Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking at an #UltiWorkshop in the lovely city of Milwaukee. There was a good mix of people at this workshop from different organizations, industries and sizes. They all had one thing in common though. They were all there to learn about important ideas currently impacting HR and I was one of the educators for the day. Now you might be asking yourself why this matters but I will get to that in just a second.
For the past three weeks I have been stuck, I am mean lucky enough to be at home and not on the road traveling. While this is beneficial in many ways, it also has a negative impact as well. See for those of you who know me you know I have a passion for talking, presenting, tweeting, anything actually that allows me to collaborate with others. So, when I am at home for days at a time, sitting in my office, without any collaboration with other humans above the age of 13, I tend to go a little stir crazy.
Yesterday was a very welcomed event. Not only did I get to work outside of my basement office, I had the opportunity to interact with other strategic thinkers AND I had the opportunity to present to the group about a topic that is a passion of mine. You can imagine what this one event did for my week. Today, I am focused, motivated, even more engaged then before and ready to take on the world.
See, when we spend our time doing what we are naturally good at, the outcomes are far superior than trying to fix what we're not good at. Yet so many managers, leaders and organizations spend countless hours and dollars on "developing our weaknesses". They want us to close these perceived gaps because someone, somewhere along the way told them that's how to manage people. Well I QUIT! And you should too. Quit trying to change who people are and make them someone they aren't. The whole concept of strengths based management has been proven time and time again. Yet we continue to disengage, demotivate and demoralize our people by encouraging them to be something they aren't.
Again, I QUIT! I am going to be a winner because I am going to focus on helping people understand what they are good at and building strategies to work around their weaknesses. I am not going to get stuck in the mindset that winners never quit. Winners do quit. They are just smart about what they quit and when they keep going. Come on, are you ready to quit with me?
Lisa: You, I and Marcus Buckingham agree on the concept of discovering strengths and magnifying them. Thanks for the awesome reminder!
ReplyDeleteIt's something we should be thinking about with every people decision we make and unfortunately that is not the case in many organizations. I will continue to remind you frequently.
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