Peer reviews often don't work.  People feel too confronted or defensive to individually or as a team get the results intended.

Here's the problem with peer reviews:  You don't know what to say because a colleague is doing a good job; or, you don't work closely enough with them on a daily basis to have an opinion. And personally, if you are honest with yourself, what you really want to know is what your colleagues think about you.

Maybe you have some anxieties and don't know if they are well-founded or just in your head and it's affecting your sleep, mood, attitude and quality of life.  You may wonder how valued you are as a team player, if you are doing a good job with your staff and critiquing their work or if you are seen as being too social or anti-social.

Here's what some companies and organizations are doing: They are setting aside structure time to let select groups of people get their anxieties out in the open and calling them Anxiety Parties.

I don't like the name; it's focusing on the reverse of an idea, what we don't want to create and perpetuate at work.  Can you help me to come up with something more forward sounding?  Maybe a Partnering for Success Party.

The point is, if moderated and structured properly, if participants know that they are safe and in judgment free space, Anxiety Parties can help foster a happy, enthusiastic, and productive corporate culture leading to more job satisfaction, productivity, and a better quality of life.

So, here's how to structure your Anxiety Party or Partnering for Success Party:

Gather a small group of colleagues or team members together for an hour in a quiet meeting room.

For the first 10 minutes, each person writes down their biggest anxieties on a private sheet of paper.

For the next 2 minutes, everyone ranks their anxieties, ones that worry them the most to the least.

For the next 30 minutes or so, each person shares their top anxieties to the group. 

After each sharing, everyone takes a few seconds to rank how much it troubles them: from Zero (“It never even occurred to me that this was an issue”) to Five (“I strongly believe you need to improve in this area.”)

Then everyone shares their numbers and there is a discussion on how to help that colleague resolve 5's 4's and 3's.

You may discover that most of your anxieties are baseless. Maybe you are afraid that your colleagues view you as a lone wolf instead of team player, but they really enjoy working with you and don’t mind if you are off on a project on your own for a few weeks.

Some of your anxieties may be well-founded. Maybe you are worried that you are placing too much emphasis on conferences and networking events over other priorities, and that does annoy your colleagues. Then great! The issue is on the table and you can talk about the pros and cons and come up with a new plan together.

Notice how this is not a meeting about anyone telling you what to do. It's supportive brainstorming to help you be better at what you do.  It can feel like the weight of the world has been taken off your shoulders to talk openly and honestly with your peers and work things out together.

Are these 'parties' the perfect solution for all small groups or teams? No. There must be a high level of trust and support to be open, honest and vulnerable. If your group or team feels this level of psychological safety, then it's a great stress deactivator, confidence booster and group harmonizer.  It's a great way to bond and feel part of something bigger than yourself, as together you see a clearer way forward.

And, even with the best of teams, it can be good idea to have a professional coach or trusted moderator on board to ensure that your 'party' is a team building experience. 

What does Being successful mean to you?

What if being successful is not about how big your house is or how many trips to Europe you’ve taken this year or whether you have a second home in Aspen or whether you are driving a new, expensive car?  What if being successful is about leaving the planet a better place than when you got here?  What if being successful is about feeling successful.

Lots of mega-wealthy people and superstars do not feel successful.  Maybe they are not giving back or, they are giving back, but for the wrong reasons; maybe their motives aren’t pure. Maybe they don’t feel worthy of success or have nagging doubts or negativity that they have never dealt with.  What's happening on the outside is not necessarily how you feel on the inside.

So how can you feel successful? What can you do differently? What I am going to share with you, you may have heard before.  Knowing is not enough.  It's about making changes to how you live your life and how you are in the world.  It's about upgrading your attitude to gratitude, appreciation, and acceptance. 

The key is to be fully present and stop worrying about the future and judging the past; stop feeling bad about mistakes; stop holding onto regrets; stop not allowing yourself to heal and move forward.

Here are some simple steps to get you there.  Although they are easy to understand, it’s up to you to take action until they are a part of who you are.

Key #1

Stop. Cease all activity for a few moments and breathe.  Breathing in through your nose and out of your nose with the out breath longer than the in breath.  This tells your sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system that's it's okay to relax, release, soften and let go. 

