everything they told you was wrong
If you come home at the end of the
day feeling angry, alienated, and exhausted, maybe you need more
than a new job; you need a new line of work.
- Marc Cullen,
M.D.
Anna wakes up at 6am but wishes she could sleep for a few more hours. After getting the kids some breakfast and taking them to school, she drives to the office. Her job pays well and her boss and co-workers are nice enough but she still dreads going to work and at the end of the day she feels so drained, like the life has been sucked out of her.
She’s put on a lot of weight over the last few years and she knows that she needs to exercise and eat better but she doesn’t have anything left once she gets home. Her lack of energy also makes her impatient and easily irritated, which strains her relationships with her husband and children.
She has read books on time management, stress management, exercise, healthy eating, parenting and marriage but nothing seems to work. Her manager has identified a few areas of improvement on her performance evaluation and has developed an action plan for her to follow. Specifically, she needs to be more flexible and work on her interpersonal skills. She has attended seminars, worked with a coach and tried diligently to achieve the goals in the plan but isn’t making much progress.
Anna wants to change. She wants to grow. She’s motivated and focused but it just isn’t working. She finds herself asking the same questions over and over again.
● What’s wrong with me?
● What am I missing?
● Why can’t I make any progress?
● What should I do?
If Anna came to you for help, what would you tell her?
● Does she need to try harder?
● Does she need to set clearer goals?
● Does she need therapy?
● Does she need a personal trainer or a life coach?
● Should she join a support group like Weight Watchers?
● Should she get a new job? If so, what kind of job should she look for?
Before we can answer these questions, we need to go back a few years. When Anna was in school, she always got good grades. Although she wasn’t the most popular girl in school, she did well in most of her classes and stayed out of trouble. Her teachers consistently commented on her shyness and encouraged her to come out of her shell. School administrators also warned her that she needed to improve her participation and performance in physical education.
Her parents wished that she’d spend less time in her room and more time with other kids and the family. They pushed her to join a sports team or some other extracurricular group activity. Sometimes they’d use terms like anti-social and wondered if she had some kind of disorder. Their fears were just reinforced by Anna’s desire to be in control and keep everything very organized. Since she was very little, she’d always been very neat and liked to have things in their proper place. After seeing a special news report on television, her parents even wondered if she might have obsessive-compulsive disorder.
In college, Anna decided to see a counselor after taking an introductory psychology class. Listening to the professor and reading the book convinced her that she wasn’t normal and that she needed to get some help. The counselor tried to teach her how to interact more effectively with others and how to be more comfortable with her roommate’s messiness. The ideas that Anna learned seemed to make sense but they just didn’t stick. She stopped going to her sessions and concluded that she must be lacking in self-discipline or motivation.
For Anna’s entire life the people around her, teachers, parents and managers seemed convinced that there was something wrong with her and after a while she started to believe them. How could they all be wrong?
Anna isn’t alone. In talking with my seminar participants, students, friends and family members, I’ve found a lot of people that are frustrated in their efforts to create the life and career that they’ve imagined. When I ask students what they want to change about their life, they consistently say that they want to find a better job or start their own business. My experience is supported by a recent Intuit study which showed that 72% of employees “dream of starting their own business” and 67% of respondents said that they “contemplate resigning from their job on a regular basis.” Other studies show that 70% of employees are not motivated at work and don’t even know how to do their jobs well.
According to a CNN Money report, job satisfaction in the United States hit a 22-year low in 2009. The study found that more than half of American employees are frustrated by their work. "The Conference Board's survey polled 5,000 households, and found that only 45% were satisfied in their jobs. That's down from 61.1% in 1987, the first year the survey was conducted. Even though one in 10 Americans is out of a job, those who are employed are increasingly dissatisfied. 'Through both economic boom and bust during the past two decades, our job satisfaction numbers have shown a consistent downward trend,' said Lynn Franco, director of the Consumer Research Center of The Conference Board.’” The ongoing recession, layoffs, pay cuts and outsourcing promise to make this problem even worse in 2011 and the years to come.
These numbers are staggering! It’s not just a few people who are unhappy at work. It is most people. It is the vast majority of people. If you like your job and do it well, you are in the minority. You are rare.
So why am I focusing on work? Why not discuss Anna’s other concerns, like health, parenting and marriage? Because I think Anna’s poor health, difficult family relationships and lack of sleep are just symptoms of an underlying problem in her career. The root of the problem is work.
As one study showed, problems at work lead to more health issues than financial or family problems. A similar study revealed that 25% believe their job is the biggest source of stress in their lives. This is partly due to the fact that we spend more of our waking hours at work than we spend involved in any other activity. If our job is draining, instead of fulfilling, it will have a dramatically negative impact on our life.
Pam Slim helps people to create alternatives to their current jobs because, in her words, “I found a lot of despair hidden behind smiling faces of smart people in cubicles over the years. Gut wrenching, tears, confusion, sadness, anger, you name it, I heard it.” According to Dan Miller, author of 48 Days to the Work You Love, most suicides occur on Sunday nights and most heart attacks happen on Monday morning. Unfortunately, some people would rather die than go to work and even if they do go to the office, the job kills them anyway.
It is no surprise then that one of the most popular television shows in the United Kingdom and the United States is The Office, which chronicles the apathy, incompetence, frustration and futility of corporate life. Similarly, organizations throughout the world are littered with copies of Dilbert cartoons, which serve as a comic strip version of The Office. Their success shows just how unsuccessful our companies and our employees have become, which is why Pam Slim’s book, Escape from Cubicle Nation has become a best-seller. The title of the first chapter of the book is a profound question. “I have a fancy title, steady paycheck, and good benefits. Why am I so miserable?”
One of Pam’s coaching clients explained it this way. “I describe my office job and cubicle as toxic to my spirit. Before I graduated, I was ambitious, excited and had big dreams. My work sucks all the creativity and fun . . . and is starting to sap my spirit too. It has dampened my will and motivation and has just made me stop caring. I’m . . . no longer excited about projects or making a difference. I’m just going through the motions . . . it’s hard to keep the lethargic work energy from spilling over to other aspects of my life.”
So why are people so frustrated with their jobs? Why do they want to start their own businesses? People aren’t happy in their careers because their job requires them to do work that drains their energy and requires them to be strong where they are weak. A recent Gallup survey found that only 20% of employees feel like they have the opportunity to do what they do best every day. This means that 80% feel trapped by work that relies on them to excel in their areas of weakness. There is a lack of alignment between what we do well and what we have to do at work.
In a Men’s Health article, Marc Cullen, M.D., a professor of medicine at Yale University, explains that "the amount of stress you feel from your job has a lot to do with whether the job fits you -- that is, whether it matches your personality and style and other demands of your life. . . If you come home at the end of the day feeling angry, alienated, and exhausted, maybe you need more than a new job; you need a new line of work. The biggest problems are with a misfit. If you're a misfit, fix it -- or you'll die trying."
Pam Slim explains that being trapped in the wrong job can lead to:
● Not being able to identify what makes you happy
● A feeling of numbness and emptiness
● A feeling of burning rage
● A feeling of powerlessness and loss of self
● A sense of loneliness
● A loss of direction
Sadly, no one seems that interested in helping people to find the right fit. In fact, well-meaning parents, schools, employers and psychologists systematically teach people how to fit in, instead of showing them how to match their talents and passions to their activities.
While researching ideas for the book, I did a Google search for "strengths and weaknesses." The majority of the results were instructions on how to properly answer the interview question, "What is one of your weaknesses?" It is worth noting that this is one of the most common questions asked by interviewers.
The advice that I found varies, but falls into three basic categories. First, tell them about a weakness that you have already improved and explain your plan for continued improvement. For example, you could explain that you struggle with new technology, but have started playing a lot of online video games to help you get more comfortable with computers and the internet.
Second, discuss a weakness that is unrelated to the job. For example, in an interview for a job as construction worker, you could admit to having poor computer skills or body odor or a habit of yelling inappropriate comments at attractive women. Third, focus on a weakness that has an upside for the company. For example, you can confess that you work too hard and are so committed to the company that you don't ever take time to relax. Describing yourself as a suck-up or major brown-noser might also be helpful.
All of this advice seems to assume that you have something to hide from the interviewer and that you are trying to keep them from discovering who you really are. If you are successful, then you'll be rewarded with a job and a boss that assumes you don't have any relevant weaknesses or that you are willing and able to fix any of your weaknesses. As Seth Godin explains in Linchpin, “If you need to conceal your true nature to get in the door, understand that you’ll probably have to conceal your true nature to keep that job.”
Is that the kind of job that you want? Is that the way to find the right fit? Well, it doesn’t really matter because, if you need a job, those are the answers that employers are looking for.
Once you have the job, most managers keep asking the question about your biggest weakness on an annual or semi-annual basis. It’s called the performance evaluation. This is because most companies require that evaluations focus on performance issues or developmental challenges or areas for improvement. All of these are terms to describe weaknesses.
