Compliance, Success or Disaster

by Kris Pitcher

I sat for hours in a conference and at one point I plunged my hands into my giant purse for my tiny book where I write down my big ideas. I can't help but relate what's happening in life to health and fitness. It just all fits.

Listening to a presentation on disaster response, it's the business I'm in, I heard the term malicious compliance. Malicious compliance. This is what stands in the way of successful competitors and those who just simply make it to the stage.

Malicious compliance means you do something, but without belief in it. You do it but with resentment, you don't really want to do it. You ultimately comply, but because you were told to. It's with an ill intent.

A competitor who has this attitude may in fact make it to the stage, they do what their coach says (mostly), but only out of spite for the process. It's a glass half empty kind of outlook. Malicious compliance.

In a disaster people need to come together to get things done. There is often one incident commander who gives instructions. Another person may have experience and information and comply, but maliciously, because they must in that situation. Not because they believe in what the mission is.

Do you believe in what your mission is? Do you comply out of malice toward your coach? Or do you believe in the guiding principles of their leadership, their knowledge, their ability to guide you?

Part of it is who you want it for. I see competitors coming from a perspective of malice all the time because they are not doing it for themselves. They "can't" have, is their attitude when really they've chosen something else.

Where is your perspective coming from in your process? Think how much more productive and positive the process could be if you chose this path for yourself and trusted the person guiding you. Amazing. Right? Compliance out of a place of malice must feel awful. There is no empowerment in that place.

As I tried to bring myself back to focus on the speaker, I put my tiny book back in my giant purse. And I let my big idea go for a time. Now that I've shared it with you I hope you take a moment to meditate on where you approach your process from. It could be a great success, or a complete disaster.