Shallow breathing sends you into fight or flight response. Take the time every day to practice this simple breathing technique, retraining your body to accept a new, chill way of being.  Practice makes permanent.  So, schedule times of the day to engage. 

Notice how when you feel when your lungs really fill up with fresh air and let the old, stale air out; you feel better. You are fully oxygenated. You’ve let something go. Notice how you feel when you breathe this way; notice how it's easier to let go; notice how it's easier to allow your body to let go of stress.

Key #2

Be grateful. Gratitude is a choice. You may say you are grateful, but nothing is real until you feel it.  Choose to feel grateful.  Sometime every day for 10 minutes, write down what you are grateful for about that day. Write a paragraph describing something you have experienced or observed or been a part of for which you are truly grateful.

Keep a Gratitude Journal. Once a week, read some of the things that you wrote. See how your life changes as you express and feel grateful for what you already have, all the gifts that life presents when you are aware and pay attention to the nuances of your life.

Key #3

Lovingly and with clear, strong boundaries, parent your inner child.  We parent our kids; but not ourselves, the part of you that is afraid or anxious, worried or stressed, or is throwing a tantrum because it’s not getting something it wants now. 

Our uncooperative, unruly, demanding inner child is just bits of us that we have shoved aside as unacceptable, have avoided and denied, and have never grown up.  Ask yourself, if this child was on the outside of me and I was being kind and compassionate, firm and loving, what would I do?

 You might give the child a hug, buckle her up in the back seat and continue on your way driving forward.   You might divert his attention; we are getting into the car now and going, let’s focus on the wonderful things that are ahead of us today. 

It's about parenting these bits of ourselves, loving them, nurturing them, until they are all grown up inside of us.

Key #4

Turn your inner critic into an inner coach. Notice the negative self-talk, all the things that you say to yourself, almost unconsciously, that are just not nice.  You would never talk to anyone else like that, and yet you verbally abuse and berate yourself. 

Choose to be aware of what’s going on in your mind as you drive your car and go about your day. Notice how you drag yourself down by what you tell yourself.

Why do you do such things? It’s a weird psychology. Here’s the gist of it: If you put yourself down and criticize yourself, then it won’t hurt or be as impactful when someone else does the same to you. You will be prepared.

It doesn’t make sense does it. There’s a lot of things that you and I do that don’t make any sense.  The beauty is that you chose to do it and you can choose something else now. It just takes consistent effort and practice.

It takes 28 days to create a new habit, and that doesn’t mean realize it and leave it. That means taking steps to create real change.  Saying no to the inner critic, feeling the feelings underneath what is said and loving that bit of you. It’s a cry for help and we all do it.

So, acknowledge what you said, feel the feelings that the hurtful words are covering up, love that bit of yourself, let go of it all, allow it to drop away, and choose the inner coach.  Acknowledging your feelings is powerful. Feeling never killed anyone. They are just feelings. When you acknowledge them, you take the wind out of the sales of all that old stuff, that stuff that you are now letting go.

If you heard your best friend talk to herself like this, what positive, supporting, uplifting things would you say to her. Now do this for yourself and feel how that feels. Take it on board. It’s the new you in the making!

This is all about dropping the judgment.  Imagine that your negative opinions about yourself, your situation, your circumstances are a penny in your hand. You simply open your hand and let it go.  That's how easy it is to drop the judgment if you but choose.

When you let go of the judgment, which by the way is keeping you stuck and going around in circles like a hamster on a wheel, it’s easy to feel gratitude and acceptance. It’s easy to feel more love and genuine, caring support.

Wrapping it Up

Breath work, gratitude, strong, clear, and loving boundaries and being your own inner coach are golden keys to feeling successful.   Parent yourself. Give yourself the loving care and attention that you need to transform from the inside out. 

This takes time, perseverance, determination, and effort. Consistency and constancy.  There is no magic pill to feeling successful.  It's about being the change you'd like to see in the world, creating and being on the inside what you would like to see on the outside. 

