Our guest Erin Passons, President and Founder of Passons Consulting, reveals a game-changing approach to personal growth and productivity. She guides us to a profound understanding of our unique strengths and how to leverage them for success and joy. She takes us on a deep exploration of the Clifton Strengths Finder tool, showing us how it can enhance self-awareness and job alignment. Plus, she shares real-life examples that breathe life into her teachings. This isn't just about personal development, but about creating more effective teams and businesses.
In the later part of our enlightening conversation, we discuss the practical applications of this tool in hiring. Imagine a world where instead of focusing on what people don't do well, we emphasize what they excel at. Erin's advice on how to channel our time and energy more effectively is nothing short of revolutionary. So, get ready for an episode that could very well change the way you view your capabilities and the path to success.
Meet the Advice Column Panel
Justin Reden
Justin is a husband and the father of two wonderful daughters. He owns a law firm in San Diego, CA, and his many hobbies include mountain biking and beekeeping. Reden enjoys strategy, including pondering life, and has a great love for people.
Justin's Website
Brad Tunis
Brad left his career as a hospital administrator to support people through his training as a highly sought-after Hypnotherapist and Mindfulness Coach. He enjoys surfing and riding gravel bikes with his wife, Sarah.
Brad's Website
Lisa Liguori
The founder of the Advice Column Podcast, Lisa is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and adventurer. She loves to host game nights, pilot a small plane, and write in her journal. She loves hearing what others are learning in their life's journey and sharing what she is working through.
Lisa's Website
Rico Molden
The producer of Advice Column's live steam events, Rico is a filmmaker and storyteller. Rico and his wife have two young children and are actively involved in their church.
Rico's Website
Meet Advice Column's Guest
Erin Passons
President and Founder of Passens Consulting urges us to focus our energies on our strengths rather than trying to correct our weaknesses. This bold claim isn't based on mere theory, but a tool with a proven track record: the Clifton Strengths Finder.
Erin's Website
Connect with us at the Advice Column:
Website: https://advicecolumn.com/
Instagram: @advicecolumnpod
Facebook: https://www.fac
Our guest Erin Passons, President and Founder of Passons Consulting, reveals a game-changing approach to personal growth and productivity. She guides us to a profound understanding of our unique strengths and how to leverage them for success and joy. She takes us on a deep exploration of the Clifton Strengths Finder tool, showing us how it can enhance self-awareness and job alignment. Plus, she shares real-life examples that breathe life into her teachings. This isn't just about personal development, but about creating more effective teams and businesses.
In the later part of our enlightening conversation, we discuss the practical applications of this tool in hiring. Imagine a world where instead of focusing on what people don't do well, we emphasize what they excel at. Erin's advice on how to channel our time and energy more effectively is nothing short of revolutionary. So, get ready for an episode that could very well change the way you view your capabilities and the path to success.
Meet the Advice Column Panel
Justin Reden
Justin is a husband and the father of two wonderful daughters. He owns a law firm in San Diego, CA, and his many hobbies include mountain biking and beekeeping. Reden enjoys strategy, including pondering life, and has a great love for people.
Justin's Website
Brad Tunis
Brad left his career as a hospital administrator to support people through his training as a highly sought-after Hypnotherapist and Mindfulness Coach. He enjoys surfing and riding gravel bikes with his wife, Sarah.
Brad's Website
Lisa Liguori
The founder of the Advice Column Podcast, Lisa is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and adventurer. She loves to host game nights, pilot a small plane, and write in her journal. She loves hearing what others are learning in their life's journey and sharing what she is working through.
Lisa's Website
Rico Molden
The producer of Advice Column's live steam events, Rico is a filmmaker and storyteller. Rico and his wife have two young children and are actively involved in their church.
Rico's Website
Meet Advice Column's Guest
Erin Passons
President and Founder of Passens Consulting urges us to focus our energies on our strengths rather than trying to correct our weaknesses. This bold claim isn't based on mere theory, but a tool with a proven track record: the Clifton Strengths Finder.
Erin's Website
Connect with us at the Advice Column:
Website: https://advicecolumn.com/
Instagram: @advicecolumnpod
Facebook: https://www.fac
I think one thing to be mindful of is effortlessness. So really thinking and reflecting on what are the things I do that don't feel hard, then sometimes it's why we almost discount them as a strength, because you think a strength has to be something that I really work hard at and I really put all my efforts in and then I'm really good at it, I practice and I get better. That's a value that we have oftentimes, especially in the US. What we find is that our strengths are actually the things that are just effortless, instinctive, almost the things we do without thinking about it.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to Advice Column, where we share crowdsourced ideas for living with intention.
Speaker 3:Hello On behalf of Brad Tunis, mindfulness coach and hypnotherapist, justin Reeden, attorney and father, rico Molden on technical production, and myself, lisa Ligore. Everybody welcome to the podcast. Today we are getting to talk to Aaron Passens, who is the president and founder of Passens Consulting. She spent her helping business leaders, managers and employees improve their performance and effectiveness and is an expert in the Clifton Strengths Finder tool I guess I would call it. But prior to launching her own consulting practice, she worked as a management consultant for Gallup, who is one of the most respected firms in research and for the scientific validity of research, and she consulted with the big ones Microsoft, best Buy, hewlett Packard, toyota, disney to provide coaching of management effectiveness and leadership development.
Speaker 3:How I encountered Aaron is I did a certification in how to become a strengths coach, and the reason is I was really impressed by something I learned, which is that we are better at building on strengths than correcting our weaknesses, and we'll let Aaron get into that, but before I introduce, let her say hello. I wanted to tell you she also founded the Strengths Network of San Diego, so it's an association of strengths finder professionals that she's using her strengths to bring together and connect people, and in this conversation, we are going to learn how to leverage our strengths for greater joy and also more effectiveness in what we do. So welcome, aaron. Thanks, lisa, good to be with you all. Aaron, when you do this kind of work, I assume you get some pushback on. People have a natural tendency to think that we need to fix what's wrong with us versus really addressing or building upon our strengths. So when you're talking to somebody who knows nothing about strengths finders, where do you begin in kind of pitching why this is so important? That's a really great question.
Speaker 1:And, I think, a good, important one to set the stage for our conversation today. And you know exactly, as you said, lisa, it's pretty common for folks to have that initial resistance or pushback around. Well, wait a minute, I know what I'm good at, that's fine. I want to work on improving the things I'm not good at so I can be this really well-rounded person. And what the research tells us is that really almost the opposite is true in terms of your own kind of productivity and engagement and fulfillment at work.