Organizations are requiring their managers to find and document weaknesses and create plans for fixing them in the appraisal process. In fact, this is usually seen as the primary purpose of the appraisal. The positive aspects of the employee’s performance are quickly reviewed or acknowledged and then the majority of the time is spent on repairing flaws.
We know that employees dread their performance review but did you know that managers feel the same way? Evaluations are one of the tasks that supervisors like the least. This is probably because they are so negative and, after doing them for years, most managers understand that doing the appraisal this way doesn’t actually improve anyone’s performance. This is why a lot of supervisors only complete the review process as a formality that is required by the human resources department.
To make matters worse, many companies now use 360-degree feedback tools that allow everyone to participate in the evaluation process. Instead of only being put down by your boss, you can now get criticism from your boss, peers and subordinates.
The ineffectiveness of the conventional approach to improvement at work is illustrated by Nellie’s experience during one of her performance evaluations. I met Nellie, founder of Arize Coaching and Consulting, at a seminar for entrepreneurs and she shared the following story with me. You can find out more about Nellie at http://arizecc.com.
“One incident in particular, midway through my career, stands out. Though the years have flown by, I still remember it as if it were yesterday.
I was in my manager's office going over my annual review. I was so excited. My 360-degree feedback was excellent. On a scale of 1 to 5, I was rated 4.7. As a Senior Project Manager that was an awesome achievement. Project Managers assign people more work to their already full plate along with a tight deadline and then chase them for a status updates. So, naturally, project managers are not the most popular people in the company.
My manager and I began walking through the annual review section by section. I was elated, that is until we got to the Interpersonal Skills section. I was in shock to see that I had only been given 3 out of 5. I believe that I am the ultimate people-person.
Without looking up at me, my manager tactfully went on to ask me to stop smiling and acting enthusiastic while I was at work. OUCH! My mind screamed ‘please pinch yourself and pray that you are having a nightmare.’ This could not be happening. Job descriptions frequently read ‘enthusiastic, results-oriented professional with…’
My manager explained that he thought I was fantastic and his best, most productive and dependable employee. However, one of the senior executives was annoyed by my natural enthusiasm. My boss asked me to stop smiling at this executive when I passed her in the hallways. ‘You can acknowledge her. Just do not smile.’
Wow! This pierced my being. I was born enthusiastic, smiling and looking at the brighter side of everything. His quote from her was ‘if people want sunshine they could go outside.’ The fact that I had delivered 180% of my set goals went by the wayside.”
Nellie’s story has a happy ending but her eventual success was not facilitated by her manager or her organization. She succeeded because she refused to accept this ridiculous criticism and change her approach to work.
“I have a love and passion for life and people. I knew immediately that I could not change this about me because it is deeply ingrained. Fast forward to today. I run a business and am a successful business consultant, change manager, and coach; all of which requires that a person be enthusiastic, encouraging, and genuinely caring. I am so glad that my enthusiasm was not easily turned off; otherwise this high-level executive, who I highly respected, would have killed the precise trait that propels me.”
This manager was doing his best to improve the Nellie’s performance. He thought that, by pointing out her flaws and asking her to change, he would get the desired result. However, he almost inadvertently killed the traits that propelled her.
This approach is all too common but it would be wrong to focus exclusively on the workplace. Managers and employees are just doing what they’ve been taught by parents, teachers and psychologists. In other words, the problems at work start with the incorrect beliefs that we learn at home and school. The people who should be forming us are often guilty of deforming us.
We are all apt to believe what the world believes
about us.
- George Eliot
There are four beliefs that contribute to our feelings of stress and frustration in our careers. First, we believe that to be successful, we need to be normal, to fit in and not stand out. This means that we should follow the rules and do what we’re told. Second, we think that we should be flexible, balanced and well-rounded by fixing weaknesses and improving our flaws. Third, we’re convinced that we could fit in, if we just tried hard enough. Finally, we could fix our weaknesses, if we just had enough self-discipline and perseverance.
All of these beliefs seem empowering but they are actually debilitating. They tell us that we have the potential to succeed, that we have the ability, but they misguide us as to where that potential lies and how we should apply that potential. They set us up for failure and then lead to confusion and disappointment when we don’t achieve our goals. This creates a downward spiral as we keep relying on the same incorrect beliefs and ineffective actions to correct the very problem that these myths created in the first place.
Unfortunately, the people who should be teaching us how to succeed in our lives and careers are the very people who teach and reinforce these myths. As Parker Palmer explains in Let Your Life Speak, “We arrive into this world with birthright gifts – then we spend the first half of our lives abandoning them or letting others disabuse us of them. As young people, we are surrounded by expectations that may have little to do with who we really are, expectations held by people who are not trying to discern our selfhood but to fit us into slots. In families, schools, workplaces, and religious communities, we are trained away from true self toward images of acceptability; under social pressures . . . our original shape is deformed beyond recognition; and we ourselves, driven by fear, too often betray true self to gain the approval of others.”
Schools add to the problem by teaching children that they need to be balanced and well-rounded individuals who excel equally in all areas. If you get an A in English but a failing grade in Math, you don’t move to the next grade. If you can’t demonstrate reasonable competence across a variety of subjects on a standardized test, you won’t move ahead or you’ll be denied admission to college. If you love science but hate gym, you’ll be continually pushed to work on your physical fitness, usually by an overweight gym teacher.
If you ask about the practical value of subjects like algebra, you’ll get vague answers about critical thinking or reasoning skills or an admission that algebra is just a requirement so you need to study in order to graduate. The lesson of school is clear. Effective people are knowledgeable in all areas of life and do equally well across the entire spectrum of academic subjects. Students who fight against this belief system are criticized, disciplined, medicated, suspended and expelled.
In his book, The Element, Sir Ken Robinson argues for a complete transformation of the educational system in most industrial nations because of the way our schools destroy the potential of so many students. “I believe passionately that we are all born with tremendous natural capacities, and that we lose touch with many of them as we spend more time in the world. Ironically, one of the main reasons this happens is education. The result is that too many people never connect with their true talents and therefore don’t know what they’re really capable of achieving. In that sense, they don’t know who they really are.”
Robinson says that “some of the most brilliant, creative people I know did not do well at school. Many of them didn’t really discover what they could do – and who they really were – until they’d left school and recovered from their education.” And he offers numerous examples throughout the book, including Virgin founder and billionaire, Richard Branson.
He specifically criticizes the way that schools teach children to be normal. “Public education puts relentless pressures on its students to conform . . . The current processes of education do not take account of individual learning styles and talents. In that way, they offend the principle of distinctiveness.”
I experienced this pressure to conform throughout my years in school. I wasn't very popular with my teachers in school. One particular English teacher had a special distaste for me. She might have disliked me because I wrote a creative writing paper on the subject of vomit, for which I received a grade of F. I was under the mistaken impression that when she said we could write about anything, that she actually meant it. To be honest, I probably knew that she didn't mean it, but maybe I wanted her to acknowledge that she didn't actually want us to be creative.
On another similar assignment, I wrote the entire paper using as many B words as I could think of. Every possible word started with the letter B, except for the occasional "and" or "the." Again, this was fairly creative from my perspective. Unfortunately, my teacher wasn't as impressed and wasn't as generous with the Bs. The paper got me another F.
I didn't think much of it at the time. I knew that I wouldn't get a good grade and I can't really argue that I had some higher purpose in writing the paper. It wasn't a political statement and I wasn't an artistic genius. . . or was I?
Many years later I was sitting on the couch with my two daughters reading stories to them before bedtime and I picked up The Berenstain's B Book. It was an entire children's book based on the same principle as my school paper. Use as many Bs as you can in one book so that kids learn the letter and the associated words. The story is ridiculous but it doesn't matter. That isn't the point. The point is to teach the letter B to kids.
The book culminates in the lines "Big brown bear, blue bull, beautiful baboon blowing bubbles biking backward, bump black bug's banana boxes and Billy Bunny's breadbasket and Brother Bob's baseball bus and Buster Beagle's banjo-bagpipe-bugle band and that's what broke Baby Bird's balloon."
Someone got paid to write a story just like the one that earned me a failing grade. The fact that someone published a book with Random House doing exactly what I did seems important. My teacher did what most people do. When they see something that is different, they reject it. She wanted me to be normal. She wanted me to do things right. She wanted me to see that I had a problem following instructions or being a good student. But she missed the bigger issue.
I was being creative. It may have looked like immaturity or silliness, but it could have been redirected. She could have recognized and encouraged the potential. It does take a certain amount of imagination and vocabulary to be able to write an entire paper without using any words that don't start with B.
What would have happened if my teacher would have given me an A and told me that I was an amazingly inventive soul? What if she would have encouraged me to use my talents to become a writer? What if she would have told me that I could use my off-beat sense of humor to become successful? I can’t answer those questions because it didn’t happen and it took me years to recover from my education.
But maybe we should excuse our schools because they are just trying to prepare students for a career in an organizational environment that is very similar to school. In his book, Linchpin, Seth Godin explains that our schools were designed more than a century ago to train people for factory work and they continue to prepare students to toil in our modern cubicle factories. Factories thrive on standardization and mass production, not individuation and customization. When students struggle with this artificial and restrictive environment, we diagnose them with psychological disorders and give them medication to help them behave, to fit in, to act normal.
