Tag: personal growth

Get So Good At Your Own Thing They Can’t Ignore You

In today’s hyper-connected world, the challenge to stand out in the crowd and create your own unique identity is as real as it gets. To be seen, heard, and appreciated, one needs to possess an edge that separates them from the masses. Golden principle: Get so good at your own thing that they can’t ignore you.

Photo by Daniel Burka on Unsplash

1. Discover Your Unique Strengths

Everyone has their unique set of strengths and talents. Some people are fantastic at visualizing and creating art, while others excel in understanding complex systems or algorithms. Your strengths may be unique and different from the majority, but that is where your potential lies. The key is to identify these strengths and refine them.

The process of discovering your strengths involves self-exploration and introspection. You may find clues in activities you enjoy or tasks at which you naturally excel. Feedback from others can also provide valuable insights into areas where you shine. Tools such as StrengthsFinder and personality tests like Myers-Briggs can also help identify your strengths and areas of interest.

2. Pursue Mastery

Once you’ve identified your strengths, it’s time to commit to mastering them. Mastery is not about knowing everything there is to know about a subject. Instead, it involves continuously striving for improvement and learning with an open mind. It’s about going beyond proficiency, honing your skills to the point that you become an expert.

In the pursuit of mastery, patience and consistency are key. It requires commitment, hours of practice, and sometimes, facing failure and setbacks. Malcolm Gladwell’s “10,000-hour rule” suggests that it takes approximately 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to become world-class in any field.

3. Embrace Your Uniqueness

While developing your skills and abilities, remember to embrace the uniqueness that comes with them. In a world where imitation is often easier than innovation, it’s crucial to hold onto the traits that set you apart. As Oscar Wilde aptly said, “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”

Your unique approach to your skills and interests is what makes you stand out. Embrace your quirks, your different style, your unique way of thinking, and infuse them into your craft. That’s what will make you unforgettable.

4. Showcase Your Skills

No matter how good you become at your craft, if no one knows about it, your efforts will remain unappreciated. Hence, the need to showcase your skills, your improvements, your unique take on your craft is important.

Creating a portfolio, maintaining an active online presence, networking in the relevant communities, speaking at events, and publishing your work are all effective ways to showcase your skills. Be proud of your progress and your unique approach, and share it with the world.

5. Keep Evolving

Lastly, remember that growth is a lifelong journey. What makes you unique and valuable today may become commonplace tomorrow. To stay relevant and unignorable, you must continue to learn, evolve, and grow. Stay updated with the latest trends, continue learning new skills, and adapt to changes to keep refining your craft.

Success is a journey, not a destination. As you continue to improve, evolve and excel at your own thing, the world will take notice. In the words of Steve Martin, “Be so good they can’t ignore you.” So, go forth and make your mark by getting exceptionally good at your own unique thing. Your path to becoming unignorable has already begun.

Mastering the Delta

The world of work is in constant flux. With technology advancing at an unprecedented pace, skills once considered indispensable can quickly become obsolete. To stay ahead, it’s crucial to continually evolve, to have a “delta” that is always in positive territory. This concept inspired from Victor cheng, can be broken down into three fundamental levels: your career skills delta, your employer’s delta, and your industry’s delta.

The ideal situation in this fast-paced landscape is to maintain a hierarchy where your career skills delta surpasses your employer’s delta, which in turn surpasses your industry’s delta. Let’s delve into these concepts further:

Your Career Skills Delta

Your career skills delta is the rate at which you’re improving and gaining new skills compared to the rate at which your current skills are becoming obsolete. In other words, it’s the difference between the skills you’re gaining and the skills you’re losing.

It’s about adopting a growth mindset, seeking out learning opportunities, and actively pursuing professional development. This could mean attending workshops, pursuing additional qualifications, or simply staying abreast of the latest trends in your field.

The key is to ensure that your skills delta remains positive, that you’re always learning more than you’re forgetting or letting become outdated. This personal growth, in turn, allows you to bring new perspectives, ideas, and methods to your workplace, contributing to its success and your own.