Speaker 1:And we want to kind of distinguish between when we talk about strengths in this context, especially with all of Gallup's research as the foundation, we're not actually talking about a skill set. So this isn't to say, if you wanted to be better at learning Excel, that you shouldn't waste your time learning Excel because it's a weakness of yours. That would be what we consider a skill set. That's something that we can learn, but there are some capabilities that we all have or don't have, that are not quite as easy to learn and, in some cases, impossible, and so those are the things we're talking about in terms of our innate or instinctive strengths or Gallup would sometimes refer to them as talents which helps us to really be at our best when we are leveraging those strengths as often and as regularly as possible, and so it's less about my skill set or knowledge base and more about my energy.
Speaker 1:So when I spend time in my strength zone, I actually feel better. It feeds me, I'm energized by it. I want to do more of that, and so I sometimes have to start the conversation to help people understand what is it that we even mean when we talk about a strength versus a weakness, because a strength is something that strengthens you and a weakness is something that weakens you, even if you're good at it. And that's a direct quote from Marcus Buckingham was one of the long time strengths researchers and consultants, and I just think that's so perfect to think about. A weakness is something that weakens you, but even if you might still be good at it. So it's more about energy and less about skill.
Speaker 3:Can you explain that a little bit more? So if you're doing something to make your weaknesses stronger, you're actually making yourself weaker or you're just saying that you're diminishing your energy because you're spending time in something that's not where you flourish?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a great question. So, as an example, I think these are sometimes easier conceptually to talk about it with an example. So many people, for example, are not necessarily in love with networking, just as an example. So maybe it's part of their job, maybe they need to go meet new people to try to further their career and they go to networking events or they try to meet other folks in their industry and really work the room and for some people this is just absolutely excruciating. Like they can do it and they get through it, and maybe it's part of their job responsibilities or they're trying to push themselves to do that for their career and it just drains the life out of them.
Speaker 1:And so in a world where we think to ourselves well, networking is a weakness of mine. I really need to work on that. So let me go join a Toastmasters class and let me go to more and more and more networking events to try to get some practice. And what we know is that people who don't have that natural talent or energy might get a little better at it. But gosh, it's never going to be something that they're just really energized by or thrive in, and they're almost like pushing a boulder uphill every time they do it and it's really self-defeating. And what we find that's really interesting is sometimes when we try to improve those areas of weakness, oftentimes our strengths also get diminished because we're not putting enough energy into those areas of strength. And so it's kind of an interesting dynamic that we lose power in some of our other areas that we are naturally good at because we're not putting enough time and attention in that direction.
Speaker 3:Erin, what are some of your strengths? And without a specific assessment, without the Clifton, was it called? Yeah, is it just called Clifton Strengths? Now it's called.
Speaker 1:Clifton Strengths. Now, yeah, had been called Strengths Finder for about 25 years and then, in honor of Dom Clifton, who is the kind of creator and founder of it back in the 1960s, they recently rebranded, a couple years ago, to call it Clifton Strengths.
Speaker 3:So without that Clifton Strengths tool, are there ways that you see evidence of your strengths or somebody listening could figure out where their strengths lie and how to tap into that more?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. I think there's a couple things to think about. I think one thing to be mindful of is effortlessness, and so really thinking and reflecting on what are the things I do that don't feel hard, then sometimes it's why we almost discount them as a strength, because we think a strength has to be something that I really work hard at and I really put all my efforts in, and then I'm really good at it, I practice and I get better, and that's kind of a value that we have oftentimes, especially in the US, and what we find is that our strengths are actually the things that are just effortless, instinctive, almost the things we do without thinking about it. So one simple example for me, since you asked about my own strengths I do a lot of workshop facilitation and then executive coaching, and then I interact with a lot of people, oftentimes in large groups, and one of the things that I have found is very easy for me is to remember people's names, and so if I have a workshop with people, let's say, all day, we have an offsite leadership retreat and we've got 25 people in the room, I make it a goal and I don't even really need to try that by the 10 am break.
Speaker 1:I know every single person's name by face and I just do. I don't know how I do that. People ask me all the time gosh, you're so good at remembering names, how do you do that? I couldn't tell you. I don't have a mnemonic device. I don't try, and I've always been good at that, even since high school, college and working with large groups, and so that's an example kind of a silly one, but in my job it helps me quite a bit and it's a little bit of a superpower to allow me to connect with people differently when I can use their names and the way that we interact.
Speaker 3:Do you know how many people's heads are exploding right now? That I would love that skill. It's great.
Speaker 1:It really does serve me well. I mean, certainly you know plenty of things that I don't do well, but that's definitely one that's the toughest list, and so it's funny even me just saying that right there, of kind of having to acknowledge you know that, oh, I'm not good at other things. It's amazing how ingrained in our society this sense of not wanting to be too boastful, right, let me, let me hedge a little bit by saying oh well, I'm not good at everything and of course, of course we're not good at everything, but it's so natural for us. Even myself, as a practitioner of strengths, still feels the need to kind of instinctively apologize, right, for not being good at everything. So I think effortlessness is one of those things.
Speaker 1:I think the other one is what we would consider kind of glimpses of excellence.
Speaker 1:So if you work on something, or let's say, you're starting a new job and someone on your team or your boss kind of shows you how to do something and you just kind of get it very quickly and and you get it at a very high level, and that person, maybe who's training you, kind of looks at you and goes, wow, okay, have you done this before? And you think no, but it's like, yeah, here we go and it just makes sense to you and you just kind of pick things up quickly. Interestingly, it's not always about a cognitive intelligence that allows us to pick things up quickly. Sometimes, if we're being trained on something that's in our natural talent zone, we just get it Again, going back to that effortless piece. So I think sometimes we don't pay as much attention as we need to to those glimpses of excellence. What am I doing on a regular basis that I just effortlessly do really really well at a high level, that I don't feel like I need to practice 10,000 hours to get good at it? It's just kind of flows.
Speaker 3:I love that saying glimpses of excellence. Yeah, isn't that?
Speaker 1:good. Yeah, that's a gallop turner. I stole it from them. They'll hopefully they'll be okay with it, but yeah.
Speaker 3:Do you guys feel like you know what comes? Ease fully with glimpses of excellence in your lives?
Speaker 4:Yes, I mean I think there are obviously some things that come with ease and that I like what we were talking about when the things that come with ease and working towards those strengths, how that kind of hits the dopamine system and allows you to keep moving forward because you get that satisfaction. I think my work with people and just connecting with people is one of those things that you know I've decided to shift gears and capitalize on, and so it's nice to be able to step into that space and work with those, work with those strengths.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a big pivot for your career, so I'm curious how your enjoyment of life has shifted when you're spending more time in your strength.
Speaker 4:Work is no longer work Now. You know, to some extent I mean, work is still work, but you know, there isn't this, there's no dread, there's a, there's a, there's a sheer sense of excitement. I probably spend 14 hours a day if I'm not working with clients. I'm reading the latest science, the latest literature, the some new psychiatrist or psychologist or coach and some, you know, some groundbreaking work in that area. I'm immersed in it and that feels good.