Our parents have a powerful influence on our lives and careers. However, this influence can often be quite negative. In The Element Ken Robinson tells the story of Paulo Coelho, a young man who wanted to be a writer. Unfortunately, his parents thought that Paulo should be a lawyer and that writing was nothing more than a hobby. When Paulo resisted their advice and pursued his writing career, his parents had him committed to a psychiatric institution where he was given electroshock treatments. His parents did this because they loved him and wanted what was best for him. But their notions of what was best included having a normal life with a good job doing respectable work that paid a good salary.
You might be thinking that this is an extreme case, that most parents don’t go this far to force their children to follow a path that doesn’t match their interests or abilities. Sometimes their resistance is subtle, like in the ways parents criticize children for their annoying habits. It can be difficult for children to identify pursue their unique talents and goals without the guidance and support of their parents. It is even harder when their parents actively resist that pursuit.
Adam’s parents remember that he was always screaming as a child. Adam explains, "Apparently, I was a real pain in the butt in restaurants. They couldn't take me anywhere. I was super super noisy. . . I was very talkative, very hyperactive. I was bouncing off the walls all the time. Not much different than I am now really.” He was noisy, so they told him to be quiet. They didn’t take him out because it was embarrassing to have a child who wasn’t normal and quiet and obedient.
Adam has grown up but he’s still screaming and noisy and now he has a full band and sound system to accompany him and amplify his voice. Although his parents used to tell him to be quiet, I bet they're happy that he didn't listen. Because he was the runner-up on American Idol in 2009 and his first album sold nearly a million copies worldwide, more than Kris Allen, the 2009 winner.
When I was a kid, my parents nicknamed me “motor-mouth” because my mouth never stopped running. I was always hungry and at the leftovers from everyone else’s plate at restaurants, so they called me “the vulture.”
Once I brought home a report card from school. I got an A in every subject, except English. There, I was getting a C. How did my parents respond? Did they compliment me on my excellent work in most of my classes? Did they encourage me to focus my efforts on those areas where I was having success? No. Instead, they wanted to talk about English. What was I doing wrong? How could I do better? Was I trying hard enough?
They believed, as most parents do, that we all need to be well-rounded. But before we put too much of the blame on parents, let’s remember that they teach kids to be normal and well-rounded because they want their kids to succeed in the workplace. That is what companies seem to want, average and obedient employees.
The scrutiny doesn’t end when you leave home. As an adult, your spouse and children also have strong feelings about what you should and shouldn’t do with your life and career. They might not care as much about your personal fulfillment as they do about their financial security or material well-being. The people who are closest to us are also the most likely to uncover and address our deepest flaws. We might be able to hide some weaknesses from others but our families tend to know us better than anyone else.
The roots of all of these myths and counterproductive behaviors can be found in the study and practice of psychology. For more than 100 years, psychologists have been creating, diagnosing and treating our mental disorders. Based on the medical model of identifying and repairing illness, psychology has a negative focus. Counselors and psychiatrists are trained to find and fix our weaknesses. They don’t study mental health. They study mental illness. They don’t study happiness. They study depression. They don’t diagnose satisfaction and fulfillment. They diagnose disappointment and pain.
This approach to psychology might not be so bad if it was actually working. The past 100 years of medicine have virtually eliminated some diseases, like polio, discovered preventative measures and treatments for many other previously deadly conditions and produced a tremendous increase in lifespan and quality of life. In other words, medical science has helped us to become healthier.
Psychology can’t claim the same success. No cures for mental illness have been discovered in the history of psychology. There has been no decrease in mental illness and no rise in mental health. In fact, it is quite the opposite. If anything, psychology has produced a dramatic increase in the number of people who would identify themselves as depressed, neurotic, anxious and obsessive compulsive. For many people, therapy has become a basic life activity, just like going to the gym or doing some shopping.
The default assumption is that there is probably something wrong with all of us and it probably wouldn’t hurt to talk to a counselor about it. But I think it probably does hurt. Talking to a counselor just reinforces our belief that we are different and that we should work harder to be more normal. It also encourages us to focus time, energy and effort on discovering and deleting our liabilities.
In general, I think psychologists over-diagnose and over-medicate mental illness. In other words, they convince us that something is wrong, when there’s nothing wrong and then they give us a pill to fix our supposed sickness. The only guarantee is that the side effects of the medication will probably be worse than our original symptoms. The overall effect is that we have become a society that is dominated by the negative psychological paradigm and we no longer think to challenge the assumptions of this view, even though it has failed to help us live better lives.
The self-improvement book and seminar business has a track record that is similar to that of psychology. The whole industry is built on telling you what is wrong with you, getting you to feel guilty about your shortcomings and then selling you a solution to your problems. Again, it seems like a very empowering thing to do. But given the dramatic increase in the number and availability of self-help resources, why don’t we see an equal increase in people’s performance?
Why do most of the self-help books in the 21st Century offer the same advice as those written in the 20th Century? Why do self-help books in the 21st Century try to help us fix the same problems that people had in the 20th Century? Why haven’t we made any progress?
We haven’t made any progress because self-improvement is premised on the same foundations as psychology. Are you disorganized? Read a book on how to be more organized. Are you too shy? Go to a seminar on how to be more outgoing. Are you a pushover? Take a class on how to be more assertive. What could be simpler? But if it is so simple, then why are so many of us still struggling?
The fact is that millions of messy people read books on how to be more organized and try to apply what they’ve learned but they just can’t. Millions of shy people attend seminars on how to be more outgoing and try to implement what they’ve been taught but they just can’t. Millions of non-confrontational people take classes on how to be assertive and try to stand up to others but they just can’t. What’s their problem? Why can’t they change? Why isn’t self-help helping? Is it possible that self-improvement is actually self-destructive?
As a college professor, I teach classes in personal effectiveness, strategic planning and managing change. I try to help people improve their personal lives and their organizations. Over the years, I’ve asked a lot of students to explain why they failed to make important changes in their lives or failed to achieve their goals. One of the common answers is a lack of self control. Person after person describes a sincere desire to improve, but is unable to carry it out. The goal of the class is to help them overcome the barriers to successful planning and change.
Throughout this process, I try to teach people how to change and how to plan. For example, most strategic planning starts with a SWOT analysis, which is an exploration of the organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. Similarly, most guides to self-improvement stress the importance of self-awareness. We need an honest and relatively complete understanding of ourselves in order to grow and succeed.
However, I’ve found little guidance to help people understand what to change and what to plan. What should people do with their self-awareness? What kinds of things should we try to change? What if there are some things we can’t change or shouldn’t change? Specifically, when confronted with our strengths and weaknesses how should we respond?
I believe strongly in our ability to learn and grow. However, I’ve watched so many people struggle with change that I’m not convinced we can change anything we want to. I’m not convinced that we need, or can find, more self control or willpower. Maybe we’re trying to change the wrong things. Maybe we’re setting the wrong goals.
These questions have led
me to focus more on teaching students what to change, what to plan
and what to do with their awareness of strengths and weaknesses. I
start by asking a simple multiple-choice question.
If you want to increase your personal and professional effectiveness, should you:
1. Fix your weaknesses
2. Build on your strengths
3. Do both (fix your weaknesses and build on your strengths)
The overwhelming majority of students choose option three, both fix weaknesses and build on strengths. In many situations, no one will choose to just build on their strengths, but someone will always choose to just fix weaknesses. This result is consistent with research by the Gallup Organization which indicates that 59% of respondents believed that fixing weaknesses was essential to personal development. Only 41% chose building strengths as the path to success.
In the Gallup study “doing both” wasn’t offered as an option. However, I suspect that offering people the option of doing both would have drastically decreased the number of those that chose to build on their strengths.
I follow up by asking students to support their choice. Why did they choose their answer? It is interesting to explore their rationale for each answer.
Those that chose to fix their weaknesses gave the following reasons:
● I’ll turn my weaknesses into strengths and then I’ll be even stronger.
● You don’t need to build on strengths because they will always be there. They are natural. You don’t have to maintain them.
● Nobody is perfect. There is always room for improvement.
● You are only as strong as your weakest link.
● I can think of more weaknesses than strengths.
● Weaknesses make you look bad. Managers, co-workers and others notice your weaknesses and use them against you.
Those that choose to both fix weaknesses and build strengths offer similar reasons.
● It is important to be well-rounded and balanced.
● You can’t ignore your weaknesses because they will trip you up.
● It is easier to be balanced than great. It is hard to be so good that your weaknesses are irrelevant.
● You should work on as many things as you can.
● There is always room for improvement.
Those that choose to build on strengths believe that:
● You can’t be good at everything.
● There is a place for everyone.
● Nobody is perfect. You’ll always have weaknesses so don’t worry about them.
● Our weaknesses make us human.
● It is important to see the best in people and bring out the best in others.
● Strengths make up for our weaknesses. A great offense makes up for a bad defense.
