The Influence of Environment

“If we do not create and control our environment, our environment creates and controls us.” ~ Marshall Goldsmith, Triggers: Sparking Positive Change and Making it Last

In Triggers, Goldsmith illuminates how we are different in different environments - especially if we choose to remain unaware of the influence different environments have on us. For instance you may be one way when you are reading a silly bedtime story to your children or grandchildren - and a totally different person in the environment of a board meeting. These are but two examples of different environments that shape our behaviors. [Another example is how you might stick to your healthy diet at home and then eat all the cookies in the break room! The environment shapes your behaviors - if you let it.]

In recent leadership literature we talk a lot about authentic leadership. Is it inauthentic that we show up differently in these different environments? No! It is natural and human and Goldsmith speaks of it through the lens of situational leadership: the most effective leaders vary their leadership style to best fit the needs of a given situation.

Some environments may bring out behaviors and ways of being that aren’t serving us well. Do you find that when you socialize with people who are cynical and negative that you have a tendency to begin to speak that way as well? In an office environment that regales others with tales of the latest office gossip - do you join in and then regret it later?

So where does the word ‘triggers’ come in? Different environments shape our behaviors differently and, according to Goldsmith, “most of us go through life unaware of how our environment shapes our behavior”. Our environments are a non-stop triggering mechanism - and some of those environments are designed to lure us into acting against our best interest. The best example is social media use …. Scrolling and responding to text and reels and posts and more …. It’s made to be addicting and to keep you engaged for that serotonin hit - again and again. All of a sudden instead of that nice 7 or 8 hours of sleep you know you need - it’s 1a.m. and you’ve been mindlessly scrolling for hours!

“A behavioral trigger is any stimulus that impacts our behavior….. What if we could control our environment so it triggered our most desired behavior…this environment propels us.” Goldsmith suggests to pick a behavioral goal you are pursuing and list the people, places and environments that influence the quality of your performance toward that goal (positively and negatively).In these settings what ‘triggers’ the behaviors you want - your best self? What moves you further away from your goal or desired behavior? Once you identify these things you can make choices on how to engineer your environment. For example, I want to work out in the morning: If I commit to not looking at my phone until my bed is made and my workout clothes are on and I’m on my way to the gym - I have engineered my environment for success!

“A trigger leads to an impulse, which leads directly to a behavior, which creates another trigger - and so on… Awareness is a difference maker. It stretches that triggering sequence, providing us with a little breathing space to consider our options and make a better behavioral choice.” ~ Marshall Goldsmith

Where might you need to practice more awareness and engineer the environment to set you up for success?