Shawn Achor

The greatest predictor of future performance is the beliefs you hold about the world.  Beliefs do more than shape the lens through which we see the world. They shape what happens next. In this high impact, interactive and humorous new talk, world renowned researcher and New York Times bestselling author Shawn Achor illuminates how our beliefs change the math about what is possible and probable in our lives. And by changing the math, beliefs change our path.

Scientifically, beliefs don’t just reflect reality. Beliefs bend reality. Using stunning new research, Shawn reveals how our beliefs take the cap off our potential or hold us down, enrich or impoverish us, heal us or make us sicker.  Moreover, Shawn reveals something incredible: as technology has become more powerful, our beliefs have become more predictive. Based on his work, Shawn has identified the seven most predictive beliefs that successful leaders and teams hold.  By strengthening these seven core beliefs, individuals or teams have been able to increase revenue by up to 50% in 18 months, improve retention by 14%, raise productivity by 31%, live 7.5 years longer, increase SAT scores for our kids, and improve sales by 37%. Shawn reveals how:

• Belief changes what we perceive—including opportunities others miss
• Belief reduces change anxiety and increases trust, even under pressure
• Belief fuels resilience, especially during change or after rejection
• Belief amplifies social support, boosting performance the way the home-field advantage boosts elite athletes
• Belief causes us to beat the odds, and to see how our behavior matters

Then drawing on two decades of research, as well as his work with NASA, with NFL and NBA teams, elite military units, and over a third of the Fortune 100 companies, Shawn outlines six practical strategies for undoing our limiting beliefs and strengthening these seven core beliefs together. By changing our lens and the lenses of those around us, we can significantly improve performance, strengthen resilience and create a better life and society. Same world, different beliefs, different outcomes.

Key Takeaways:

• Understanding how beliefs predict our future outcomes
• The seven core beliefs that the most successful people and teams hold
• Six strategies for how to rewire limiting beliefs and strengthen empowering ones
• How leaders can intentionally cultivate positive core beliefs to create cultures where people thrive

Most companies and schools follow this formula: if you work harder, you will be more successful, and then you will be happy. This formula is scientifically backward.

A decade of research shows that training your brain to be positive at work first actually fuels greater success second. In fact, 75% of our job success is predicted not by intelligence, but by your optimism, social support network and the ability to manage energy and stress in a positive way.

By researching top performers at Harvard, the world’s largest banks, and Fortune 500 companies, Shawn discovered patterns which create a happiness advantage for positive outliers—the highest performers at the company. Based on his new book, The Happiness Advantage (September 2010 from Random House), Shawn explains what positive psychology is, how much we can change, and practical applications for reaping the Happiness Advantage in the midst of change and challenge.

What is more important than IQ and emotional intelligence combined? Based on the research in Before Happiness, Shawn Achor takes us to the beginning of human potential to explain why some people are able to make great changes while others remain the same.

Before you can make a change at work or home, your brain first constructs a picture of reality; this mental picture already determines your likelihood of success and your ability to harness your brain’s IQ, emotional and social intelligence.

In this exciting talk, Shawn takes the audience to the cutting edge of positive psychology and neuroscience to clearly demonstrate how one can become a “positive genius”: one who can continually architect successful, positive realities based upon true facts then transfer those realities to others. Using his signature humor, new case studies and interactive experiments that engage the audience, Shawn makes this research come alive.

Shawn illuminates new research he did in collaboration with Yale published in the top psychology journal this year showing step by step how a leader can change their mindset about stress to increase productivity by 30% and lower health problems and fatigue by 23%. Audiences leave with five clear, practical takeaways, which can immediately start to transform their life, raising both happiness and success rates.

In this program, participants will learn how to navigate multiple realities at work, cancel internal and external noise, add vantage points to planning, use success accelerants to speed goal completion and use meaning markers to spread positive genius throughout a team, family and an entire organization.

Confidence, trust and job satisfaction are at historic lows. When the economic collapse began, the world’s largest banks called in Shawn Achor to research how to restore confidence and forward progress. While many managers succumb to helplessness, with their teams and clients quickly following suit, Shawn researched those who maintained high levels of success and leadership during the challenge. He found that our brains create confidence based on the belief that our behavior matters to the outcome we desire.

To develop this trust, we must create “wins” for our brain necessary to overcome learned helplessness and must train our brains for rational optimism. Based on the science of positive psychology and case studies of working with companies in the midst of an economic collapse, Shawn provides practical applications for raising the belief that individual behavior matters and helping leaders to keep teams motivated and engaged.

Common sense is not common action. This is because information does not necessarily cause transformation because we require a certain level of “activation energy” to start a change. Shawn’s research in the field of positive psychology has revealed how changes in our own brain due to mindset and behavior can have a ripple effect to a team and an entire organization. This positive ripple effect can create a more productive, positive work culture making positive change easier.

Audiences will learn about the latest scientific research on mirror neurons and mental priming to explain how positivity and negativity spread, case studies on how to become a lightning rod for change, and findings on how a positive ripple effect profoundly affects an organization’s ability to transition and change.