Speaker 3:Wow, that's really neat. How about you, justin?
Speaker 5:I do, I think I know. But mine kind of has to do with my job, like a natural skill set with that. But I know I can walk into any room with anybody and I'll understand rather quickly whatever the issues are, and I know I can like hold my own working through any issues with anyone in the room on legal matters, and so it's like it doesn't feel like work to me and I have no reservations about it. I'm almost eager to get into the negotiating room with someone because I just know naturally I'm gonna be okay, kind of. It's like an effortless thing, not saying I always get the result I want or that I'm the best at it, but it is an effortless thing. But I have a question for Erin. When we're ready for a question?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think I cut Erin off too. So I don't know, erin, if you were in the middle with that. But please.
Speaker 1:No, that's okay. You actually, if you both just answered it with your examples, I was just gonna give you kind of the third component of how you know if it's a strength. So ease and effortlessness is one of them, and then excellence is the second one, and the third one is enjoyment, and it's exactly what you both just shared. It's so if you think of ease, excellence and enjoyment as kind of the pillars of you having a strength in a certain area, there is an energy, and I think, justin, I just heard from you saying I'm eager to get into that room with a client, right, you find yourself drawn to it, and so some people are drawn to getting into a spreadsheet and thinking about all of the analysis they can do with those numbers and what story can they tell and what problem can they solve. That's absolutely energizing for them.
Speaker 1:That might be my worst nightmare, right, but for them their worst nightmare is standing up in front of a room and trying to figure out what 25 people's names are. So that level of enjoyment and eagerness to like, ooh, I think I could do that. We watch somebody else having a job that maybe we don't have and we think to ourselves I could do that. I would like that. It's that kind of energy that we get or peaked curiosity about how we wanna do more of that if it's something we don't already do. But I think the enjoyment piece is a really critical aspect which gets to what Lisa was talking about in terms of the connection to our own engagement and fulfillment. It's not just that I'm good at something, I really enjoy it, and so there's kind of a win-win situation as I see it.
Speaker 5:Right, lisa, do you wanna share yours before I ask my question?
Speaker 3:Oh my thing.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you're it.
Speaker 3:I think being able to tell what people's moods are. I don't really know how to use it, but I think that that's something that sometimes I'll say that person was nervous, and maybe my husband David will say, really, and I think, well, obviously you know, but I can't help it. But pick up what people are feeling and I have to be careful I don't over get too much confidence where I don't double check it. But I think that that's something that flows naturally. I don't think that's actually a strength, though. Huh Erin, that's not technically one of the strengths, yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it's empathy, it's activator, it's positivity, it's input. I think it's a lot of those little layers that you have in your top five strengths results, so it makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 4:I would think, too, that just your ability to stay present to pick up on that. I mean, a lot of people might have that ability, but they're so caught in their own head that they're not even aware enough to. So I think that in itself is a strength. To stay present, focused on another person like that.
Speaker 3:That's a good point. Yeah, you Thanks guys. Do you have the strength of encouragement?
Speaker 4:That's what I do.
Speaker 5:But you were Justin. You wanted to ask him. Thank you, yeah. So I'm sitting here listening to all this and it makes so much sense and I'm in my brain. I'm thinking, well, yeah, this is a no brainer, right, it's like a functioning society looking for efficiency or positivity or whatever. You just want to advance the ball as a society.
Speaker 5:It seems like a no brainer that we would immediately focus on people's strengths, foster those strengths, place them in roles that support that and will have a better end product as a society. And I see that in a lot of areas, right? So if you're building the space shuttle, they're going to have people very specialized in what their strengths are and whatever tasks they have, and they're not going to be trying to convince the computer programmer of the shuttle that he or she can really do this and just go home and study more and you can get it right. They're not going to waste time on that, right, they're just going to get the person who's the best at that and then we see it in sports a pro quarterback. They probably don't spend a lot of time with that quarterback's training about how to block and tackle or punt or whatever.
Speaker 5:It is right. Yet I presume with your business coaching, you're coming into situations where people like business owners like myself, need coaching on one, even realizing the value in this seemingly obvious thing, and then two, developing tools to help think through how to actually implement that as a positive strategy to advance their business. And I'm just so curious, like why you think, if you agree with my analysis, why you think it's even necessary as a society to remind ourselves of this, or why we would even focus on anything else to begin with and not just immediately and naturally just focus on strengths.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sorry that was long-winded, but yeah, some layers in your question there for sure, but I'll see if I can tackle at least the first one that popped out. So there's some really interesting research around parents around the world. When their child brings home a report card and they have three A's on that report card and one C, and where do the parents start the conversation with their kids? And, as you might imagine, it's like 80% or more of parents in all countries that were studied start with the C. What went wrong? What did you not do? Were you talking too much in class? Did you not do your homework?
Speaker 1:We tend to spend a lot of time in our lives and some of this is societal and some of it is, quite frankly, human nature. We probably evolved to see what's missing or see what the gaps or deficiencies are, in order to protect ourselves from a predator, for example. And I think when we have that approach to what's missing or what's wrong or how do we unpack and explore the gap or the deficiency, what we miss is the opportunity to explore the success. And so when I share that data point about the report cards in workshops that I teach, I often say how many of you here who are parents, how many of you have ever started the conversation with your kids about the A first Doesn't mean you're not gonna talk about the C, doesn't mean you're not gonna talk about what needs to change. But how many of you have started with the A to really explore the why behind the success?
Speaker 1:What went right? What allowed you to get that successful grade? Was it a teacher who you were inspired by? Was it a subject you're really passionate about, like? What was it that got you that successful outcome? We don't typically take time to unpack what we did well. We kind of just dismiss that or assume that that's just how it should be, so we don't spend time understanding it. So we can replicate that success in the future. And so I think all that long-winded answer to your long-winded question I think we have a natural tendency to focus on what's broken, because it helps us feel like we're being successful if we fix it, and I think it's just not a very high return on our investment of time and energy.
Speaker 3:Do you ever start conversations with your kids on the A's, justin?
Speaker 5:Always yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Good for you.
Speaker 5:I think I do.
Speaker 3:What gave you that insight to do that?
Speaker 5:I don't know, but I've always naturally looked at strengths over weaknesses and then wanna just capitalize on okay, you're good at this, we don't need to talk about where you're not good at. Let's focus you on what you're good at.
Speaker 3:That's fantastic.
Speaker 5:I don't know.