Never give up and you will succeed, one step forward at a time.  And each step forward, no matter how small, is a victory beyond measure.  Something to acknowledge and celebrate as the foundation for the new you that you are creating.

You want more clients?  Your Golden Key to Success may not be what you think. It's missing in so many interactions nowadays; and when you encounter it, it's like a breath of fresh air.  What am I talking about is humility.

Humility goes a long way when it comes to attracting and keeping clients. There’s no bigger turn off than dealing with someone who is arrogant or full of themselves, someone who is a know-it-all and refuses to listen.

So, what is humility?

Humility is about acknowledging how far you’ve come while recognizing how far you still have to go; it’s about accepting where you are at, warts and all, while being kind to yourself.  We are all works in progress.

How can we be more humble?

Be genuinely self-effacing. That's endearing. Know that you are good at what you do without flaunting it. Enjoy helping others without any pretense of being better than, with simply a willingness to serve. 

Be genuinely likable. If you are humble and likable, then you will be a pleasure to deal with, and people will feel that you have their back.  Make it easy for people to be in your presence without being a doormat.  Create a drama-free zone.  When people are with you, they know that you won't make a mountain out of a mole hill or dump your problems on them or judge them or be a drama queen. 

Know that you are worthy of success. When you are humble, you have nothing to prove. When you feel worthy of having clients that love to do business with you, when you feel worthy of receiving all the abundance that is coming your way, again in genuine humility, people will enjoy working with you.

 Breathe deeply, slow down and relax. When you are calm and assured, people will relax in your presence and enjoy being with you. 

Be grateful for what you have. Gratitude is a golden key to success. Take stock of your life, all the people that love and care about you, your friends and family, your home and possessions, your health and the ease and comfort in which you live, the things you get to do, everything and anything you may have taken for granted.  When you are grateful for what you have, when you drop any feelings of entitlement or being better or worse than anybody else, when you breathe and take time to enjoy your life, when you value your uniqueness and what you bring to the table, humility is possible.

Cultivate humility and notice the grace, ease and flow that enriches your life; notice how people are naturally attracted to working with you.

You want to be profitable, to attract the right and perfect clients / customers who will benefit from and be grateful for your products and services.

You want clients / customers who feel drawn to work with and buy from you. Your products and services speak to them. There is an affinity. They resonate with what you are offering and are drawn to you. They find you because what you say and do; what you put out to the world attracts them to you.

Here’s something to ponder:   If you want to be more profitable, if you want more of the right people to find you, look at yourself honestly with a focus of letting go of what’s not working.

Your biases may be getting in the way of generating and expanding your success. Everyone has biases. You may not see them in yourself. But I bet you see them in other people.  Biases that block you can run unconsciously; they are so ingrained that you don’t even notice them.

Triggers can be someone’s weight, how they dress, if they smoke, their religion, their ethnicity, the color of their skin or their sexual orientation. Other, perhaps more-subtle triggers are someone’s mannerisms, accent, makeup, and shoes.

I am not saying to disregard your intuition. Always listen to your inner knowing, that still small voice that guides you when you stop and pay attention. What I am saying is to notice when you move away from someone who could be a client or customer because of their packaging on the outside.

People feel when you back away from them - when you discount or judge them. It’s palatable.

There are some great videos about bias. One is of a critically acclaimed violinist playing unnoticed in the New York subway. He is wearing common clothes and looks like a nobody.  His music is amazing and almost no one stops to listen.  People rush by him as if he does not exist, speaking volumes of how we are programmed to be.

This is about helping you not walk away from business opportunities because of your biases, making your unconscious biases conscious!  Choose to be aware, and ask yourself, 'What am I thinking when I see someone on the street? In the news? At an event? What are my first thoughts? 

Notice when you use all or never when referring to a someone, a group or organization. Notice if you put people or whole groups of people in box. Notice how it feels if someone does this to you.

Be open to new possibilities. Drop the judgment and look for similarities instead of differences: 'I wonder what we have in common?'  You might be really surprised to find people you thought you had nothing in common with have a genuine connection, simply because you engaged in a conversation and asked open questions with a genuine desire to learn.

You may notice new kinds of people streaming into your business, and how cool that would be!