Managing Oneself-5

Where do I belong? and  What is my contribution?

 

The answer to the three questions: What are my strengths?, How do I perform?, What are my Values?

Enable you to decide where you belong.

 

This is not a decision that most people can or should make at the beginning of their career.  By the time one passes his/her mid twenties you will know what are your strengths. You should know how you perform and your values.

 

And then finally you should be able to decide where you belong. Or you should know where you don't belong.

 

If you are good as an individual contributor you should not take assignment/role of managing a team, if you can not make decisions you should not be in decision making role. Knowing whether you effective in a large organization or you will be successful in small organization is also important.  

 

Lastly but more importantly be aware that what you think you are may not be accurate. Spend sufficient time in collecting data from feedback analysis.

 

For knowing where one belongs makes ordinary people- hardworking, competent but mediocre otherwise - into outstanding performers.

 

The next question one should look into is What is my contribution? , this is moving from knowledge to action. The question is not " What do I want to

contribute?" , it is not "What I am told to contribute?" It is "What should I contribute?"

 

In the previous era very few people had the choice of making a contribution, today we have the privilege of making the contribution. Live a life of Freedom.

Managing Oneself- Part 4

How do I Learn?

 

The next thing one should know after "How do I perform?" is, how one learns. We saw last week being a reader or listener impacts how you perform.

 

Next thing to look at how one learns, few of us learn by reading and some by listening and some others by writing. Winston Churchill is an example who did poorly in school, which focused on learning by reading and listening where as Churchill's trait was learning by writing.

 

Don't force yourself to know how you learn, start observing yourself and use the feedback mechanism and you will know over a period of time.

 

To ask "How do I perform?" and "How do I learn?" are the two most important questions. But they are no means the only questions.

 

Other thing to know about yourself is do you perform well under Stress, or you perform well under a predictable environment. Are you a good manager or good subordinate? Are you a decision maker or executor?

 

Next thing you should know is, do you perform well in a team or you can perform better as an individual contributor.

 

So far we have looked at various aspects of one's identity and persona. To be able to manage oneself, one finally has to know "What are my values?",

Drucker call it as a Mirror test, when you take any action your value system will tell you is it the right thing or not. When you look yourself in the mirror you can face yourself when you are in harmony with your values.   

At your workplace, if the organization values and your values are in conflict you cannot perform.

 

Values are and should be the ultimate test.

 

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Managing Oneself - 3

Last week we looked at "What are your strengths?", this week we look at equally important question "How do I perform?".  Very few people know how they get things done. Many of us don't even know that people perform differently.

 

One of the main reasons for this is during our school days all of us were told how do things, rarely any us had an opportunity to look at how we learnt, what are the different ways to accomplish the same task.

Now as grown-ups we neither do thing as they are meant to be done nor do we create new ways of doing things. The impact is we don't have the results that we want. 

 

How one performs is very individual. It is part of his/her persona. There are few personality traits that usually determine how one achieves results.

First thing to know about how one performs is whether one is a reader or a listener. Very few people know that there are readers and listeners, and that very few people are both. Even fewer people know which of the two they themselves are. 

 

One small example is, consider your manager is listener and you are a reader, in that case to give an update on your project status you might send an e-mail. Whereas your manager might prefer that you call-up and update. You might also observe that you too have your preferences; you might be comfortable talking and listening whereas others might want to write down, or send a mail. 

You might also observe that some people are great, when it comes to presenting, participation in meetings, whereas their skills in preparing slides or reports are mediocre. 

 

The point is you should know how you perform, where you can produce results. In the next article we will look into How do I learn? And my Values.

Managing oneself -2

Last week we saw the importance of managing oneself.  We are looking at these questions

·  Who Am I ? What are my strengths?

·  How do I work?

·  Where do I belong?

·  What is my contribution?

This week let's look at Who Am I ? What are my strengths?

One aspect of knowing yourself and about your strength is making an inventory of your strengths and weakness.

 

You think you know your strengths but most of the time you know where you are not good at, that is also not accurate.  Since we constantly focus and work on where we are not good at we don't focus much on our strengths.  Don't go by what you think or feel as your strengths as your strengths. Also don't go by what others say also.

 

 One way as suggested by Drucker, to identify your strengths is  to do a feedback analysis. Whenever you make a key decision or take a key action, write down what you will expect will happen and after 9 or 12 months compare the actual result with you expectation. Over the years you will start noticing the difference.

 

As the outcome of the feedback analysis is first - concentrate on your strengths; put yourself where your strengths can produce results.  Second work on improving your strengths and third discover where your intellectual arrogance is causing a barrier and

overcome it.  What I mean by this is we take pride in our expertise or domain and we take pride in showing our ignorance in other fields. For example a hardcore network engineer takes pride in his ignorance that he can't understand people and their emotions or a top ranked HR executive will say that she can't be with these technical stuff like machines or cars etc.  You don't have to be an expert in other fields but identify these barriers related to your strengths and overcome it. These are your blind spots.

Also observe areas in your life where you are not taking any actions, No action No result. Look at your behavior or manners are you too strong (assertive/ arrogant ?) too mild (helping/sincere) adjust them as per the need.  Same type of behavior may be a constraint at times, be present to what is appropriate. 

To summarize, focus on your strengths; it takes far less effort moving from competent to excellence than incompetent to meritocracy.

 

Managing Oneself-Part I

All of us spend considerable amount of time improving the process at work, learning new tools and techniques to improve productivity and efficiency. Seldom spend our time in understanding oneself.  We don't put enough time in understanding the human machinery.  We have great understanding of the human physiology and psychology but still our understanding of 'self' is limited.

 

It is especially very important for the "Knowledge Worker" to know about how one performs. In last few decades the way people are working is transforming, new types of organization roles are evolving, there more avenues for people to make living.  Unlike the 80's and 90's one need not have work for single company nor have stick to the career one has chosen.  One can choose the career what inspires him/her. It is not uncommon that we come across people starting totally a new career like Investment banker starting restaurant or becoming a wild-life photographer.

 

At the same time number of people who are losing their jobs, not able to manage their career, going through stress at work is also increasing alarmingly.

 

With this context we will examine few fundamental questions that help in managing oneself.  This series is based on Peter Druckers article "Managing Oneself" , which has influenced me tremendously.

 

You have to ask these questions

Who Am I ? What are my strengths?  How do

• I work?
• Where do I belong?
• What is my contribution?

Will discuss these questions in subsequent articles, till then dwell into these questions try to find answers.

 

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