If you are responsible for coaching those on your team, you may be hurting their chances for success by encouraging them to think positively.  This revelation is completely opposite from what the self-help industry would suggests.  New research, however, claims that the “power of positive thinking” pontificators may be on the wrong track…

In a recent article in Time Magazine, John Cloud highlights the following research:

“Is there power in positive thinking?  A study just published in the journal Psychological Science says trying to get people to think more positively can actually have the opposite effect:  it can simply highlight how unhappy they are.

The study’s authors, Joanne Wood and John Lee of the University of Waterloo and Elaine Perunovic of the University of New Brunswick, begin with a common-sense proposition:  when people hear something they don’t believe, they are not only often skeptical but adhere even more strongly to their original position…  [This is true because] many of us are reluctant to revise our self-judgment, especially for the better.

In 1994, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology published a paper showing that when people get feedback that they believe is overly positive, they actually feel worse, not better.  If you try to tell your dim friend that he has the potential of an Einstein, he won’t think he’s any smarter; he will probably just disbelieve your contradictory theory, hew more closely to his own self-assessment and, in the end, feel even dumber.”

As a coach, your job is to help people understand their legitimate strengths.  Everyone has strengths, but many people have a difficult time recognizing and implementing them successfully.  Much of your work should be focused in this area.  When you do spend time on weaknesses, show how these deficiencies can be shored up by others.  Nobody is perfect, but in a team environment we all compensate for each other in some way or another. 

This principle is difficult to remember when coaching someone.  We’re all too eager to provide encouragement, concentrate on the positive, and highlight what’s going right.  But, however well-intended, telling a person something that is not true, or choosing to focus only on the positive, typically backfires.  Think about all the great professional coaches we all hold in high esteem… Lou Pinella, Mike Holmgren, Billy Martin, Bobby Knight…. are they known only for their positive strokes?  Not so much.  
 
The correct formula for improvement is to teach those on your team to better utilize their strengths and become more mindful of their weaknesses.  As John Cloud puts it, “Mindfulness…can teach people to put their shortcomings into a larger, more realistic perspective.  Call it the power of negative thinking.”