style="font-size:15px;"> In my case, working with Olympic athletes and coaches has led to an understanding of the profound power of the Third Factor. Olympic sport provides the ideal “performance laboratory” where the role of the Third Factor can be closely observed. In the world of international athletics, the truly great coaches have a strong developmental bias that is directed at the Third Factor in the performer. Coaches with a strong developmental bias are always concerned with encouraging their performers to engage their Third Factor, to get passionate about developing themselves. Through my 25 years of involvement with the Olympic movement, I have seen first-hand the remarkable outcomes that this produces—both at the Games and afterward, in life.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Walton, former players of legendary basketball coach John Wooden, wax eloquent about him. But it’s not about the basketball skills he taught them. It’s about the role Coach Wooden played in their development as human beings, encouraging them to be the best they could be and to take an active role in their own growth and development. John Wooden is not unique in this regard. I have worked with many coaches over the years and witnessed their developmental bias and their skill at igniting the Third Factor in their performers. Doug Leigh, one of the world’s top figure skating coaches, put it succinctly once when we were discussing a world-class skater late in his career. “In the end,” he said, “all you have left is the person.”
If you have purchased or are leafing through this book, you already have a fair dose of the Third Factor. People looking for ways to help others improve by getting better at something themselves are engaging their Third Factor in big ways. Similarly, the developmental bias already at work in you may have drawn you to the book’s title or contents page.
The Third Factor
The concept of the Third Factor, critical in developing performers, originated with Kazimierz Dabrowski, under whom I studied in 1977 and 1978. I want to make it clear that I am borrowing the concept— which he considered important in the development of moral and emotional growth—and employing it in a much more simplistic manner than he did. I use the term as a way of talking about self-direction and the development of self-awareness and self-responsibility in the people we coach and manage.
Dabrowski believed that developmental potential has three components:
Nature. These factors establish the physical and mental “road map” of the individual. They include genetic as well as other factors such as a mother’s alcohol consumption during pregnancy.
Nurture. These are the social and physical (environmental) factors that contribute to the shaping of the individual, such as parents, friends, school, financial status, culture and nationality. “Nurture” modifies your “nature.” A good upbringing is obviously an asset, but as we will see, a less-than-ideal upbringing need not limit where you end up. The term ideal is also in need of some definition in that a conflict- and adversityfree upbringing sometimes can be limiting in terms of personal growth and development.
The Third Factor. This is the factor of choice. No matter what the genetic and environmental endowments bestowed on individuals, they have the potential to transcend these endowments through the action and power of the Third Factor. The individual can make a conscious choice to change and to become a higher-level individual. Simply put, the Third Factor is the important role that an individual plays in his or her own “becoming.”
This self-development often happens in times of conflict, when the person becomes dissatisfied in some way with themselves. Initially there may be an external conflict, a failure, loss or disappointment, but the person internalizes it, and the dissatisfaction between “what is” and “what ought to be” is the impetus for the emergence of the Third Factor. We will see that emotion is a critical factor in where performers end up developmentally.
The Third Factor is the key to high performance because it requires engaging the will and becoming increasingly more self-responsible and aware. It’s not possible to go back and change or trade in our genetic gifts, or to select “better” parents to re-raise us. What is, is. We have to work with what we have. Nor can people be pushed to the highest level. They have to have their own desire to get better at what they’re doing. Others, however, most notably leaders, teachers and coaches with developmental bias, can take an active role in developing in others the self-sufficiency necessary to perform. And when the developmental bias of a good leader “plugs into” the Third Factor in a performer . . . WOW happens.
Over the past few decades much has been written on self-development, empowerment, personal power and other concepts that, at first blush, would appear to be synonymous with the Third Factor. But much of pop psychology is not about awareness and true self-development. It is more a denial or “riding over” of a person’s current reality through conditioning or reprogramming: “Listen to this CD series daily and you’ll begin to believe.” There are good programs out there, but most are about pushing the person to a new place. Igniting the Third Factor is all about pull. It is very much grounded in self-direction.
It is not about willpower, a forced changing and driving oneself forward, but more about developing an awareness of free will and our choices. It is about being pulled toward growth. It is not adding a layer of new “to dos,” but removing blind spots and seeing what is possible and, again, being pulled by that.
I sometimes think of the Third Factor as an uncovering of what we already possess and a realization of what is therefore possible. It is as if we own an amazing “computer” that has a powerful program of self-development installed, but that remains undiscovered and dormant until the user, often with the help of an exceptional coach, leader or parent, becomes aware of it. Then everything changes and new possibilities arise. In that instant, igniting has occurred, and the Third Factor begins to help the person evolve.
Our understanding of this concept will grow as we progress through the book.
A quick word on terminology. I will use the words coach, manager and leader interchangeably in what follows. The skills apply to anyone (parent or teacher or coach or manager) developing anyone anywhere. I tend to use the word coach more frequently because I believe that is the management style most needed in today’s workplace. I want leaders and managers to think of themselves as coaches.
Developmental Bias
Developmental bias is the underpinning for every truly successful coach. Coaches with a developmental bias recognize the importance of, and are passionate about, growing and developing people. Success for these coaches is not only about the results but also about building competence, commitment, capacity and passion in their performers. They take on a bigger role than simply supervising, directing or managing.
Coaches who have a strong developmental bias rarely, if ever, in any way damage those under their care. This is not true of those who serve their own interests from a top-down position. The exceptional coaches stand out because of the results their people are able to produce.
This book is about developing a developmental bias. It is written for anyone with an interest in learning how to help others grow and develop. Some people seem to be born with that urge, but for most of us, a developmental bias emerges gradually, becoming obvious only when we take on a leadership role, and continues to develop through our diligent efforts and under changing circumstances.
In the work world, and indeed also in the sporting world, it is essential to continually learn and get better at whatever it is you’re doing. There are many reasons for this, which we will go into later, the most obvious being that the bar is always being raised. We live in a world of endless change, where last year’s results will rarely do next year,
