Following his own inner beat (at DragonCon 2006))

It’s August, and time for contemplating the beginning of the school year here in the States, the upcoming festival of geekiness that is DragonCon (see picture, and, no, that is not me — although it does come from my camera), and I am busy fending off the calls to join the ticket. So please, Senators, let me say it again: I have withdrawn from the race!

It being August, I thought it a good time reiterate the most useful piece of coaching I can give you: do you what you’re good at doing.

It seems so simple that feels almost insulting to receive as advice: Do what you’re good at. It seems like such a truism.

Except that so many high potentials just don’t see it.

They spend their lives working at things that are to meet someone else’s expectations, or even what they think someone else wants (but really that person doesn’t care.)

This isn’t a recipe for success. So why do they do it?

Some of them are still caught in the Overachiever’s Dilemma. You’re good at something, usually something technical or detailed, and so good that you massively outperform all other comers. But that’s just because you are doing that PeopleFit called “burning capability”: you are a size too big for the role you have, so you can do the job faster than anyone else.

But you don’t really like the job. You feel like you could do much more, doing something else. But you get strokes being better than anyone else. Deep in your heart you know you need to jump to something else before you get stuck here but you can’t make the break.

Others have already passed through the Overachiever’s Dilemma. Now living in the Underachiever’s Nightmare, they have so much more capability than the job requires that they can’t do it well. Think of a highly trained cabinetmaker trying to pass himself off as a student in a high school wood shop class. It sounds like it would be a cinch, but the expert always tries to do more. And then there’s the insane, mind-numbing, soul-destroying boredom.

So why not just do what you’re good at? [Read more →]