● It is more enjoyable to build on strengths.
● Strengths are where you have the greatest chance of becoming exceptional.
As you can see, there are many different reasons supporting each approach. The validity of these beliefs and the effectiveness of each will be explored throughout the rest of the book. For now, it is enough to note that the beliefs that support fixing weaknesses and doing both are significantly different from the beliefs that support building on strengths.
It might be helpful at this point to note the responses that fit best with your current belief system. How would you respond to the one question quiz? Why?
I wanted to get a better sense of people’s beliefs about strengths, weaknesses and career development, so I created my own survey, which has been completed by hundreds of people throughout the world over the last year. The survey is nearly identical to the self-assessment at the beginning of this chapter.
The survey results confirmed my experience in the classroom. Overall, 48% of respondents believed that they need to fit in, fix weaknesses and be well-rounded in order to succeed in their careers.
● 50% agreed and only 35% disagreed with “It is important to fit in at work.” *
● 52% agreed and only 35% disagreed with “If I want to improve, I need to fix my weaknesses.”
● 52% agreed and only 33% disagreed with “It is important to be well-rounded, especially at work.”
● 52% agreed and only 30% disagreed with “I should fix my weaknesses and build my strengths.”
● 56% agreed and only 26% disagreed with “A well-balanced set of characteristics will make me more marketable.”
Nearly 25% responded “not sure” to “Being different and sticking out will help me in my career.”
*agree/disagree percentages don’t equal 100 because some respondents chose “not sure.”
The results of this survey are important because our beliefs have a profound influence on our actions. Furthermore, the validity of those beliefs has a major influence on the effectiveness of our actions. If we believe the wrong things then our actions will be ineffective and self-defeating. If we believe the right things, then our actions have the potential to be fruitful and fulfilling. The power of our beliefs is illustrated painfully and beautifully by the story of an elementary school teacher in Iowa.
In April 1968, Jane Elliott taught her third-grade students an important lesson. She divided the class into two groups based on eye color. The children were then told that blue-eyed children were smarter, kinder and cleaner than brown-eyed children. Because of this blue-eyed children were given extra privileges in the classroom. For example, they were allowed to be first in line and got a longer recess.
Brown-eyed children had to wear special collars that designated them as inferior and their actions were consistently criticized by Elliott throughout the day. As the day progressed, the supposedly superior blue-eyed children began to tease and insult those with the inferior eye-color. Because of this treatment, the inferior children became withdrawn and sad. They also decreased participation in class activities. In discussions with Elliott, they admitted that they were indeed less intelligent than their blue-eyed classmates and their test results and other schoolwork for the day showed a marked decrease in performance.
The next day, Elliott explained to the students that she had made a mistake. The brown-eyed children were actually superior to the blue-eyed ones. The response to this announcement was immediate and profound. The brown-eyed children began to celebrate, while the blue-eyed children became despondent. As with the day before, the newly superior brown-eyed children began to criticize their supposedly inferior counterparts. The inferior children showed a significant decrease in confidence, energy and effort, while the apparently superior students demonstrated a commensurate increase in positive attitude, engaged activity and overall success.
Elliott used this exercise to teach her students about discrimination. It was the day after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. and her students in Riceville, Iowa lived in an all-white community of just under 1,000 people. She wanted to help them understand the insidious nature of prejudice and stereotypes. She did this when she chose “a physical characteristic over which they had no control and attributed negative elements to this characteristic.”
It is obvious to external observers, especially adults, that there is no real advantage to having a particular eye color. The apparent superiority of the blue-eyed or brown-eyed students was just an illusion. It wasn’t real. It was just an exercise. However, the belief that one eye-color was good and the other was bad had a major impact on students’ behaviors and performance.
This exercise illustrates the power of our thoughts in determining how we act. More importantly, it illustrates the incredible change that takes place when we discover that what we thought was bad is actually good, that what we thought was a weakness is actually a strength. Imagine the response of the brown-eyed students when, after a day of humiliation and criticism, the teacher announced that they weren’t inferior. Imagine their joy and excitement. Imagine their transformation.
What if the same was true for you? What if what you thought was bad turned out to be good instead? What if your apparent weaknesses were just an illusion? What if the people that have been criticizing you were wrong? What your teachers, bosses, co-workers and spouse had made a mistake? How would you feel? What would you do?
I think we all experience some form of Elliott’s exercise every day. There are three stages to this process. First, other people take a characteristic over which we have “no control” and “attribute negative elements to it.” Second, we believe that the criticism is true. We listen to their charges and take them to heart. Third, we feel bad. We wish we could change. We vow to turn things around. We promise to do better but we can’t. Gradually, as it did with Elliott’s students, the frustration begins to erode our happiness and reduce our performance.
It doesn’t have to be this way. The truth is that your critics are wrong and your weaknesses are just an illusion.
It’s never too late to be who you
might have been.
– George
Eliot
So far we’ve discussed two lies that lead to frustration and failure in our lives and careers. The first lie is that being normal, following the rules and fitting in will help you to succeed. The second lie is that fixing your weaknesses, being balanced and well-rounded is the best route to personal and career fulfillment.
I just found out there’s no such
thing as the real world, just a lie you’ve got to rise above.
John Mayer, No Such
Thing
We need to replace these self-defeating beliefs with two more accurate and useful assumptions. First, it is good to be different, to stick out and to be a freak. Second, it is good to flaunt your weaknesses, instead of fixing them. It is good to be unbalanced.
Conformity is the ruin of the
mind.
- Jesse Shelley
Chris Guillebeau’s book, The Art of Non-Conformity, argues that "you don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to. You can do good things for yourself and make the world a better place at the same time." Unfortunately, most of us adjust our behavior based on what most people do. This seems to be human nature. Psychologists refer to it as social proof. We figure that if most people are doing something, then it must be a good idea. Unfortunately, this isn't true.
● Most people are employees
● Most people don't like their work
● Most people only have a high school education
● Most people are in debt
● Most people make less than $50,000 per year
● Most people don't exercise regularly
● Most people think they'll succeed by fixing their weaknesses
● A select few start their own businesses
● A select few do what they love
● A select few graduate from college
● A select few are debt free
● A select few earn a six-figure income
● A select few exercise regularly
● A select few flaunt their weaknesses, instead of trying to fix them
I'm not arguing that starting a business, having a college degree or earning a lot of money are the most important things in life. My point is that you probably don't want what most people have. You probably want what only a select few have. But if you do what most people do, if you follow the crowd, then you probably won't have the life that you want. Non-conformity is important because you probably want to be like a select few, instead of ending up like most people.
I'm not going to change the way I
look or the way I feel to conform to anything. I've always been a
freak.
– John Lennon
After a speaking engagement in Boston, I was doing some shopping and saw this sign for sale in a small store. It read “I think the only normal people are the ones you don’t know too well.” This is important. There is no such thing as normal. We only imagine that other people are normal. Similarly, other people know they aren’t normal, but assume that we are.
Even if it was good to be normal, it isn’t possible. No one is normal. It is just an abstract concept that doesn’t exist in reality.
A lot of people pay lip service to the value of being different. An essential marketing strategy for most organizations includes achieving significant differentiation from their competition. However, it is difficult to be different. When others notice that you are different, they try to make you fit in.
Robert Quinn argues in Deep Change that “deviance will always generate external pressures to conform. . . If you perform beyond the norms, the systems will adjust and try to make you normal.” Einstein put it more strongly when he said, “great spirits have always experienced violent opposition from mediocre minds.”
Matt Langdon at The Hero Construction Company teaches kids that they can be heroes in everyday situations. One of Matt’s posts about the movie The Tale of Despereaux argues that it is good to be strange. The post begins with a quote from the movie, which is a cartoon about a mouse with extraordinarily large ears and tremendous courage.
“'Reader, you must know that an interesting fate awaits almost everyone, mouse or man, who does not conform.’ When you act heroically, you’re going to stand out. Despereaux’s ears were not the only thing that made people notice him. His courage, thoughts of a better world, and kindness made him stand out. They also made him the object of disdain and mockery. Heroes are ordinary people who do extraordinary things, so there will always be a majority to think the hero’s behavior is wrong, dangerous, or weird. Heroes don’t cower and they don’t subscribe to the ideas of the masses just because those ideas are popular.”
Some will always see deviance as wrong and dangerous, so they respond with disdain and mockery. That is why E. E. Cummings warned “It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.” It can be risky to stick out. Because of this, we tend give up on being who we really are and instead we just do what other people are doing.
We want to fit in. We don’t want to be different or unusual. We don’t want to stick out. It seems safe to be normal. Why risk “violent opposition?”
However, it can be just as dangerous to simply remain average. Management guru, Tom Peters argues that "The White Collar Revolution will wipe out indistinct workers and reward the daylights out of those with True Distinction." He believes that it is no longer safe to be the same, to be normal, to be indistinct. Let that sink in for a minute. He is saying that the only safe move, the only prudent choice, the only wise decision is to become a freak, to be unusual, different, strange and remarkable.