Speaker 3:So one of my questions for you, erin, is how old can someone be when the strengths find her Strengths find out? I just called the wrong thing again. What's it called again? Clifton strength, okay. Strings is appropriate, because it seems like this would be really exciting for parents.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it really is, and actually there's a whole separate book on it for parents as well, called strength-based parenting, for those who want to go down down the rabbit hole of that. But so a couple things I just want to observe before I get specifically to your question, lisa. So so, justin, it's really interesting your observation earlier about why wouldn't we just focus on strengths Doesn't that make sense? And your previous question Completely aligned with the fact that you do naturally start with the a's when talking to your kids about their grades. And what's interesting about that is that that very perspective.
Speaker 1:There's actually a strength in Gallup strengths finder assessment, called maximizer. That's exactly what that is is to say, yeah, I always see strengths rather than weaknesses. I start from a place of what do you get at and how do we take you from good to great? Let's invest more time and energy there. It's just a natural way of looking at things. So the very nature of your approach and Instinct that is one of your strengths, as Gallup would define it.
Speaker 1:So kind of interesting to just share that observation, because not everybody sees the world that way, and for you to see well, yeah, doesn't this make sense? Isn't it obvious? That's another good example of something that we would say it is almost hard to define as a strength because it's so close to you you can't imagine seeing the world any other way. Why would you start with weaknesses doesn't make any sense. So I just want to point that out before I get to Lisa's question, which, in terms of the age of the assessment so I Would say early to mid teens, as probably appropriate it's I think it's geared towards eighth grade reading levels, so like 13, 14 and older.
Speaker 1:But I'll tell you I've done a little bit of work just pro bono stuff with, like high school students and others other students that are younger. It does require a little bit of a deeper conversation around the content, because kids don't necessarily have the same level of self-awareness as adults do, and so there's actually a kid version of the assessment that's called strengths explorer and that one's geared more towards like eight or nine years old to maybe 14, something like that. A Little bit more simple instead of the 34 talents that Gallup has for strengths finder, as an adult version they only have 10, and instead of getting your top five, you get the top three for kids, and so that might be a good way to kind of Say what are the sort of broader patterns that we observe in your strengths and how do we help you continue to lean into those as you get into junior high, high school, college, etc. And start to think about how we might fine-tune and align your strengths with what you're ultimately going to do as you get into the next phases of your education.
Speaker 3:So when parents do that have work with their kids around their strengths or when we're talking to ourselves about our strengths, what are some practical ways that we can use that knowledge or those observations to Improve our lives and be to be more effective, but also to have more joy? When you talk about enjoyment, I thought of the same let joy be your compass and it seems like Maybe we think life has to be too hard where we can actually just gear it around what we really love and it doesn't have to be this Puritanical, painful You're not working if it's not difficult type of mentality, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Well. So there's a couple things. So, so to speak, to the last piece of what you just said, lisa, in terms of you know, it doesn't feel like it's Valuable unless we had to work really hard to get it. That also would be a strength that Gallup has on their list, which is called achiever and so many achievers and, quite frankly, there's a lot of you out there because it is the number one most common talent in the Gallup global database. So we're 30 million people now who've completed the assessment since the early 90s or late 90s, rather, and so achievers shows up at the top of the list all the time, and its achiever is exactly that. I find value from being busy and productive and working hard, and I get great and deep satisfaction from Climbing that mountain and hitting that goal and reaching that you know z-ness of something that I worked really hard to accomplish. So it does sometimes feel for a lot of achievers like, well, did I even do it if I didn't have to work that hard, right? So there's some of that. That is just kind of doing a bit of self exploration. As to you know, how do we use joy as, as the compass, and I love that saying. I think that's very much in line with the strength based approach. But but a couple of things I would say. Just to get to your question about the specific.
Speaker 1:I think one rule of thumb, especially as it relates to work, is really thinking about what is my Optimal alignment of my talents and my strengths to my job responsibilities. And I think sometimes people get stuck on. Well, you know, work is work for a reason. That's why they call it work. It shouldn't be super fun and easy and engaging, that's. You know that would defeat the purpose, and so they get stuck in this in this place, of how we define work. And I think one way to look at it is a lot of the research talks about kind of as in many cases, the 80-20 rule. So if we can align our strengths and our sort of areas of energy and enjoyment and ease and excellence, all those things we talked about if we can do that and apply our strengths for 80 percent of our job responsibilities, we know that it's okay.
Speaker 1:If I have 20 percent of stuff in my work that I have to just kind of muscle through, that's maybe not in my strengths zone, it's not something I'm great at, maybe it's the areas I procrastinate on, as we all do. Sometimes Maybe it's the stuff that I save to the end of the week or the end of the month that has to be done because the business needs it to be done. But it's not my jam. And so how do I really think strategically about Getting through that 20 percent, such that I can spend more of my energy, and hopefully even more than 80 percent, in my areas of joy at work? And so I think sometimes thinking about that, that 80-20 rule of thumb can be a helpful way to organize what you, what you, should be aligned to at work and when we are feeling imbalanced or off, thinking about, well, who else on my team might actually put something in their 80, that's in my 20, and that's how we get really strategic.
Speaker 1:And that's to me as a consultant, really where the fun happens is to say let's work with a team and figure out what's everybody's 80 percent and what's everybody's 20 percent and what's everybody's 20 percent, and let's really strategically optimize who does what as much as possible so that we can get everybody in their kind of strength zone as much as we can.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that makes so much sense before we get too far ahead of something the justin said I think was interesting too is and I think what we're kind of talking about here too, is In finding someone's strengths. I think you also have an opportunity to reframe what a quote unquote weakness looks like. Can we apply the strength in one area and reframe that, to pull that strength into an area that's a perceived weakness? Well, look, you did this over here and then did this. Really well, what did you do there that we might be able to take and apply to this other area?
Speaker 4:And so there's a fluidity In a reframe that we need to be creative about and not so stuck on like well, this is your path.
Speaker 3:That's right. How do?
Speaker 4:we pull that strength and then apply it. That's a really great idea.
Speaker 3:It is and a confidence builder too.
Speaker 4:Well, that's another benefit of starting with the positives. Well, look, build them up, build them up. And now, how do we move this over to this?
Speaker 3:Yeah, do you do that with your?
Speaker 4:client's that's.
Speaker 3:That is the work. That's the work, wow.
Speaker 4:How do we take what we know you already are feeling and are good at or are joyful, and how do we move that to this other area of your life? And that's not to say that everything can be unicorns and rainbows all the time, but there is room.
Speaker 3:What's a way that you have done that in your life?
Speaker 4:What is the way that I've done that in my life, I think just with the career change that we discussed. Um, okay, I'm a pediatric hospital administrator for 20 plus years. What were the things that I did well in that career that might apply to this deep interest in Buddhist psychology and Trans work, and how how would that look like? I never thought I was going to be a coach To other people or a hypnotherapist to other people, and when I decided to go, oh, I wonder if I could do that, I I had to look at with the other things I was good at in my life and see how those might apply. And this gets down a whole other rabbit hole that we don't need to go to.
