Staying Connected

The ability to connect is the power that lies at the core of both personal and professional success. When a child is born, he must connect with his mother for food and care. And we are just talking about physical connection, our need for emotional connection is just important as well. In fact, if babies do not receive emotional connection from caregivers, they can wither away. It is called failure to thrive syndrome and it can kill or emotionally cripple babies who grow up in institutions or other situations where they do not receive the love and connection they need.

In a workshop in Kota Kinabalu on Leading and Managing People recently, one of the participant asked me what are the key elements to stay connected in our daily life.

I shared with him the meaning of CONNECT. It is to feel and or create a strong, positive relationship with someone or something. The ultimate result of this relationship should be uplifting both for the individual and others.

When we talk about the power to connect, there are three key elements:-

First, to connect there must be an emotional link. Connecting is built around emotion. You can use your mind to connect with something or someone, but until you get your emotions involved, it is a weak connection at best. When you first join a company, you may or may not connect to the organization. But as you develop relationships with your team members and feel that you are contributing to the company’s mission, then you create an emotional link: you connect. You can feel connected to a team or a group of people, most of us feel connected to our family, for instance. You also can feel connected to an organization or to an idea, mission or concept.

Second, to connect we must create a strong feeling. Most of us do not feel especially connected with our casual acquaintances because we do not feel strongly about them. We do feel connected with really good friends because the emotions we take our belief we experience in those relationships are a lot stronger. It is like the difference between watching a football game on TV for your entertainment value and strongly to your cheering for your hometown team. Your feelings about he outcome of the game are a whole stronger because you are watching “ your “ team. It is also possible to connect with an idea concept, or belief as long as we feel strongly about it. To connect, we take our belief in something and link it to our emotions. I feel strongly about my faith as a Christian. You may connect strongly to your personal mission in life and your family.

Third, to connect is to create a positive, uplifting relationship. You can feel strongly about someone and hate that person’s guts, but I would not consider that a positive, uplifting relationship I also would not categorize gangs, or abusive relationships or movements like fascism as positive or uplifting. All of these can create strong emotional links between people, but the results are terrible.

I strongly believe that we are successful when we connect to an uplifting purpose in ways that produce positive, uplifting relationships. Great organizations foster the right kinds of connections between the company, its mission, and its employees. Some 20 years ago when I was working for an wood-processing equipment firm based in Kuala Lumpur, we gathered all the top management staff together to move outside the box to transform the company and the lives of the people who worked there. We want to win over all the small and medium sized woodworking manufacturers with a difference. We were in the timber downstream business to have value-added products from wood waste. We wanted to create value-added business for the timber industries by reducing wastage. After the meeting, we held a customer party to inform them of our goal. We asked our customers – what are their goals. We shared our goals. We stayed connected with them and they supported us by installing the equipment that we marketed.

Staying connected in building success through people, purpose and performance. The key is our commitment to an organization or team’s goals, mission and vision. We create an environment of excitement, fun and togetherness by staying connected with our clients, family members and friends. We can understand their needs so that we can provide solutions to meet their needs.