Fitting in is a short term
strategy. Standing out pays off in the long run.
- Seth Godin
Don Wells, a wonderful friend and consultant, sent me this story about a student who seemed dumb, but he wasn’t. He was just different. "When I was head of the middle school at the Friends School, there was a 14 year old, Tommy, who was severely dyslexic. I ran a six week course about perception with about 15 students in it. One day I said that we were going for a stroll about the school grounds and when we returned I would ask them 20 questions about things that we would see on our walk. For example, were there any red cars in the parking lot? They could take any notes that they wanted to, and the things that I would ask would not be trick questions.
We walked and everyone took notes and looked earnestly, except Tommy. He just strolled along and observed. That was it. When we got back to the classroom, I gave everyone a piece of paper with 20 questions on it. There were some very smart kids in the classroom and it was well known that Tommy struggled in almost every class.
Kids finished and exchanged papers and then we went down the answers. The highest score out of 20 seemed to be 14, by perhaps the smartest kid in the class. However, Tommy got 18 out of 20! The class and I were stunned. They asked ‘how do you do it?’ Tommy, a bit embarrassed, simply said ‘I just looked.’
Students were not convinced, so they persuaded me, and Tommy, to do it again in the next class. We did and got the same results as he blew everyone else away, even though kids were watching him for any clues.
His Mom and Tommy struggled greatly about the stigma of his performance in school. But from that day on Tommy was never dismissed as dumb. He simply viewed things with a different eye than others and it worked. His Mom, a few days afterward, came into my office and hugged me while sobbing saying that Tommy's life changed that day. What a gift! Tommy went on to graduate from North Carolina State with a degree in design and has a successful business near Memphis.”
That which has always been
accepted by everyone, everywhere, is almost certain to be
false.
- Paul Valery
As a young man, Albert Einstein was also criticized by most of his teachers and was considered a “dullard” because of his independent and unconventional approach to life and learning. He went on to become one of the most admired and influential scientists in history by attacking the foundational assumptions of math and science. Einstein’s enduring greatness supports Seth Godin’s assertion that “if you want to get better than conventional results, it’s important to ignore the conventional wisdom.”
Einstein and Tommy are not isolated cases. It seems that success absolutely requires you to be different. In his book, Deep Change, management professor, Robert Quinn, explains that “Excellence is a form of deviance. . . The way to achieve and maintain excellence is to deviate from the norm. You become excellent because you are doing things that normal people do not want to do.”
Nerds are a good example of the relationship between excellence and deviance. The very habits that make these people so awkward and disliked in school are the very traits that often lead to their incredible success. This is why Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, once quipped, “Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.”
When my middle daughter started kindergarten, they assigned each child to a reading group based on their ability. But when I asked her who was in her group, she said that she was the only one. The teacher seemed to be confused about the definition of the word “group,” so I went to talk with her. She explained that my daughter’s reading ability was so much better than the other students’ that she didn’t have anyone else to put in the group. My daughter didn’t fit in because she wasn’t normal, but this wasn’t because she was bad, it was because she was good, because she was better.
Read, every day, something no one
else is reading. . . It is bad for the mind to be always part of
unanimity.
- Christopher Morley
It might be hard to base your differentiation efforts on the fact that my six-year old is a good reader. That is understandable. So let’s take a look at Warren Buffet, one of the richest and most generous people in the world. He explained his formula for success in a New York Times article, written during the spectacular meltdown of the financial sector in 2008. "Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful." In other words, his formula for success is to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. He’s different. He’s a deviant.
Michael Lewis wrote The Big Short to tell the story of the few people who predicted and prepared for the crash of the sub-prime mortgage industry. One of the people he profiled was Mike Burry, a neurologist in California who has Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism. Burry’s investment company, Scion Capital, had returns of 490% from 2000 to 2008, when the Standard and Poor’s 500 returned only 2% during that same period.
Burry saw the demise of the real estate sector as early as 2005 and made nearly a billion dollars when it imploded. When asked to explain his special insight and willingness to go against the grain, he credited his success to the example of Warren Buffet. Burry believes that Buffet’s life proves that "to succeed in a spectacular fashion you have to be spectacularly unusual." Many of us miss out on spectacular success because we are unwilling to be spectacularly unusual.
How does Jim Cramer, the manic host of Mad Money, explain his success? In an interview for Esquire he said, "I'm a freak of nature. I'm just a freak. I'm just a freak." He's not lying and he's not exaggerating. He is definitely not normal. Cramer's success and his strangeness prove that it is indeed good to be a freak.
Don’t try to stand out from the
crowd. Avoid crowds altogether.
- Hugh MacLeod, Gaping Void
1. Being different makes
you rare. Being
normal makes you ordinary.
Scarcity increases value. Diamonds are valuable primarily because they are rare. Sand and salt are far less valuable, not because they aren’t useful, but because they are so ordinary and plentiful.
I'm the boss. I don't make copies.
I make originals.
- Michael Scott, The Office
2. Being different makes
you original. Being normal makes you easy to imitate.
One reason that many jobs are outsourced or computerized is that they’ve become so routine that they are easy to automate and simple for others to learn and duplicate. Keith Ferrazzi, in his book Never Eat Alone, argues that we must “be distinct or be extinct. . . The best brands, like the most interesting people, have a distinct message. . . When it comes to making an impression, differentiation is the name of the game. Confound expectation. Shake it up. How? There’s one guaranteed way to stand out in the professional world. Be yourself.”
Similarly, personal branding expert, Dan Schawbel, writes in The Five Laws of Being an Interesting Brand, “Be yourself. Your personality is your best and most distinct attribute. I can’t copy it, nor can any of my readers or anyone else in the world. It’s easy to not be yourself sometimes because you want to impress someone or you want to fit in with cultural or group norms. When you start acting like everyone else, you lose the essence and beauty that would actually make people interested in you. By being yourself, you’re bound to appeal to certain types of people."
Heretical thoughts, delivered in a
way that capture the attention of the minority -- that's the path
that works.
- Seth Godin
3. Being different makes
you noticeable.
Being normal makes you invisible.
Fitting in makes us invisible. If we do things well, no one can see us. If we fit in at work, we don’t get in trouble. We don’t get fired, but we don’t get promoted either. We don’t get interesting projects and we don’t get challenging tasks.
Average feels safe, but it’s not.
It’s invisible.
- Seth Godin, The Dip
If our business fits in, everyone drives right by. No one stops. They don’t know we’re even there. If they do stop, they don’t stay long and they don’t buy anything because our products or services are just like everyone else’s.
If we fit in, we don’t get any attention. And attention is one of the most valuable gifts we can receive from others. Seth Godin, one of the world’s most influential business bloggers, explained it this way in a message to his readers. “Every time you read something I write here, you're giving me a gift... attention. It's getting more precious all the time, you have more choices every day, and it's harder and harder to find the time. I know. I'm grateful. I'm doing my best to make your attention worth it."
Mark Sanborn is a well-known speaker and author of The Fred Factor, a story about an unusual mail carrier. Fred was different than most postal employees. He was so extraordinary that he got Mark's attention and ended up as the subject of a bestselling book. Fred's story teaches us an important lesson. As Sanborn said in a recent blog post, "we are bombarded by people and messages every day, all trying to get our attention. With limited attention, there is only so much we can give." People only take notice when something is unusual or surprising.
4. Being different makes
you surprising.
Being normal makes you predictable.
I was walking down the street in San Francisco and saw a homeless man with a cardboard sign, the kind that usually say “Will Work for Food” or “Homeless: Please Help.” But this one didn’t say anything predictable. It said “Who Am I Kidding? It’s Miller Time!” As the Heath Brothers explain in Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, we are more likely to be persuaded by messages that are unexpected.
5. Being different makes
you memorable.
Being normal makes you forgettable.
We remember the unusual events in our lives, not the common ones. If no one remembers you or your message, then you don’t have the opportunity to influence them. The worst criticism that Simon Cowell, the caustic judge of American Idol, can give is that a contestant is forgettable. In contrast, one of his most powerful compliments is that a contestant is memorable. He recently told one girl "You are such a strange person. I mean that as a compliment." We remember people that are strange.
6. Being different makes
you remarkable. Being normal gives people nothing to
talk about.
When we see something different, we want to tell other people about it. Once people remember you, the biggest challenge is getting them to tell others about you. As Mark Sanborn demonstrated, if you are remarkable enough, someone might even write a book about you. I regularly feature remarkable people on my blog as the Freak of the Week. Matt Langdon collects stories of everyday heroes and posts them on his blog. This word of mouth is powerful for individuals and businesses.
7. Being different makes
you influential.
Being normal makes you impotent.
If other people are sharing your message, it increases your influence because it enables you to reach a larger audience.
I’m a big Counting Crows fan. I’ve bought every one of their albums since the first one came out in college. Their newest release is Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings, which includes the song Insignificant. The chorus includes the line, “I don’t want to be so different but I don’t want to be insignificant.”