Speaker 4:And then the visualization and the seeing it, seeing yourself actually doing it that's a big part of that process, but that's like a whole other pathway I think we probably don't want to go down to today.
Speaker 3:I'm very curious about it. We can start another podcast.
Speaker 5:So I'm thinking should I go back to my office after this and just dump everything we do out on the table and let everyone in my office pick what they want to do and how they want to work together? Is there a downside, or where do you draw these lines between fostering someone's ability or exploration to capitalize on a strength in the line versus what you actually need them to do? I guess it's at 80-20. Do you have any guidance on that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think and this is where I think the power of some of the business, organizational infrastructure and processes can really come into play here, because think about how many organizations, historically, when they run a performance review process, for example, it's very weakness focused. We think about how much time and energy we spend hiring someone for their strengths. What are you good at? What are your talents? What are your experience? What education do you have? What do you bring as an asset? And then, six months in it's time for their first review and what do we talk about? Where do you need to work on? What are the things you need to improve? It's backwards, and so I think, using those opportunities to think about when I identify what I think you might want to work on.
Speaker 1:It's not something you don't do well, it's actually. You know, what I see you doing Is every now and then we ask you to give a presentation on XYZ topic, and I know it's not a primary part of your job, but you just are killing it. Every time you do that, the room is captivated, you get the message across really clearly and you really take questions in a super effective, facilitative way. How do we get you doing more of that that's your area for improvement. It's getting you doing more of what I see you doing well. And then inviting the conversation from that person's perspective to say do you enjoy it? Because it seems like you do.
Speaker 1:And if they do which is usually the case with some people who are really good at things they'll say, yeah, actually I'm intrigued about so-and-so's job. They do that a little bit more often than I do. I wonder if I could step a little bit more towards that to take on some of those responsibilities as my next step. There are things I'm curious about or things I'm eager going back to that word from before I'm eager to really try.
Speaker 1:And so it's shifting how we have those conversations by inviting the conversation around what do you do well, what do you want to do more of, and what do you want to do less of? And then the question is to say, if there's a long list of things you want to do less of and sometimes that happens then the conversation is well, let's talk about it's even really the right job for you, not because you're failing miserably, because you're hanging in there, but if what you want to do less of, if half of that is the primary function of your job. Where else might we find a fit for you? Because you're only ever going to be so engaged in a role where it doesn't feed you. So let's find you a place where you are fed and we can get the best out of you and you can get the best out of us.
Speaker 5:I have a funny story about what Aaron just talked about. So I said I was someone in my office not too long ago and I said, hey, what do you like doing? What don't you like doing? Because I was trying to just make sure I was and I was told that they absolutely do not like checking the mail, going to get the mail. And I was just fascinated by this because I was thinking I would love to be able to just check the mail. All that, that's my dream to go do that.
Speaker 5:And so I pressed further and I said, ok, tell me more about that. And it turns out that they didn't like checking the mail because they didn't know what time the mailman comes, because the mail person varies when they show up at our building. And so the person in my office took the responsibility very, very seriously and they would go check the mail, and if the mail hadn't been delivered yet, they felt like they had failed, wow, and had to walk back. Had to walk back without the mail and then wait and then go check again and be nervous that they're going to walk down again and not come back with the mail.
Speaker 3:And not be efficient sort of yes.
Speaker 5:It was all out of wanting to do well with the processing the mail, yeah, but it just started with them saying I'd like to not check the mail, and if I hadn't pressed further, though, I would have completely misinterpreted that. That's so interesting, but that's what you're talking about getting them aligned with their strength really, and it turns out that that person has a deep strength on wanting to get a really successful result. That's a great example. That's an amazing commitment.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's so cool. I was just thinking too about how important Brad earlier before we started recording, mentioned a teacher. But when we're able to point out people's strengths where maybe it's so natural they don't even know it how critical that could be in someone's life, whether it's a teacher or your child, or just noticing a friend, but calling it out and taking the time to do that could be such a gift to them, for sure, for sure.
Speaker 5:Yeah, because someone might not value in their mind their strength. They may not think it's a valuable thing it's not the shiny gold object because they don't think it's hard to attain and they may not realize it's so valuable to the people around them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there is a book that's interesting. Sorry, erin, no, it's just going to.
Speaker 1:That's OK.
Speaker 1:I was just going to add one more layer to that, which is sometimes what I see in a lot of my coaching clients is not only do they not see it as a value, because it's effortless for them, oftentimes even conditioned by a parent or a teacher or a former boss that it's actually a weakness.
Speaker 1:They need to stop doing that Because guess what Whoever that boss was or whoever that teacher was, they had a different set of talents and viewed this person's talents as kind of judgmentally Like well, no, you need to stop doing that. You need to be more competitive, right? Stop being so sensitive, those types of things where guess what Sensitivity and ability to read people, just like Lisa talked about earlier, that's a superpower, and if someone was told at a young age you need to just buck up, buttercup and start being more competitive, because that's what my value is as your parent or teacher or boss, then you start getting people who have some deep shame about their talents and it takes quite a bit of time to uncover not only a recognition that this is something I'm really great at, but also that's a good thing and not the bad thing that maybe they were told over their life for a variety of reasons, Wow, wow.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And that can be. I mean, that's something that, as she just said, that's something that can carry with you. If you were told that as a child and a strength of yours was sort of diminished, yeah, then there's a neural pathway learning that has you got to rebuild new neural pathways to the opposite. That is much more difficult to do and if it's not done, it can carry with. I mean, these are limiting beliefs. This is what limiting beliefs are in an adult Exactly right Things that were ingrained as a child.
Speaker 3:Wow, wow, that's sound that makes me sad to think that someone might have this beautiful superpower and they're actually carrying around shame.
Speaker 5:Yeah, because someone else had a different set of values that were actually I don't say this lightly but meaningless to that other person and their path, right yeah? The other person is just wrong relative to this person's life path.
Speaker 1:And I think what reinforces that is that when people who have a lot of judgment about other people's talents, sometimes those people can also be very successful. So again in that same example, if I'm the super competitive, high achiever, work hard, play hard, step over everybody to get to your goals, if that has gotten me to a place of success. It's like a self validating story, a narrative. I tell myself well, this is how it is, this is how one becomes successful, is doing it this way? And when people don't have that self awareness to recognize everybody has a little bit of a different path, but they can all lead to a different successful outcome. Sometimes, again, you get that additional layer of judgment that just continues to be self affirmed by one's experience, and that's dangerous too. Yeah, I could see that.
Speaker 5:It's amazing, I feel like when we're in school from little kids, it should all be part of the fabric of teaching and raising someone into the workforce or just into society. And maybe it is and I was just naive, but I don't remember anyone sitting me down talking about my test scores to what my strengths are and things like that. They probably did, I'm probably just don't remember.
