The Significance Principle

Les Carter and Jim Underwood

Over forty years ago, a young salesman was struggling just to get by. After two and a half years with his company, he had learned all the skills of how to get prospects, make appointments, conduct demonstrations, handle objections, and close the sale. Yet he was not getting the job done. At one point his home phone was disconnected and the electricity cut off. When his wife gave birth to their first child, he had to scramble to make two sales to get the baby released from the hospital.

At a sales meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, this young man encountered an older gentleman who had been watching him and who believed he had great potential. He pulled the salesman aside for a private conversation and told him he had the ability to be national sales champion and someday he should be an executive in the company . . . if he just believed in himself and worked from an organized schedule. These were foreign words to the salesman, yet his respect for his mentor caused him to take them to heart and actually live as if they might be true.

Prior to this conversation, the salesman had seen himself as “a little guy from a little town.” The tenth of twelve children, he had been raised by a single mother whose husband died early. An average high school student with only a few minor accomplishments, he had tried his hand at college but quickly dropped out, hoping to make it big in the world of business. At the time his mentor spoke with him, this young salesman was riddled with personal doubts.

Yet that conversation began a remarkable turnaround. After the talk, he developed an entirely different picture of himself. This talk “gave me a tremendous boost in confidence and self-acceptance, and for the first time in my life, hope was born,” he said. “My hopes were high, so I worked harder and asked prospects to buy more often. In overcoming my doubts about my future, I was able to overcome the inhibitions and reluctance to work hard and make the effort to get the sale.”

By the end of that year, the salesman had risen from obscurity to become number two of the seven thousand salespersons in the company. He received a promotion to management, then the next year became the company’s highest paid field manager in the country. Two years later he became the youngest divisional supervisor in the company’s sixty-six-year history. He determined never again to be a “little guy from a little town” struggling for survival, but instead would strive to accomplish much.

This salesman, Zig Ziglar, is recognized today as a leading authority in motivation and personal training. An author of several books, he has spoken internationally before audiences of thousands. Chances are, you’ve heard of Zig, the little guy from Yazoo City, Mississippi, who made it big.

But do you know P.C. Merrell?

P.C. Merrell was the man who saw something in Zig that Zig did not see in himself. It was P.C. Merrell who took it upon himself to guide a young man who needed an encouraging word. Seeing beyond the numbers game that accompanies quotas and monthly reports, P.C. Merrell saw the person, a young man with talent who had not yet learned to tap into his own significance, his value to both customers and the company.

Have you ever known a P.C. Merrell? Has someone ever said to you, “I believe in you”? Or have you ever been someone’s P.C. Merrell? Are you the type of person who actively seeks out people in order to touch them at the inner place of value? You can be. Start by understanding “The Significance Principle” and then use that understanding to empower and motivate people to reach their potential.

The Significance Principle

The basic, driving force of human behavior is the desire for acceptance, understanding, appreciation, and recognition. The need for significance is such a powerful aspect of our personality that it motivates us to identify with success and just as powerfully motivates us to avoid failure and conflict.

As soon as you entered the world, you screamed and cried. In essence, you said: “Hey, somebody needs to take care of me now.” When someone wrapped you in a warm blanket and held you securely, you calmed down and added, “Now there, that’s more like it.” In the days to follow you repeated many such messages hundreds, even thousands of times.

What prompted you during your first moments of life to communicate so powerfully? The significance principle. Instinctively you felt a need, a right, to be held in high regard. You were searching for someone to tell you: “I think you’re important,” or “You have value,” or “Your needs are legitimate.” You wanted to feel significant and you responded to the actions of those around you who recognized your need.

What would you think about a person who, at the moment of your birth, set you aside with no hugs, no tenderness, no care-taking, and then said, “As soon as you accomplish something, I’ll treat you with significance . . . but not one moment sooner. You’d cry foul! That’s no way to treat an infant. In fact, such calloused behavior would be labeled abusive, even criminal.

Inherent in every life is a God-given value and worth. At the moment life begins, our Creator gifts individuals with significance. Instinctively you know you deserve it, and at some level of awareness you know others do too.

Consider carefully how the significance principle is at the foundation of many qualities, both good and bad. Can you detect how it is at the core of each of the following examples?

In a routine social conversation, a friend exaggerates his accomplishments, hoping for a few extra pats on the back.
A student pushes herself to maintain an A average, driven by the need to prove herself as acceptable and respected.
A rookie employee feels she must be mistake-free in order to prove her worth to peers.
A tyrannical manager feels he has to be perceived as a notch above his subordinates.
A salesperson is calculating in what she says to her field supervisor, knowing that the wrong words could bring accusations of company disloyalty.
A marketing executive feels he has to lower personal moral standards in order to keep the business of the customer he is entertaining.
A worker cuts corners, knowing his boss will be angry if a project is not completed on time.
In routine conversations with friends, a person talks freely about personal successes, yet rarely reveals personal flaws or struggles.

Can you see in each example how people can be pushed to behave as they do, based on the possibility of being either denied or given significance? This factor silently underlies many of the choices we make every day. Only as we become aware of the centrality of the significance principle can we begin to understand why we do what we do – and why others do what they do. By gaining this awareness, we have the opportunity to turn losing relationships into winning relationships.

To Become a Significance Builder, Check Your Attitude

Who in your world would benefit if you regularly recognized their significance? Your customers? The clerical staff? Subordinates at work? Your boss? Family members? The guy in the car in front of you? The check-out clerk at the supermarket?

Probably a lot of people. But knowing the significance principle is simple. Living with it as a guide – being aware of its many applications – is another story. To consistently apply it, you will need to honestly assess your behaviors and attitudes. To help you do this, we have compiled a list of ten qualities valued by most true builders of significance.

Significance Builders:

Practice humility. They enter relationships with a realistic understanding of their own shortcomings and a realization that they, too, are human.
Proactively focus on others. They seek to understand the needs and perspectives of others.
Practice integrity. They understand that honesty and trustworthiness are bedrock qualities of any successful relationship.
Deal positively with conflict. They realize that moments of conflict, when handled in a positive manner, can be turned into opportunities for improved communication.
Live the significance paradox. They understand that true success is the result of first affirming the significance of others. They put team goals ahead of personal goals.
Openly encourage others. They understand the life-changing power of encouragement.
Use ceremony to recognize others’ significance. They understand that the public recognition of others’ accomplishments and qualities is one of the most important ways of affirming their significance.
Commit to personal accountability. They develop relationships with those who will help them maintain pure motives and right relationship skills.
Actively work to right wrongs. They willingly accept feedback and look for ways to repair damage that might have been caused by their own actions.
Are committed to excellence. They realize the quality of their work often serves as the starting point for others’ success.

It’s Up to You

Businesses spend billions of dollars each year to improve corporate performance. While they must give attention to changing trends and organizational efficiency and improved procedures, they will under-perform – or they may even fail – if they ignore the significance of their people.

So it’s up to you. Adopt the ten attitudes of significance builders and choose to act in ways that affirm the value and dignity of others. Whether in a boardroom or a loading dock, people need to hear the message: “I recognize your unique qualities. You matter and you are valuable!”

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From: The Significance Principle: The Secret Behind High Performance People and Organizations, by Les Carter and Jim Underwood (Broadman & Holman, 1998). Used by permission of the authors.