Lead singer/songwriter, Adam Duritz, seems to be saying that significance and difference are related and he fears that if he stops being different, he will stop being significant. I think this is a legitimate fear and acknowledges a real dilemma.
I also think too many of us are singing a different lyric. We’re singing “I want to be significant but I don’t want to be different.” I don’t think we really have a choice. I think they’re connected. It seems that throughout history, significant figures have always been strange, they’ve been freaks.
Are you ready to be a freak? Are you ready to be different? Are you ready to be significant?
Being a freak is about being different, being unusual, being uncommon and being rare. At this point, it might be helpful to think about what makes you odd, atypical and exceptional. We tend to focus on the ways that we are similar to others. We want to be normal and we emphasize the characteristics that help us to fit in with everyone else. However, as we just discussed, this approach isn’t very effective.
What is it about you that
makes you different from most people? Here is my list:
● At a height of 6’6”, I’m taller than 99% of people in the world. My tall stature might also contribute to greater reproductive success.
● I suffer from Morton’s Toe. My second toe is longer than my first. Only 10% of the world’s population has this condition.
● I’ve completed a marathon, a feat only accomplished by .10% of Americans.
● I’m the father of three daughters but no sons. I can’t find the exact statistics on this but apparently it increases my risk of prostate cancer, wearing nail polish and watching Strawberry Shortcake cartoons.
● I have a very small neck, 14.5 inches. I know that this is unusual because I can’t buy shirts with that size and the proper sleeve length at traditional stores. I have to buy my clothes online. The good news is that my pencil neck decreases my risk for heart disease and sleep apnea.
● I earned a doctor of management degree. 25% of Americans have graduated from college, 8% have graduate degrees and just 3% have doctorates.
● I’m a nerd. I listen to and read about 50 books per year. My record is 100. Most people don’t do this. The average is four books per year. 27% percent don’t read any books. Many of my fellow nerds are also older and female.
● I’m self-employed. This is unusual. Most people are employees. Depending on which report you look at, self-employed people make up less than 20% of the workforce.
Michelle Verhaeghe, a good
friend and freelance designer, sent me this list of her
rarities.
● I have “geographic tongue,”a condition that occasionally causes white lines on my tongue forming random shapes, especially if I eat citrus. Only .06% of Americans have this condition and people like me make up 3% of the world’s population.
● I wear socks to bed every night; I sleep terribly if I don’t.
● I prefer the Mediterranean Food Pyramid as a guide for servings of food groups, rather than the American Heart Association Food Pyramid.
● As a female web designer, I am one of the less than 25% of women in the nation’s IT industry.
What about you? What makes you rare? Take a moment to create your list.
You might find distinctiveness in your appearance, personality, habits, accomplishments, career, education and/or family.
I haven’t always been proud of my strangeness. For most of my life I was unhappy because I couldn’t fit in, wasn’t well-rounded and couldn’t conquer my weaknesses. So how did I find my own freak factor? How did I find the courage to be different?
A number of years ago my friend’s wife, Lynn, asked me to do a parenting presentation for a women’s group. I was happy to do the talk, but a little apprehensive. Because the meeting was just for women, I would be the only man in the room. Fifteen years of marriage and nine years of parenting three daughters has taught me that women don’t like men to tell them how to do anything, much less how to take care of children.
To make matters worse, at the time of the presentation, I didn’t have any children. My only qualifications were academic, since I had undergraduate and graduate degrees in counseling psychology. This probably wouldn’t count for much since I already had two major strikes against me. I was a man with no children who telling mothers and grandmothers how to care for their offspring.
Fortunately, Lynn assured me that my failure to procreate would not be a problem. She had an introduction that would give me the credibility I needed to win over the audience. She started by listing my qualifications and then explained that I had been a friend of her husband’s since high school. Apparently, he had shared many stories with her about my past and his revelations had led her to an important conclusion.
The final words of her introduction were, “The reason you should listen to Dave is because he is proof that even your really bad kids can turn out OK.” Ouch! In other words, “He has seen behind the curtain. Listen up because he has secret knowledge about the inner workings of difficult children. Maybe he has some special insights to share from his checkered past.” Her creative and light-hearted introduction broke the ice and the presentation went very well. However, this isn’t a book about giving great introductions.
I want to focus on her final phrase. I’m a bad kid that turned out OK. How exactly did that happen? Was I really a bad kid? What lessons can we learn from that experience that will improve our work and our lives?
As Lynn suggested, I was indeed a bad kid, at least that’s what everyone told me. My parents and teachers had three primary goals during my entire childhood. They wanted me to sit down, be quiet and do what I was told. My inability to master these basic skills was a major problem, especially since I was forced to spend most of my childhood in school, sitting still, listening and following instructions, or at least trying to. Because of my weaknesses, I was told repeatedly that I was obnoxious, immature, had a bad attitude and lacked self-control.
When I was in third grade, the principal called me into his office and sat me down on his lap. (This seems questionable in retrospect and I’m not sure if I’ve blocked out parts of that interaction). During our meeting, he told me about three kinds of people: bad people, really bad people and people that are so bad they won’t be able to recover. He told me that I was really bad and almost too far gone. I was in third grade! I was only eight years old. I wasn’t smoking weed behind the equipment shed. I was just a little disruptive.
The principal wasn’t the only one who was frustrated with me. Even my parents called me motor-mouth because of my non-stop chatter. At one family gathering, one of my uncles, frustrated by my constant banter, told me to shut-up and accused me of being obnoxious. A few months later, in an ironic twist, my aunt divorced him. I guess maybe he was the obnoxious one.
One additional criticism, related to those I’ve already shared, was that I needed to be the center of attention. I was always telling jokes and getting people to focus on me. According to those in authority, this was a character flaw that needed correction.
You can only hear people tell you something is wrong with you for so long before you begin to believe them. I saw myself as immature, out of control, rebellious, hyperactive and unattractive, because others saw me that way. This didn’t give me a lot of hope for my future and the problems continued throughout high school and into college. I did well for a while early in my career, but soon my distaste for authority, my hyperactivity and consistent failure to keep quiet continued to haunt me.
“This isn’t working out,” said Camille. “The problem is that you’re just not a team player.” Hearing this made me sick to my stomach. I was only a few weeks into my new job at a large nonprofit in Chicago. My former employer recently merged with another organization and I went from working mostly alone in a two-person operation to working with hundreds of people on a five-person team.
Now I was sitting in a booth at McDonalds’ with my boss and two co-workers. They’d called this meeting to inform me that I needed to make some major changes in order to succeed in my new role. I was stunned. I had been very successful in my two previous jobs, which required me to work independently. This was my biggest strength and I thought that it would serve me well in my new position as well. But I was wrong.
It seemed like everything that was good about me was working against me. The very thing that my last boss praised me for, my ability to work independently, was about to cost me my job. My new co-workers saw me as a lone ranger. They complained that I didn’t ask for their input and that I talked too much, too often and for too long in meetings. I didn’t seem open to their involvement. Their organization valued teamwork very highly and if I couldn’t change, they would ask me to leave.
Seeing the handwriting on the wall, I started looking for something new. I found a new job in a city closer to my family but was soon confronted with new challenges. My new responsibilities required me to create a brand-new business within an existing company. It was a perfect fit because I got to develop a plan for a dramatic change within the organization. The plan required a major investment of capital and created a lot of positive visibility for me and my company. After the new operation was in place, I was promoted to a senior management position and immediately began talking to my boss, the organization’s CEO, about other change projects.
However, there was a conflict between my interest in starting new projects and the company’s need for me to manage ongoing operations. There was also a conflict between my desire for rapid change and my boss’s patient and deliberate approach. Our meetings gradually became more and more contentious as my boss continually admonished me to slow down and focus on improving existing processes and I argued for the need to speed up and dramatically transform the entire organization.
I strongly believed that I could do a better job of running the company. It was very difficult for me to follow someone with such a dramatically different approach. I’d never been very good at doing what I was told and I strongly valued freedom and the opportunity to control my own future.
Additionally, it was clear that some of my employees wanted me to provide more structure and specific direction. I was always talking about vision, mission, values and the long-term goals of my division but devoted little time to offering detailed instructions regarding short-term goals and daily activities. I believed that it was important to provide my employees with the autonomy to make these decisions. I thought that they had more insight into these issues than I did, since they were on the front lines every day.
Meetings were still a problem as well. I’m very intuitive and seemed to instantly develop a strong feeling about how the organization should proceed. Unfortunately, I couldn’t always clearly articulate why I felt the way I did and I didn’t necessarily present concrete evidence for the effectiveness of my recommendations. This didn’t keep me from sharing my ideas very passionately and arguing for them strongly against challenges from others on the management team.
These issues began taking a toll on my health and happiness. I was constantly frustrated and irritable. I became very self-conscious and lost my confidence. My weight began to balloon as my eating habits and sleep patterns deteriorated. Every day at work was such a battle and I began to dread going into the office. I couldn’t understand how my past success had turned into such a mess.
Eventually I resigned but even this went badly. I was asked to leave before my chosen resignation date because my boss and subordinates felt like I was no longer committed to the organization.
