WHO DO I NEED TO BE?

WHO DO I NEED TO BE, TO DO WHAT I NEED TO DO?

Research from Harvard shows we operate on autopilot almost 50% of the time, meaning we can become over reliant on our habitual core strengths, using the same ‘tools’ all the time. We rarely challenge how we do things until we hit a block. Then, we may tell ourselves it’s because we don’t have those abilities or strengths. We may believe that success only comes to those with natural talent, motivation and ambition, holding ourselves back from what we are truly capable of. But this simply isn’t the case. Top achievers in life always seek to draw out their ‘underdone’ strengths to improve them in order to perform and achieve. They take full responsibility for this, not an easy task but a necessary one. When was the last time you consciously worked on developing the ‘underdone’ areas in yourself? This can prove challenging but the good news is that anyone can change and adapt – if they really want the end result enough. To become who we need to be, we need to tap into the ‘underdone’ strengths and understand how to bring them into effective use. 1. Consider what strengths you need to achieve your goal? Examples are self confidence, ambitious, persuasive, quick to act, trusting, supportive, risk-taking, methodical, persevering, flexible, adaptable, analytical, tolerant… 2. What’s the reason for using this strength? 3. How will it help you to achieve your goal? 4. When or where will you use this strength? 5. How will this strength show up for you each day? Now you can consider which ones of those are ‘underdone’ within you and you can work on strengthening these. Choosing more appropriate strengths to use can feel uncomfortable and clunky at first. If you haven’t used this strength for some time, it can feel least ‘like you’ and you may be fearful of it if you’ve experienced it being ‘overdone’ by someone else or you haven’t used it before. The challenge lies in understanding that a shift of strengths is required. I recently coached a copywriter who left her successful career to write her first novel. She felt a fraud, unable to say ‘I’m an author’ because she hasn’t been published yet. In feeling a fraud, she wasn’t making things happen. She lacked confidence and was fearful of rejection. In considering ‘who do I need to be, to be an author?’ she identified as confident, persuasive, methodical and flexible. She then looked at ways to move towards being more confident and learning to be more persuasive, how to handle rejection to be more successful next time, what systems could help her to be more methodical, what she needed to do to be flexible – finding ways to be who she needed to be to do what she needed to do. When stuck, she can ask ‘how does confident/persuasive need to show up for me today?’ Then she can behave differently to achieve that. Asking yourself the question ‘who do I need to be, to do what I need to do?’ at the outset, can be the difference between failure and success. We all have varying levels of strengths. Some that come more naturally to us and others are under-used. However, they can all be finely tuned to give us a varied and powerful toolkit of strengths to draw on when different goals and challenges in life and business appear.

Kate Southerby is a relationship intelligence and self-awareness expert, supporting entrepreneurs, businesses and corporate teams including Royal Marsden, Rothco & Publicis. She is a speaker and a certified facilitator of TotalSDI, MBTI, Korn Ferry leadership styles & climate & Situational Leadership. iammecoaching.com