I grew up watching David Copperfield, Lance Burton, David Blaine, and a dozen other magicians that you've probably never heard of. I learned how to perform a few magic tricks to entertain friends (although I never quite made it to the level of Gob), and perform at Children's birthday parties.
One thing I learned from performing magic was that what seemed to be so impossible, was usually the result of a very simple gimmick or sleight. When I performed a routine that fooled others, they would always ask to know how it was done - nay, demand to know how it was done. The times I gave in to their demands, they always walked away disappointed.
Perhaps they were expecting it to be real magic...
Regardless, I discovered that knowing a bunch of secrets did not make anybody very special - it was the application of those secrets that set the magician apart from the layman. Knowing how a coin "vanishes" and being able to make the coin "vanish" are two very different things.
It's no different for any other profession. LeBron James, in collaboration with Powerade, decided he would share his workout with us - all 57 minutes. He knows that showing everybody what he does won't make them better than him - 99% of the people who watch the video probably won't stick to the workout routine for more than a week (or even one day).
Because improvement takes knowledge and application of that knowledge (i.e. effort). Change comes about from learning something new, and then using what you just learned.
And what's more, often times the secret isn't a secret at all. The basic method for "vanishing" a coin is no different than what you do when you pretend to throw a ball and watch your dog (or small child) go looking for it - magicians just do it better. And the basic exercises LeBron does to become an elite basketball player aren't really any different than what I've read in magazines and seen in exercise videos - he just does them more consistently and at a higher intensity.
Nowadays, differences in performance aren't because one has a secret and another doesn't (pretty much everything is out in the open if you look hard enough). The difference is whether you are brave enough, and disciplined enough, to apply what you know.
Here's a secret for effective onboarding
In this video, I share a "secret" to effectively onboarding somebody new in your organization - it's not the only "secret," it's just one of them. But you'll soon realize that it's not very complicated, and it's not really a secret. So you may go away being slightly disappointed (almost everybody is after they learn a secret) and do Salesforce onboarding the same way you always have.
The real question is, what are you going to do with it? Now that you know (something you already probably knew), how are you going to adapt your onboarding training? Are you going to strip out all excess information and only include information that new users need to know? Or will you continue on, doing what you've always done, because that's how everybody does it?
Try a different approach 3-5 times, and see how it goes. Show new users how to do only what they need to do to get up and running - nothing more. If you need help deciding what that is, leave a comment and we'll work through it together. For an idea on how to approach this, check out this video I made - the secret is easy, but applying it might be tricky.