In summary, I had these weaknesses. I was:
● Too talkative. Not a good listener.
● Hyperactive. Not able to sit still.
● Too independent. Not a team player.
● Too intuitive. Not rational enough.
● Too passionate. Not calm enough.
● Too strategic. Not operational enough.
● Too focused on the future. Not focused enough on the present.
● Too impulsive. Not patient enough.
These seem like substantial challenges and a traditional approach to personal development would focus on fixing these weaknesses. However, I chose a different approach. I didn’t improve by overcoming my weaknesses. I didn’t really change myself at all. I succeeded by flaunting my weaknesses and finding situations that valued the positive side of my apparent flaws.
Instead of changing myself, I changed my situation. I quit my job as a manager and began working as a college professor. This change allowed me to teach two of my favorite subjects, managing change and strategy. I also started my own business, helping companies with strategic planning. My clients appreciate my strategic thinking and ability to help them see the big picture. They don’t need me to be detail-oriented and focused on operations. They have that covered. They need me to help them look to the future and identify the larger issues that the organization was facing.
As a speaker, I get praised for my energy and enthusiasm. My passion is infectious and helps me connect with audiences. As a solo entrepreneur, I can change quickly and act on his intuition without having to convince others to follow. I can also work independently and don’t need to be a team player. My initiative and obsession with achievement keeps me motivated without direction or supervision from others. I’m in control and I love it.
I’m rarely criticized any more for my weaknesses but I still have all the same flaws; they just don’t matter in my new work.
I’ve also lost weight and started running marathons. I feel energized and confident. My work provides me with happiness and fulfillment and a sense that I have truly found my calling. My new career has been an unqualified success.
This unlikely transformation illustrates the seven strategies for finding your freak factor.
1. Awareness – Identify your strengths and weaknesses
2. Acceptance – Stop trying to fix your weaknesses
3. Appreciation – Embrace your unique characteristics
4. Amplification – Flaunt your weaknesses
5. Alignment – Find the right fit
6. Avoidance – Move out of situations that highlight your weaknesses
7. Affiliation – Partner with people who are strong where you are weak
During one of my management classes, I showed the DVD for A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink. The following quote is from the introduction. "I think a great life is using your strengths, understanding what it is that you were put on this earth to do, understanding what it is that makes you unique, and what is the truest expression of who you are, doing that persistently in the service of something larger than yourself."
Do you know what you were put on this earth to do? Do you know what makes you unique? What is the truest expression of who you are? How could you combine all these things in the service of others? Our ability to build a fulfilling life begins with an awareness of our strengths and weaknesses, and an understanding of the unique value that we can add to the world.
My wife and I recently watched The Soloist, a movie based on the true story of Los Angeles Times reporter, Steve Lopez and Nathaniel Ayers, a homeless man and musical prodigy who studied music at the Julliard School. At one point, Lopez is talking with the director of a homeless shelter about how to help Ayers. Lopez suggests that Ayers should undergo a psychiatric evaluation to discover what is wrong with him.
Director: I don't get too hung up on diagnosis.
Lopez: But how do you help somebody if you don't know what they have?
Director: Look at these people. Every one of them has been diagnosed more times than you can imagine and, as far as I can tell, it hasn't done them any good.
I agree. I think we are too hung up on diagnosing our own problems and the problems of others. Diagnosis usually doesn't do much good and it actually causes harm by making people believe that they are inadequate, flawed or damaged.
As I’ve already demonstrated, a century of traditional psychology hasn't done much to improve our mental health, happiness or fulfillment, but it has done a lot to brand people as broken and in need of repair. I think it is time for a new approach that focuses more on what is right with us and less on what is wrong with us.
Lopez comes to a similar realization at the end of the movie. At some point, he stops trying to fix Ayers and begins treating him like a friend. He stops trying to find what is wrong with his friend and begins to accept him as a fellow human being. I think this is a good model for the rest of us to follow with ourselves, our spouses, children, friends, co-workers and employees.
There’s nothing wrong with you. You will succeed because of your weaknesses, not in spite of them. You can find success in your apparent weaknesses because your biggest weaknesses are actually components of your biggest strengths. They are two sides of the same coin.
For example, in one recent study, 43% of respondents cited public speaking as their biggest fear. This is not an isolated result. In the American Institute of Psychology’s annual study of people’s biggest fears, public speaking was first on the list. Death was second, followed by long-term illness, snakes, spiders, bugs and flying. Apparently some people fear public speaking more than death.
Seinfeld explained it this way, “at any given funeral most people would rather be in the coffin than giving the eulogy.” I love to make presentations. I love public speaking. Sometimes I speak in public, even when I shouldn’t. This means that I love to do what most people would rather die than do. My desire to be the center of attention isn’t a weakness; it is a strength. My longing to talk isn’t a problem, it is an opportunity. And the same is true for your weaknesses.
Amplification is the essence of flaunting your weaknesses. According to the Encarta Dictionary flaunt means “to parade yourself without shame. Show something off – to display something ostentatiously.” This is a great description. Too often, we are uncomfortable with our weaknesses. We are ashamed of them, apologize for them and try to hide them. My goal in this book isn’t simply to help you become comfortable with your weaknesses. I want you to parade them without shame. I want you to show them off.
I found a great example of amplification in a Forbes article about famous people who’ve been fired. One of them was Sue. After being fired, she said that she “discovered ‘two things about myself: One, I’m not a good team player. And two, I’m not a good sport.’ So, she chose the solitary occupation of novelist and thrived at it.”
But it gets better. Sue has been married three times. During an especially ugly divorce and custody battle, she “would make herself feel better by imagining ways to kill or maim her ex-husband. Her fantasies were so vivid that she decided to write them down.”
Sue Grafton is the author of the very successful alphabet series of mystery novels starting with A is for Alibi. Her writing career was based on her own violent fantasies. I guarantee that, if she had shared those cruel dreams with a medical professional, they would have given her medication. Instead, she turned her savage visions into a lifelong career as a writer. She’s a great example of the power of amplification.
The fifth lesson is that we find success by finding the right fit. We need to connect who we are to situations and environments that reward us for our natural style and abilities, instead of punishing us. Too often we try to change ourselves to fit the situation. We try to become what the boss or teacher or coach or girl or guy wants us to be. I tried this for my whole life and it didn’t work. Even six years of training to become a counselor didn’t help me sit down and shut up. For years I’d been trying to change myself, when what I needed to do was change the situation. Everything turned around when I found activities that highlighted my innate strengths and made my many problems irrelevant.
For example, as a child, I was so skinny that you could see my heart beating . . . even when my shirt was on. When I graduated from high school, I was 6’4” and 145 pounds. Some of my nicknames during this time included twiggy, toothpick and walking stick. Twiggy was a female model from the 1960’s known for her thin frame. I’m confident that it is every young man’s dream to have his body compared to that of a woman. Crowds at basketball games would chant “walking stick” while I stood on the free throw line.
I desperately tried to gain weight by eating heavily and lifting weights but nothing worked. What I didn’t know at the time was that I was an ectomorph. This is a body type characterized by the following features. Lest you think I’m making this up or exaggerating, I took this description directly from http://bodybuildingpro.com
● Delicately Built Body
● Flat Chest
● Fragile
● Lean
● Lightly Muscled
● Small Shouldered
● Takes Longer to Gain Muscle
● Thin
“The extreme ectomorph physique is a fragile and delicate one. The
bones are light, joints are small and muscles are slight. The limbs
are relatively long in proportion and the shoulders droop. The
ectomorph is a linear physique. Straight up and straight down, and
may appear longer than he or she really is, due to the length of
limbs coupled with lack of muscle mass developed on those limbs.
The ectomorph is not naturally powerful and will have to work hard
for every ounce of muscle and every bit of strength he or she can
gain.”
Needless to say, this was not the kind of body that attracted the admiration of many ladies. The Body Building Pro website goes on to explain that “ectomorphs are generally better endurance athletes than bodybuilders by nature, and may excel in cross-country running.” I didn’t need to bulk up. I just needed to find a sport that fit who I already was.
Not only are ectomorphs ideally suited for distance running, it is difficult, if not impossible for those with larger body types to succeed in competitive running. The Stillman Table is one guide for the ideal height-to-weight ratio for runners. It recommends that long distance runners should weigh about two pounds for each inch of height. In other words, a runner who is six feet tall should weigh around 150 pounds.
Apparently, this ratio isn’t just an academic or scientific recommendation. It seems to be consistent with the build of successful distance runners. Paul Tergat, who held the world record in the marathon from 2003 to 2007, is six feet tall and weighs just 137 pounds. This puts him at 1.9 pounds per inch. Tergat’s record was broken by Haile Gebrselassie in September 2007 during the Berlin Marathon. Gebrselassie weighs in at a sturdy 123 pounds and is just five feet and three inches tall. This is almost exactly two pounds per inch. This physical requirement for running success rules out a lot of people in the same way that I’m excluded from being an offensive lineman for the Green Bay Packers.
