need to win such "big money." What was he going to do with the money? We saw it as a reckless habit, a sign of poor judgment in his final years. Some of us would say, "If I were to give him money to buy 4D, why don't I use the money and buy 4D myself? At least I have better discipline". It has taken me two decades, and the experience of raising my own three grown-up children, to finally see the truth that was hidden under that matt...

Head Bleeding when the Chair Falls

The Weight of Silence: What Were We Really Arguing About? My earliest memories are punctuated by the sound of shouting. In 1970, when I was barely 6 years old, I stood as a small witness to the fierce quarrels between my father and my late eldest brother Kah Yang (he passed away in 1971 at the age of 17). As I grew up, these contradictions became the soundtrack of our lives, usually centered around our family's shoe shop and clothing stalls in Chinatown. In the court of family opinion, the verdict was almost always the same: my father was "wrong." He was judged as a man who didn't fulfill his role, who wasn't "burdening" enough for the family’s success. But as I look back from the vantage point of 2026, I have to ask: Was that actually true? Let me finally put to rest what my father did right: the truths that were buried under decades of criticism: Unseen Labor: He worked grueling, long hours. I remember him hauling boxes of goods and equipment to set u...

Business and Money Tips

Search This Blog