A concise approach on how to become a high performing individual . These 8 steps are clearly written and easy to understand by anyone .

This book takes a straight and concise approach on how to become a high performing individual in your organization. The author mentioned 8 steps he deemed to be the way to do it. This book is also well-written and easy to understand. Nevertheless, I find that his attack of other management ideas a little bit uncomfortable since I’ve read and watched about those things he mentioned. Those ideas work in several different contexts if not all. Anyhow, we can apply the same principles of research, science, and conclusive science to evaluate the ideas in this book.

8 STEPS TO HIGH PERFORMANCE by Marc Effron suggests that managers "Focus on What you can Change [and] Ignore the Rest." Effron describes the purpose of his book to gather and identify which insights matter most to consistently high performance and "make them practical, applicable, and easy to understand." What are some of the skills he lists? They include expected ones like "set big goals," "connect," and "maximize your fit" as well as some surprises like "fake it" and "commit your body." In each case, Effron supplies rationale and suggests tools for self-assessment (many of these worksheets are password protected on his website). He also includes several pages of notes which would certainly supplement readings for a class on this topic. Overall, I thought 8 STEPS TO HIGH PERFORMANCEhad some useful ideas, but found the text rather cumbersome to navigate.

Marc Effron has researched for years existing scientific studies, to develop these 8 steps that be believes are scientifically proven to increase your performance.
Step one - Set big goals
Step two - Behave to perform
Step three - Grow yourself faster
Step four - Connect
Step five - Maximise your fit
Step six - Fake it
Step seven - Commit your body
Step eight - Avoid distractions

Effron defines performance as <i>someone who consistently delivers better results and behaviours, on an absolute and relative basis, than 75% of their peers</i>. That sounds like a pretty tall ask, but if you treat this book like a meta-analysis of various scientific studies on performance, I've no doubt you will find information that will be helpful for you to improve your performance.

A caveat here is that there are parts I don't agree with based on my own psychology studies. Caution should be taken, as even the author states, to always critically review any study before taking it as fact. For example, Effron claims that your personality and intelligence is fixed ; that EI is a myth ; and that focusing on your strengths is a distraction. But his comments in these areas are related purely to if they increase your performance (or not), and are based on select studies related to performance.

think this was a great, easy book to read and I have already recommended this book to a few clients to pre-purchase (book is released August 7), because I think there is real value in this book for anyone who wants to develop themselves, but really doesn't know where to start or even what role they want next. There are also a number of tools and quizzes in the book to help you set your development path.

Thank to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

I was given an advanced copy through Netgalley for my review. I would highly recommend this book to family and friends and will buy a copy for myself.

The book starts with the sentence: <<I wish that, as a young man, someone had sat me down and said to me, "Marc, I’m going to tell you how to be highly successful at work." ... No one gave me that gift, and I doubt that many of you received it either.>>

And I fully agree, so I went through the paged of this book, reading it avidly, looking for the best advices that could improve my career. And I found out several very useful hints.

The author analyzed thousands of articles and books in order to define which steps met his "desired level of proof that these actions definitely improve individual performance at work." and are based on conclusive science.
These are "Set big goals", "Behave to perform", "Grow yourself faster", "Connect", "Maximize your fit", "Fake it" (why you sometimes shouldn’t be the “genuine” you), "Commit your body" and "Avoid distractions".

2.5 stars
I initially wanted to read this book to glean ideas for entrepreneurs; however, this book is written for people who work for larger corporations. I appreciated the chapter on setting effective goals, as well as the various questionnaires and troubleshooting questions at the end of each section. Some readers will find the ideas for connecting with others in your industry and the scripts helpful.

A few sections didn't work for me. First, the author claims quality sleep and exercise are important, but diet doesn't influence performance. He should have done more research on nutrition and cognitive function. I was also surprised when he disparaged popular concepts like power posing and fixed vs. growth mindset. It's not only for children or raising general IQ as the author mistakenly assumes but rather emotional intelligence and the ability to grow and improve. Attempting to discredit other professionals diminished his credibility.

I received an e-copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I am always seeking opportunities to consistently optimise my performance and this book seemed to have some answers. As it is research based, Marc provides 8 steps readers can take to predict and create high performance. He also describes how you can take care of your body so it is not weary from your new level go performance.

There are so many practical steps and assessments that Marc provides to the readers. For example, he provides the “Fit Matrix” assessment that helps the reader assess and understand how they fit within an organisation.

The 8 steps he writes about are:
1. Set big goals
2. Behave to perform
3. Grow yourself faster
4. Connect
5. Maximise your fit
6. Fake it
7. Commit your body
8. Avoid distractions
.
My favourite Quotes:
“Coach toward the future. Coaching combines feedback with direction—here’s what you’re doing today and here’s how to do it better tomorrow.”
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“There’s even a phenomenon called the Dunning Kruger effect showing that the least competent people are the least aware that they are incompetent.”
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“Everyone has derailers, including high performers, so the secret is to recognize which ones you have and work hard to keep them in check.”
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“The person you see behaving badly may be delivering such strong results that the company is giving them a temporary pass on certain behaviors.”
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“To grow faster, you must understand which development activities matter most and do as many of them as quickly as possible.”
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“High performers continually adjust and maximize their fit with their company.”
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“Two performance factors you can’t fake are sleep and exercise.”
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“Your body plays a critical role in your performance; it’s important to eat right, exercise, and get enough sleep.”

#8stepsToHighPerformance #NetGalley

Marc is a world expert in leadership and performance. His book contains very good references on the domain. Marc propose a eight steps to create successful leaders in every sector with a theoretical and practical blend that can be used in any sector. The book can be used by professionals for autodidact purposes or as a companion book for students of business school at any level. Very helpful book!

In Marc Effron's book 8 Steps to High Performance I found his writing to be straight forward and yet still provides the advice and encouragement to get you on a proven path to higher performance

Really enjoyed this book, as with all 'self help' type books some didn't seem relevant or workable for me but overall some greta points and worth a read!

There have been a lot of books on individual peak performance that have gone on to becoming best sellers with massive impact on how people think about peak performance.

Marc Effron in this book claims to have distilled down proven scientific ideas that can help us start on our way to becoming high performers. There is no doubt that these 8 steps make sense. The way he goes about writing the book is what makes the book interesting. He shares the 8 steps and talks about what we can learn from proven scientific studies.

His practical & pragmatic approach makes the book both interesting and at times off-putting,

I would recommend this book for all aspiring high performers but would also advice them to take the advice with some scepticism, just to be sure that they don't go overboard, following the advice in the book.