Speaker 3:You could have so much more impact than arithmetic or yeah, or you should be a lawyer.
Speaker 5:You want to be a lawyer? Sure, you know everyone pushes that, or you want to be this or you want to be that. None of that discussion, as far as I remember, was ever based on a real skill set that I had or that an individual had.
Speaker 3:There's a book that this conversation is reminding me of. It's called the Blessing and it's by the same guy who wrote the Love Languages, if you guys know that book, and it's about how, in the Jewish faith, they bless children and it's, I think, five steps or something. But one of them is they hug or touch, like lay hands on the child's head, but they talk about an attribute that the child has and then how it could play out in their life. Like you're so sensitive, you might be a very caring family person, and this is reminding me of that, because if we could spot one another, especially in kids I'm just thinking what their unique attributes are, and kind of give creative ideas for how that might manifest and they're like how it could play out, that could open up avenues or ideas or plant little seeds that maybe could flourish later as they're exploring.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Gallup has a whole practice area around education. So to your point earlier, I think it was Justin that was saying that we don't remember this from our childhood. This whole science is actually relatively new in the last 25 or 30 years and it's starting to grow. And what's so interesting is Gallup's doing some research on teachers in particular and they have a whole area of education practice that when I worked there, I got a chance to dabble in and it's just fascinating. They help every teacher understand his or her or their own strengths and then that teacher has an opportunity to do their little strengths explorer assessment with everyone in their class and so they know the top three strengths with every single kid in their class and how impactful that is to say.
Speaker 1:How are those kids different from each other, different from me? What's that say about their learning style? How do we set them up for success? How do we reward them and recognize them and praise them in those areas of growth? So just really a lot of energy there around trying to shift that mindset and that perspective. But it's still new generally, relatively speaking. So it'll be interesting to see how that evolves.
Speaker 3:That brings up a question I had, which is there's so many different tools. What's the one you mentioned earlier, Justin?
Speaker 5:The Colby.
Speaker 3:Colby disk, myers-briggs. How does this tool or process differ? How does it fit in If somebody is just navigating this landscape for the first time? Obviously you believe in this one, but I guess I'm just wondering how do people sort it out and find a place to start?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a really good question and I'll just say for the record, I think any tool, whatever it is, as long as it's sort of scientifically validated, any tool that facilitates a person's additional self-awareness and growth, I think is a good one. So this is not necessarily me Kind of one's great and one's not great. I don't necessarily think that. I obviously have a lot more experience and certainly I'm passionate about the Gallup's Clifton Strengths Assessment, that version of it, for a couple of reasons, and one of them is probably reflective of my own strengths, since I have positivity as one of my top five talents. But what I like about Strengths Finder or Clifton Strengths is the approach to it is about a positive reflection on who we are and how does that talent that we are measuring in you, how does that lead you to positive outcomes? It's very outcomes driven. It's not just as many of the tools are kind of an assessment of personality, those who you are, for better or for worse. This is very targeted towards. If you leverage these talents, you can improve your outcomes and there's a variety of what those outcomes might be. But there's really kind of a performance orientation to kind of align people to more of a positive or, as you said, lisa, more of a joyful way to be, which is really something that to me personally is appealing because it is very positively focused. And even though all of our strengths can sometimes work against us and sometimes show up as weaknesses, those same behaviors have kind of a duality to them. They're generally there are ways to say how do we get you at your best? How do we take that talent and really harness it and align it with what you do to help you be your highest level of contribution to the world while you're on this planet and the others? I think so.
Speaker 1:I'm also certified in Myers-Briggs, just as an example, or what's also known as MBTI. I also really like that one, and that one is rooted in kind of the big five personality characteristics. If you've read about Carl Jung and some of those kind of more earlier mid-20th century psychological research, I like a lot of the Myers-Briggs research as well. I think there's some really good stuff in there and it can complement strengths really nicely. I think there's some things you learn about Myers-Briggs type that you don't really learn in your Strengthsfinder results and vice versa. So I like that, but really anything, any tool that people use that can help them facilitate their own growth and self-awareness, I think, is a good place to start, to give you some language for it.
Speaker 5:So I'm thinking of a listener hearing this and thinking you know what? I know I'm misaligned at my job, or I know that I have this really good skill set and I'm not using it and they want to do something about it, but they don't know, like literally today, the first step to take when they get done with hearing this podcast. Do you have any advice in that situation that could literally change someone's life, like today, when they just get done with this?
Speaker 1:Like the first big step.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Yep. So what I recommend and I have clients like this on a fairly regular basis that asks a very similar question and I recommend keeping almost like a tracking journal for a week ideally for 30 days, because you do different things on different days, different weeks of your job but keep a journal and basically create in whatever journal format you use, even if it's just bullet points. Keep a journal with two columns and I like to kind of call it, just as an easy to my device, cheers and chores. So on the cheers column every single day, if you can write down the things that you did at work in particular that really energized you, my cheers, right. I really liked having this meeting and really collaborating with my coworkers to come up with a problem solution. I really liked having this one-on-one with my boss, who really helped me feel valued, and blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 1:Whatever it was, whatever activity or meeting or task that you did, put it in the cheers column and the chores column. I'm sure you can see where we're going with this. Write down all the things that drain you of energy, right, I know I have to do these TPS reports or I can't stand doing these. He's drained me of energy. Let's put that on the chores column, whatever those things are, and track it for at least a week, if not closer to 30 days, and then go back and look and see what patterns you observed. Right, what are you seeing that shows up consistently in the cheers column? Is it relationships? Is it kind of detail, orientation and problem solving? Is it accomplishing goals every day? Is it having tough conversations with people and trying to convince somebody of something like a sales type role? What are you doing consistently? That kind of stand out for you.
Speaker 1:And then here's the clincher at the end of that exercise, whether it's a week or a month, look and see if you can assign the percentage of time that you spend in a given day or week or month with those cheers. And literally you're almost doing a bit of an analysis to see what your ratio looks like. Are you indeed at 80-20? You're probably not unhappy if you're at 80-20. You probably aren't thinking about I'm in the wrong job.
Speaker 1:Maybe you're at 20-80. Maybe your list of chores is quite long and you only have a handful of cheers and you only get to do those every couple of weeks. That's a sign Like, hmm, like this might not be the right fit for me if you're in that kind of inverted ratio, or even if you're at a 50-50, really start to think about are there ways that I can do some job sculpting to shift and increase the amount of time I spend in my cheers and it's also a great tool to be able to come to your boss especially if you're not the boss to say, hey, I've done this analysis and I'd love to talk a little bit more about what I can do to greater contribute to the organization, because this is what I'm best at and this is where I get my energy and I'd like to do more of that and see if that's possible.
Speaker 5:Awesome, thank you. I hope none of my employees are listening to this. Don't do any of this.
