Do You Make Their Day?

May 15th, 2009          Email This Post       

Here’s a video, using the metaphor from Tom Rath’s How Full is Your Bucket (link to book or dvd).

(Video 2:41)

Focus Exclusively On Your Strengths

January 30th, 2009          Email This Post       

It seems I haven’t written about this topic at all. I have pursued finding what my strengths are, but oddly, I haven’t seriously focused on using them. It seems really, really obvious now, but it took reading “The Missing Chapter” (free download) to make it click.

If you are looking for a job or how you can help others, then you are probably focusing on their lack or on your knowledge. “What are they missing, or what do I know that can help?”
While that is nice, there is a much better (and fulfilling) way: ask “What am I really good at?”
After leaving Egypt, when collecting supplies for the Mishkan (the traveling Temple) the princes were looked down upon for saying “we will handle whatever is left over”. They should have given their best. So don’t ask “what’s left to do?” Rather, ask “What can I do really well?”

Whatever it is that you do really well, you probably do automatically. In Is Your Genius at Work? Dick Richards says that everyone has a core process – a way that they process all information, naturally. Mine has to do with seeing possibilities and potential for expansion. It just happens naturally: if the conversation turns to business, I start coming up with ideas to market better and provide more value, automatically.

Stop trying to “fix” all the natural ways that you act. Stop developing competencies merely because you think that they will get you a better job. Unless the way you act is downright harmful, find a way to harness it to help you. Instead of developing a weak skill, focus on what you automatically and naturally do well – and become amazing at it. That’s really what makes you unique – the tools that G-D put in you, not the things that you learn. So focus on your strengths and inclinations, and develop them.

(StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath is a test that will identify your top strengths, which probably fuel your core process.)

What are your strengths? When do you use them? Can you tell the difference in your energy and results when you aren’t using them? Come discuss it in the forum!

p.s. It seems the page with the list of recommended books was inaccessible until just now – view it here: Recommended Books

What’s Your Focus?

January 18th, 2009          Email This Post       

I know I have the opposite problem of many people: I want to work on too many things at once. I get curious very easily and want improvements to happen quickly. (Hmm, that’s not so odd after all.)

However, it just doesn’t work. If you have a short burst of energy and make loads of decisions and plan out how you want things to be… you rarely carry through on any of them. In fact, there is an inverse proportion: the more things you focus on, the less you accomplish.

The question to answer is – what are you currently working on?

You may have a large list of things to work on – improving your davening, your learning, diet, productivity, spending time with your family, etc. Notice how you have tried to work on them all, and made little (if any) improvement – because you were focusing on them all! 

Unfortunately, you just can’t focus on too many things at once. We tend to get sucked into the way things are and changing them takes time – but worse, it takes attention. When you try to move your attention to 5 new things… it just doesn’t work – tafasta merubah lo tafasta – if you grab too much, you end up with nothing.

So choose the focus that would make the biggest difference or is the most pressing – and throw yourself into it.

Correct, you need to do this horrible thing that signifies some level of maturity – saying yes to one thing, to the exclusion of others. But that’s better than saying no to everything!

Please share your reaction – and your current focus, if you would like to share – in the forums. I would love to hear from you!

New: Comment On the Forums

January 16th, 2009          Email This Post       

I love talking about personal development. However, writing about it is a different story – by default, it’s one way. You can’t see people’s reactions or get any feedback from them. It becomes much more boring – and hardly the same excitement as talking to an individual.

I have installed – and am testing how the integration works.

So, please come and join the discussion!