I like the body type example because it is something that can’t be changed. Additionally, it shows that my literal muscular weakness was actually a strength. However, it was only a strength when I found the right fit, distance running.
Daniel Pink’s book, Johnny Bunko, is the story of a struggling cubicle dweller that discovers six lessons of career success. Lesson #2 is “think strengths, not weaknesses.” Johnny is working in the finance department, despite the fact that he loves art, learning about people and developing creative ideas. His job makes him miserable. However, instead of seeing that he is in the wrong spot, his solution is to get better at working with numbers and spreadsheets. He decides to take a series of training seminars to improve his skills.
His strategy is "to work harder . . . to get better at what I stink at . . . If I want to succeed, I need to focus where I'm weak and make sure that my weaknesses don't hold me back." As we’ve discussed, this is a very common approach and it usually fails.
Johnny's career advisor, Diana, suggests a new perspective. "Steer around your weaknesses and focus on your strengths. Successful people don't try too hard to improve what they're bad at. They capitalize on what they're good at." Johnny eventually finds greater fulfillment when he moves into a different role at the same company that doesn’t require him to overcome his weaknesses in finance.
If you stop doing the things you don’t like to do, how will they get done? One option is to form relationships with people who have strengths that complement your weaknesses. You don’t need to be well-rounded but you can still live a balanced life by finding the right people to help you.
One of my favorite examples of affiliation came from Sara Dunnigan at The Greater Richmond Partnership in Virginia.
"I’ve been struggling for weeks to write an annual report for a business program that I manage. Each year, we interview about 600 business people in an effort to connect them with resources and support the growth of their businesses. The annual report is an aggregate view of the data points and every time I tried to write an engaging, conversational report that people would actually want to read – it came out like a dry article from an economic journal. While well-written and chock full of facts and figures – this was not the effect I was going for.
This wasn’t the first time I struggled with this project. It has been my responsibility for more than three years and no matter what I did to get better (I must have read every other similar publication in the country) I just couldn’t get there. In fact, during the time I spent trying to write, all I really wanted to do was go out and talk to stakeholders in the community about what we had discovered, what we had done and exciting plans for the future.”
After struggling to write the report on her own for years, she finally tried a different approach.
“I had been working with Grace, an intern in our office who was a fantastic writer. I did the data gathering and roughed in the outline and she reorganized the content and added the dimensional writing I was looking for in the project. I’m happy because now I get to focus on building on my skills as a speaker and solutions facilitator and Grace got to use her skills and add another great project to her portfolio. Now I am excited about using this approach for other projects our small team works on.”
Finding someone else to write the report was a win-win-win situation. Sara was happy because she had more time to do what she loved. Her company and constituents were happy because the report was more interesting and Grace was happy because she had an opportunity to use her strengths at work. Affiliation enhances teamwork and improves performance.
Throughout the rest of the book, I’ll devote a chapter to each of these seven strategies. Mary’s story, below, shows how these strategies can transform your life.
M
ary contacted me after reading The Freak Factor
manifesto. Her boss gave it to her and Mary liked
what she read so much that she decided to quit her job. That’s
probably not the response her boss was hoping for.
Mary now works as a personal trainer and specialty fitness instructor in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is also a healthy lifestyle blogger, writing at http://www.fitthisgirl.com. When she’s not training clients, she volunteers with Bolder Options, a youth mentorship program in Minneapolis. She just ran her first marathon in Honolulu. You can find her on Twitter @fitthisgirl.
“I have always colored outside the lines. As a child, I struggled with the confines of a classroom, with doing work and with having to fit into any kind of mold, except for the one I made myself. But when I graduated from college, I fell into a job, at an office, in a cubicle. I felt important, adult, professional, like I was doing what I should do.
Years passed and I moved from one office to the next, from one set of gray walls to the next. I made slight advances, as much as a literature major in Corporate America can. I kept changing titles, but always kept ‘assistant’ on the end, like a tag line. I was excelling at being mediocre. I was barely getting by, lacking in joy and feeling inadequate. The problem wasn’t just the jobs I was working, but also my performance in them.
What was wrong with me? I was a smart, passionate and vibrant free-thinker and I could screw up an office supply order with the best of them. Then I found something that I really could do well—working a front desk, greeting people, and being the face of a company! I excelled. I was given more responsibility and started to struggle with the expectations. I started to examine the things I fell short on, the projects that I procrastinated on, the tasks that I screwed up.
Did I have ADD? ADHD? Did I
have a bad attitude?
But the woman I worked for saw my full potential. One time, when talking about a certain project, she asked me, ‘Who told you that you weren’t capable?’ Then she handed me a copy of The Freak Factor manifesto. What I read changed the way that I looked at myself and my work.
If you are anything like me then you probably have an idea of what your weakness are. As much as I wish I had fewer weaknesses, I don’t really intend to go through life sweeping them under the rug or making excuses for them like I had been up to that point. I learned to look at my weakness a little differently after reading the Freak Factor.
I needed to shift my focus. Weaknesses are not always bad thing. Instead of focusing on overcoming our weaknesses, we can harness the corresponding strength to achieve our potential in our life, work and relationships.
Most people focus on their weaknesses and work hard on turning them into strengths. I was working hard trying to improve where I fell short, trying to find fixes and shortcuts and ways to work better. For a while, it worked. Things got a little better, but I was hammering my weakness into submission only to end up with a slightly dented version of the original product.
The main key to succeeding by finding the strengths hiding inside your weaknesses is to seek out situations where you can use your strengths and excel there. If you are constantly in situations where you are required to use your weaknesses you will not feel like you are succeeding. When you feel that, examine the situation and ask ‘why don’t I feel successful here?’ You will be able to pinpoint corresponding strengths more easily when you see your weaknesses for what they are.
I learned to choose situations that fit my natural strengths. That meant a career change. I researched becoming a personal trainer, did the work and leaped out into a world of the unknown. I moved from a well paying corporate job, which I was mediocre at, into unpaid internships and a world where I was able to tap into my strengths and use my natural skills to excel.
I have been working as a personal trainer for only eight months and have already been praised by my boss as being a ‘professional highlight.’ I’ve been encouraged to never lose my natural love and enthusiasm for people and training. I’ve also received countless positive comments. I don’t say this to say ‘look at me and what I have done!’ What I’m trying to say is that when you are working from your true strengths, it will be apparent.”
I was so excited about Mary’s transformation that I wanted to learn more. Below are her answers to a few of my follow-up questions. :
Tell me more about particular weaknesses
and how you discovered the strengths that corresponded with
them?
I was never built to sit still. As a receptionist I was always confined to a front desk and copy room. I felt restless and agitated and that made me feel unproductive. I actually was unproductive too. I would start projects, get bored and leave them half done. It wasn't that I was bored with the project itself, I was bored with my inability to move around in my position and bored with the confinement of my job. I would have multiple projects half completed and no motivation to finish any of them.
Weaknesses that I discovered on that job were only weaknesses within that environment. In a different setting they could easily be strengths. For instance, when someone would request a project or special order from me, I would just dive right in and have to back pedal later. In hindsight, I can see the value in asking all the important questions up front, but my enthusiastic drive was never tapped in the way it is in some of my current ventures.
What weaknesses did you struggle with on the job? Were you disorganized, unfocused, hyperactive, etc?
I had to work extra
hard to be organized in the way that the rest of the team required.
There was little room for individual style in my work. As a
personal trainer, I still have to do paperwork, like tracking
client progress, planning sessions, follow-up and notes. The
difference is that I am free to do it on my own time and in my own
way. It's a much more creative environment.
Did you find any of your weaknesses on the strength/weakness chart*? YES!
● Positive-Unrealistic: My head is always in the clouds.
● Passionate-Impatient: Oh how I want things right now!
● Creative-Unorganized
● Dedicated-Stubborn
● Enthusiastic-Obnoxious
* This chart is in Chapter 2 – Acceptance
What is it
about being a trainer that matches your unique
strengths?
One of my strengths is that I have a heart for serving and helping people. I’m also good at showing people how to do things the best way. I’m a natural leader and planner, but due to some situations in life, I adopted more of a follower approach. Sitting behind a desk as a receptionist or in a cube kept me from being able to lead. I may have been the face of the organization, but I didn’t have the opportunity to lead or use the true power that I knew I had. My strength was never in administrative duties. I excelled much more in the personal and social aspects. Now, as a trainer, I have the opportunity to lead and direct individuals and groups.
Mary was lucky to have a boss who saw the strengths hiding inside of her weaknesses. I was fortunate to have someone like that in my life as well. Late in my sophomore year of college, Elliott Anderson, the resident director of the men’s dorm approached me and asked me to apply for a resident assistant position. This was a big surprise. Up to this point, I thought I was the reason that the college employed resident assistants. I saw myself as a rule breaker, not a member of the enforcement team. However, Elliott saw something else.
He saw a lot of himself when he looked at me. He was also a bad kid that turned out OK. Maybe he could help. It was great to work with him and we are still friends today. He was the first one to call me freak, which is one of the few nicknames I am proud of and was the inspiration for the title of this book.