Speaker 3:I have a feeling that they're enjoying. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.
Speaker 5:I can't afford to lose that video once.
Speaker 3:That's fun detective work. It seems like it is.
Speaker 1:It is and what I'll say, just you know. All kidding aside, I will say, in terms of people who really find that they have an inverted ratio like that, it's pretty small percentage. Most folks are, if not at 80, 20, maybe they're 60, 40, 70, 30, there are often some very sort of significant but small tweaks that can be made to fine tune what someone does every day. That can really make a massive impact on their engagement and fulfillment at work. Most folks, you know, because we have a sense of self-awareness most people do to some degree we gravitate towards roles that seem to be in line with what our strengths are. We do it automatically because it is so effortless, and so we think to ourselves oh, I really think I'd be good as a lawyer, I really think I'd be good as an accountant or teacher or whatever it is. So most folks do have a decent amount of alignment.
Speaker 1:It's not that common that we have find someone who's totally in the wrong job. But what I will say is, oftentimes people are hired for a particular role that they're attracted to and over time in the organization, because there's a reorg or downsizing or something has shifted and now they're being asked to do this other job they didn't sign up for. And that's where we tend to see some of those shifts in like wait a minute, what am I doing here, Right? I haven't even really noticed how tired and unhappy I've become because I have a totally different job than I really wanted in the first place. That kind of tends to be where we see those shifts.
Speaker 4:I have a comment question too. When you've identified the shifts and there's the word effortless has come up quite a bit, and this is again comment question and how do you talk to your clients about this? Anything of value is going to. You're going to have to work through resistance. Stephen Pressfield wrote a really neat book called the art of war. No, no, no, no, sorry, the war of art, not to be confused with the art of war and it's about resistance showing up and that resistance can be seen as a signpost that you know, if there's some resistance there to make a change, it's probably important to you. Maybe you should be looking at moving forward and through that resistance and so with that and then kind of the state of flow and enjoyment within a job, there needs to be some effort involved. There's a balance between the effortlessness and the efforting and the moving towards something of value to be worked for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think I hear what you're saying and what I would say is how eager are you to engage in that effort? And if you're eager to engage in the effort because, again, effortless doesn't necessarily mean I don't have to work hard right, we might want to put significant effort into something, but it doesn't make me feel drained in that way in terms of effort. It doesn't make me feel like I'm pushing that molder uphill. If there's a big effort, like a huge project in front of me, and I can't wait to get started, it's gonna take a lot of effort, but the effortlessness is in my energy and and and eagerness to jump in and roll up my sleeve and get into that project. Oh, this is gonna be a messy one. I can't wait, right, it's.
Speaker 1:How do you feel about the effort is maybe one way to think about it. So, so I I really think, in terms of the resistance, you know, I don't know. I have to give that a little bit more thought, because I think that it really depends on what is the resistance that we're feeling, right, where is it coming from and and what do we need to do to get past it? I think there's a there's a great coaching question that I often ask some of my clients, which is, as we're considering, some change that you're making. What will be different about your life if you're able to achieve this goal?
Speaker 4:Yeah, and I think we're saying the same thing. I, honestly, I, I I bring it up mainly because, you know, for our listeners, in that we've used the word effortlessness a lot and so I was just kind of trying to get the conversation going on a little clarification around that. And I think we've just done that, because I think we're kind of saying the same thing.
Speaker 3:I'm glad you brought that up, though, because it doesn't. I think that it's important to distinguish between effort that feels worth it and motivating, versus this grog Grog, what's the word like where you're just trying to slog where it's so hard, yes, and not really holding promise of something on the other side.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 1:That's exciting Thanks for bringing that up. Yeah, it's a great, great call out.
Speaker 3:Erin, is there anything else that we should make sure we ask you about before we let you go? That's a good question.
Speaker 1:You know I don't, I don't think so. I think you know this conversation is hopefully planted a seed in folks to be really thinking about, at least just against the point of mindfulness, as we've talked about a little bit today, can we just be mindful about where am I most engaged? And, whether we use an assessment or not, how can I start to pay attention to those things that really kind of help me feel fulfilled and feel whole? And those are the things we should be spending at least the majority of our time in, and I think it's just a good reminder to all of us to pay a bit more attention to that.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you so much for taking time to be with us and to share such an uplifting topic, and I just appreciate the work you're doing in the world.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, thank you, Erin, it was wonderful to meet you and thanks for sharing your thoughts with me. Thank you.
Speaker 1:My pleasure. Thanks everybody, Good to be with you all, of course.
Speaker 3:Thanks, Erin Bye.
Speaker 5:Bye.
Speaker 3:All right, so we have a debrief time this time.
Speaker 5:You know, what I think is so cool about this personally Tell us Is that we really really want people doing what they're good at. I mean, if you can strip away all the other conditions, right, like if I just walk into my office, if I didn't have to care about anything, I got to choose what I get to care about. I really want people doing tasks they're good at, and then on top of that, I want them doing tasks they enjoy. Now I understand it gets more complicated than that, because sometimes a certain package comes in the door that requires other tasks that everyone's not good at, but it's such like everyone's so aligned with it in my mind, and so I'm just so fascinated in why we don't just naturally do this more. Yeah.
Speaker 4:You know when we were, it is, and you know what came to me, lisa, when we were listening and talking, was you know you asked a question to me on the value of the program and the purpose of life. Yeah, and as we were kind of kicking this around. If you're good at it and you enjoy doing it, you're probably being of service.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 4:Adding a significant value to your life's work and your time on the planet.
Speaker 3:That's such a good point yeah.
Speaker 4:And so maybe you know that is it.
Speaker 3:I also think it's why a community is really powerful. I was thinking about it as she was talking, because if we all have different strength than when we're in community, we can each contribute our respective things and we have a sense of contribution and belonging. And your strength is my weakness, and vice versa, right? So we're more of a whole, right?
Speaker 4:Well, and that is, I mean, and again, another rabbit hole we could open, but I think, given the state of affairs, it's a really beautiful time to bring that up in community. I just read a quote I think it was Tick-Not Han that said the next Buddha will be a community, it won't be one person, and it's time to come together and so, in valuing each person's strengths and using that as a community, I think that's a great point.
Speaker 3:I got to redo it. I have found the whole quote here. Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's what.
Speaker 3:I was thinking of when you were saying.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Why wouldn't we want people doing what they love?
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's powerful. But it's like so if businesses, well, if the consumer could align with that right. Start with the consumer. Like the consumer wants a product that was like born out of that process. Right, so the consumer wants that. You get the consumer line, then the businesses get more aligned to foster that. And then, if the business get more aligned, then the education gets more aligned to capitalize on that. You're not even talking about weaknesses in schools, actually, you're just talking about whatever people are good at in fostering that. And then all of a sudden maybe you have this community right. That's.