Your Employer’s Delta

Your employer’s delta, on the other hand, is the rate at which your organization is evolving and improving its practices and processes compared to the rate at which its current practices are becoming outdated.

Companies that fail to innovate and adapt to changing circumstances risk being left behind. Those with a positive delta – who innovate faster than they become outdated – are in a much stronger position. They can retain talented staff, attract new talent, and stay competitive in the market.

As an employee, you want to be part of an organization that has a positive employer delta. This provides opportunities for growth and development, and allows you to apply and expand your own skill set.

Your Industry’s Delta

The industry’s delta is the rate of change in the industry as a whole, including the emergence of new technologies, shifts in consumer behavior, and regulatory changes. The industry’s delta can serve as a benchmark against which to measure your own delta and your employer’s delta.

Staying ahead of the industry’s delta requires vigilance and foresight. It involves keeping an eye on industry trends, understanding the implications of emerging technologies, and adapting to shifts in the market. This not only provides a competitive edge but also ensures you’re well-positioned to seize new opportunities as they arise.

The Ideal Ratio

The ideal ratio, therefore, is:

Your Career Skills Delta > Your Employer’s Delta > Your Industry’s Delta

This means you’re learning and evolving faster than your company and your industry. This puts you in an advantageous position, ready to seize new opportunities and face challenges head-on.

The key is to keep pushing yourself, to never stop learning and growing. When your personal skills delta is larger than your employer’s and your industry’s, you become an invaluable asset, a driving force behind your organization’s success, and a leader in your industry.

In conclusion, embracing the delta hierarchy allows you to stay one step ahead in a fast-paced world. By keeping your skills, your employer’s practices, and your industry’s changes in mind, you can ensure that you’re always in a position to succeed, no matter what the future brings. So, here’s to cultivating a high delta – and to a bright, dynamic future!

Art of Prioritizing

In the words of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, ‘Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least.’

Each day we’re bombarded with tasks that demand our attention. Emails flood our inbox. Meetings clog our schedules. The phone rings incessantly. In the midst of all this chaos, it’s easy to mistake the ‘urgent’ for the ‘important.’

A recent piece published in the Harvard Business Review titled “How to Focus on What’s Important, Not Just What’s Urgent” delves into this conundrum. It’s a must-read for anyone who has ever felt overwhelmed by the sheer volume of ‘urgent’ tasks that pop up daily.

The article begins by introducing the Eisenhower Matrix, a time management tool named after the 34th President of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower. The matrix separates tasks into four categories based on their urgency and importance. This simple yet powerful tool is designed to help you prioritize tasks effectively and focus on what truly matters.

The trouble is, in today’s fast-paced world, we often let the urgent tasks take over our day, while the important ones – the tasks that truly align with our personal or business goals – get pushed to the backburner.

The article highlights the need to reevaluate our approach to prioritizing tasks. By consciously deciding to focus more on ‘important’ tasks, we can take a proactive approach to our work, rather than a reactive one. This shift not only increases our productivity but also brings a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment.

So, how do we make this shift? The HBR article offers three key strategies:

  1. Plan proactively: Start by identifying your ‘important’ tasks and block out time in your schedule to tackle these first.
  2. Recognize and resist the ‘urgency bias’: Our brains are wired to focus on immediate, urgent tasks, even if they’re not the most important. Recognize this bias and consciously make the effort to resist it.
  3. Conduct regular reviews: Regularly reassess your priorities and adjust your schedule accordingly. This will ensure that the ‘important’ tasks don’t slip through the cracks.

By adopting these strategies, we can break free from the tyranny of the ‘urgent’ and invest our time in tasks that truly matter.

As we go through our days, let us remember the wise words of Stephen R. Covey: “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.”

So, the next time you find yourself drowning in ‘urgent’ tasks, take a step back, evaluate your priorities, and remember to focus on the ‘important.’ After all, our time is our most valuable asset. Let’s spend it wisely.