Exploring Your Decision-Making Foundation

Crunch Time
by Ken Lindner

(Page 3 of 5)

The Concept of Crunch Time

One of the great benefits that I derived from being an athlete and studying different sports is that I learned to identify Crunch Time, and thereafter developed the ability to, in many instances, respond constructively when a Crunch Time challenge is presented to me. The other day, the news manager of a television station called me about my client, Terry. He said that he would be giving Terry a plum assignment that afternoon that would showcase Terry's broadcasting strengths. This manager told me that Terry was one of three people who were being considered for a coveted national position, and that if my client was on his game and really showed his stuff, he would likely get the position. The manager finished our conversation by saying, "Kenny, I can't be any clearer than this: If Terry gets it right, his career is changed for the better from here on out. It's up to him. Starting this afternoon, it's Crunch Time!"

The last few minutes of a close game are sometimes referred to as Crunch Time - a critical point during a sports contest in which the outcome of the game can go either way. Crunch Times are those pivotal points and defining moments when individuals are faced with significant choices. They are our opportunities to either make wise decisions and enhance ourselves and others, or to make poor and diminishing decisions, which often result in our being destructive to ourselves and to others.

As someone who counsels individuals every day regarding their making the most positive and healthy career and life decisions possible, I have found the concept of Crunch Time to be a particularly useful, effective, and visual one.

I believe that not enough attention is paid to the fact that each of us faces Crunch Times - or moments of decision - many times each day throughout our lives. For example, we often must decide whether or not we will eat or drink something that will cause us to gain weight or affect us negatively in some other way; whether or not we will light up a cigarette or cigar; whether or not we will remain in a personal or professional relationship that we know isn't healthy for us, etc.

Crunch Times are those instances when individuals who are committed to excellence (star performers) often step up to positively and effectively meet the challenges before them. They combine presence of mind with knowledge, understanding, and educated and prepared instinct to correctly analyze the situation of the moment. These individuals then adapt their performances to make the maximum use of their analyses (by making the right and/or best choices), thereby raising the level of their games to attain a successful outcome. They turn great potential into positive reality.

This ability isn't acquired overnight. It requires focused thought, analysis, preparation, and practice, along with great desire, enthusiasm, and tenacious persistence to achieve the sought-after goals. A proactive approach and appropriate discipline are also critical components of optimal performance at Crunch Time. One Crunch Time quality that makes all of the others viable and effective is an accurate understanding of the situation at hand and of the elements and individuals involved. True understanding of the pivotal elements that comprise a constructive decision is the foundation upon which all Crunch Time qualities are based.

"Behaviorism" - A Quick Look Back

It was during my first college psychology class that I was introduced to the works of Ivan Pavlov, B. F. Skinner, and other behavioral theorists. Do you remember the dog in Pavlov's stimulus/response experiment? During the initial stage of that experiment, a bell would sound and a dog would immediately be fed some meat. With the repetition of this ringing and feeding scenario, as soon as the dog heard the bell, it would salivate, expecting that it would be fed. With further repetition, the dog began to reflexively salivate upon hearing the bell - even without the meat being present, which had been the initial stimulus for the salivation. In essence, when presented with a familiar situation - hearing the bell - Pavlov's pooch reflexively and non-discerningly reacted with a behavioral pattern of response - and strategy - that it perceived had worked in the past. Other scientists took Pavlov's findings further, by theorizing that individuals seek out pleasurable experiences and avoid painful ones. Based upon those premises, they asserted that individuals' actions can be conditioned and reinforced, based upon the introduction of positive and negative stimuli.

While maximizing the importance of positive and negative reinforcement and their impact upon molding behavior, these theorists often minimized some of the most valuable qualities of a human being: The abilities to consciously think, analyze, reason, reflect, prepare, and choose to make value-based decisions.

Popular authors such as M. Scott Peck and Stephen Covey have pointed out that there can and should be a step between the introduction of a stimulus or event and a person's response to it. Dr. Peck writes that this period separating stimulus from response is a time to "bracket," or hold in abeyance, our old responses and/or behavioral patterns, and to decide whether the situation at hand calls for a new behavioral pattern, a modification of the old one, or the usual response.

It is the intervening step - or period of time - between when a stimulus or situation is presented to us and when we choose to act (constructively or destructively) that we will refer to as Crunch Time.

Crunch Times are those precious moments when we can act (as opposed to reflexively react), and consciously decide to raise the quality of our personal and professional lives, or we can compulsively react, often non-discerningly reenacting our old, inappropriate behavioral strategies, and thus diminish the quality of our lives in one way or another. It's your goal on our journey together and throughout the rest of your life to become the best Crunch Time performer and decision-maker you can be.

Copyright © 2005 Ken Lindner

About the Author

Ken Lindner has represented hundreds of the country's most prominent anchors and reporters, including Matt Lauer, Elizabeth Vargas, Lester Holt, and Paula Zahn. A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard, he worked as an attorney for the William Morris Agency before founding Ken Lindner & Associates.