Speaker 3:So talk a little bit about what you mean by if the consumer wants that. What do you mean by that? How do we kick this off?
Speaker 5:Well, I think for me to change the way I do business. I don't literally I do mean I include myself, but I just mean in general. I use myself an example. My consumer needs to be on board with the product I'm putting out and it needs to be efficient and it needs to meet their expectations price point, time, whatever. So I think for businesses to really get motivated to really invest in themselves and realign their people and be focused on not when you dump on someone's desk and tell them to have it done by five, but make sure you select what you put on people's desk because that's aligned with their strengths and their enjoyment For the business to be motivated for that, I think it needs to translate out to the consumer side. Does that make sense?
Speaker 3:You mean, you need a consumer who wants that, or that's a good question.
Speaker 5:I didn't mean that they want it, but I mean the end product needs to be a natural consequence of that they will inherently benefit because the back end has been yes that's it.
Speaker 5:That's a much more articulate way to explain it, my thoughts there. But I can't grab it. The closest thing I can grab is sometimes you want like I'll get into handmade stuff. I'm willing to pay more for something if I think someone sat in their shop and pounded the leather or the metal with their own hands right, or make a knife by hand or something like that. So that's an example where the consumer, like the consumer demand, my consumer demand for that knife is that it's I'm in a pot like nice gentleman's pocket knives and thanks, that's why I'm talking about knives. But Is that? It's custom built? So there are businesses now that the way they do business is designed around my willingness to buy that custom built product. Pay a little more. I want to see the Like.
Speaker 5:I buy these Swedish axes that have the initials of the person who made them stamped into the, forged into the metal. So they have that process. They added it. It's an expense to them, but they add the process because they know it gives value to the consumer and I'll pay more for it. So they're willing to change their process because of what the consumer's driving. Does that make sense? So it's kind of like the opposite of the cheapest, mass produced mentality that arguably some of us have at this point, and it's more, hey, that might take a little while longer to produce for you because we're having, because of the way our processes work.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so your people would engage with your firm because it's a place where people are positive and they're being nurtured and they're in a role they love.
Speaker 4:And the outcome of working with the firm would be an exceptional experience because of that.
Speaker 5:It's more. That, I think, is what I had in mind. Yeah, I'd say less warm and fuzzy and more killer end product.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's the result of everybody being in a role where they flourish. Yeah.
Speaker 5:Because how many people? If you just asked them hey, what's your skill set? What do you spend? What's your 80, 20? How many people? I couldn't answer that. Yeah, I feel like people should be. I feel like we all should be able to answer that, now that I got educated today on how important that is. But I can't.
Speaker 3:So instead of some rote answer of what are you good at when you're in a job interview, you could actually say this is how I will flourish.
Speaker 5:Boom.
Speaker 3:And then it's truly a conversation of is it a fit or not? Exactly Versus just trying to get the job, or that's it yeah.
Speaker 5:That is exactly what I'm thinking.
Speaker 3:But I do think the self-awareness is sometimes challenging. So, being a good detective of ourselves, like whether it's I don't know, Brad, you might have good ideas of how we can get more attuned. You know, I liked the cheers and chores thing, Are there other ways that you think we could tap into an awareness?
Speaker 4:I mean really, it starts with how do you? And not to make this too soft and fuzzy, but you get soft and fuzzy.
Speaker 3:How do?
Speaker 4:you feel about it, not what you, thanks, not what you think about it. But you know we talk a lot about mindfulness and mindfulness is an easy word to throw out there, but it's not so easy thing to actually do, and I think that that's what you're talking about. I was like yo, I'm being mindful. I was like, yeah, man, are you really? And it is really a how do you feel about it? Now, what are you thinking about it? How do you feel it? Where does that touch you? A lot of people really think they're being mindful, but mindful is much more of a body felt, deeper wisdom process than this Thinking of it 15 different ways in the conscious mind. That's still. You think you're being mindful, but you're not being mindful because you're not tapping into. How does that affect me? How does that make me feel? How does that touch me? And when people can start really understanding. Do I like this or do I not like this? Well, I should like this.
Speaker 5:I think I like this.
Speaker 4:I was taught to like this how do you feel about it? And that is a I want to say it's a skill we all have it, but it's just some. That's a deeper awareness that needs to be cultivated sometimes, especially if you've gone your whole life just trapped in your head which a lot of us do.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so it really comes down to how do you feel about it, and I think that's one thing. There's one teeny step that anybody listening could start doing is OK, we know what you think about it. How do you feel about it?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And then and then, some real honesty. Yep Around that feeling.
Speaker 5:That's helpful. Well, so what would happen, Lisa, if you just took everyone in your office, dumped it on the table and said you guys pick who's going to do what? It'd be kind of fun, I wonder what would happen.
Speaker 3:I think it'd be really fun. That's why I love the concept of teams, because you couldn't have a team, a basketball team, of five point guards. You need somebody who's going to be a tall center, you need someone who likes dribbling the ball and I don't know. I just think it. That's why, again, community is really special.
Speaker 5:I might experiment with it a little bit on a low risk item.
Speaker 3:I think it's like Brad's case.
Speaker 5:That's a joke. There's no case, Well awesome.
Speaker 3:So I thought my biggest takeaways of the day were to pay attention to what our strengths are and look for effortlessness effortlessness with knowing that there'll be some work, Glimpses of excellence and enjoyment. What are each of your biggest takeaways as we conclude?
Speaker 5:My biggest takeaway was how important I feel it is for people to be aware of their skill set and their strengths and what doesn't drain energy versus gets them excited, such that when you write your resume, your resume would talk all about what your skills are, where you flourish, where you thrive, and things like that, as opposed to. I know QuickBooks, I've used Outlook, I've done these tasks. It wouldn't even have any tasks on it hardly it would be like this is who I am and if you know so I think that's really important.
Speaker 3:That's beautiful, that gets me excited. Yeah, yeah, cool, I can tell it gets you excited.
Speaker 4:I would say my biggest takeaway is along the same lines the importance and the value of actually really understanding your strengths, however, so that you can apply them in these other areas that may appear not to be such strengths. I'm going to stick on the developmental side of this and not just, well, these are my strengths is what I'm going to do. Well, these are your strengths, and how can you use those strengths to accomplish what you want to accomplish or do what you want to do?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love that?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I do too.
Speaker 3:Thanks for that one.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Awesome. Well, thank you to our listeners, and I'm going to link up Aaron's information, as well as any resources that we mentioned today, and I hope it brings you a lot of joy to reflect on your strengths and that brings you joy.
Speaker 2:Thank you for spending this time with us. My prayer is that this conversation gives you ideas and inspiration for living the kind of life that is meaningful to you. See you in the next episode, thank you.