Deliberative Heroes

Today is the birthday of one of my dear friends. Special to me for many reasons, I have come to rely on her carefulness. This friend is never glib, reckless or impetuous. Instead, she is thorough. Conscientious. Wise. She takes time to think, and when she does share her advice, it is rock-solid and takes into account potential risk that I and others may not see.

My friend's way of being reminds me of my father, a man who embodied caution and carefulness, who was simultaneously risk-aware and conscientious.

There were times when my father's caution annoyed me, such as the day he first handed me the keys to our family station wagon. With a new drivers license tucked into my wallet, I was high as a kite, ready to navigate the streets of my hometown of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to claim some independence and no longer depend on my parents to drive me. What did my father say to me as he handed me the keys? I'm handing you the keys to a death machine. You have the capacity to kill with the car you will drive.  You are responsible for every life you carry in the car, and you are responsible not to take the lives of other people on the road. I kid you not. That's what he said. Whoa! There I was, ready to accelerate into independence, and my father, like a brake, slowed me down to contemplate the risks associated with my new freedom.

Even at the time I heard his little speech, though, I knew that my father's goal was not to be a killjoy; instead, underneath that speech was love and care. My dad's selfless service to me and to everyone with whom he interacted gave me a foundation to know those words were shared in love. He cared deeply that I would be safe in my car, that I would guard the safety of those who rode in it, that I would never hurt someone else and that I would never experience the excruciating tragedy of having done so.

In his university career, my father's thoroughness was valued highly. He could be depended upon to be conscientious. His words, carefully chosen, were highly regarded. Yes, he had a sparkle and wit as well, a mind brimming with curiosity and a humility that endeared him to others. My dad supported my mother in her career, as she took choir after choir of 7th through 12th grade students on performing tours across the United States in caravans of buses and vans. My father felt acutely the responsibility for the lives of those young people on tour. In a conversation in the year before his death, he remarked quietly, We brought them all back. Their lives mattered deeply to him, and he had carried the weight of responsibility for their safety, quietly, in the core of his being. His caution, though, was by no means his only defining characteristic:  students remembered much more his pick-up games of basketball with them, his taking photographs and videos that captured their growing-up years and their journeys into adulthood, his teasing and humor.

In the language of Strengths, the particular talent my dad shared with my friend is the Deliberative talent, which can contribute to our families, work groups and community that brake and caution we need. At a time when speed has become a high-order value in our culture, when we're pressured for instant action and instant response, we at times find ourselves plunging into rushed, ill-considered plans, failing to anticipate downstream consequences, failing to anticipate what can go wrong. Those who embody the Deliberative talent can contribute mightily to our lives and work, helping us slow down, anticipate what can go wrong and prevent wreckage that in our rush we might otherwise cause.

After my father's death at the end of 2012, our home church was packed with hundreds of his colleagues, friends, nieces, nephews and former university students as well as those who had been on those cross country tours. In the eulogy, the minister captured many dimensions of my father's nature, the full spectrum of which could never be captured in a single word or label. As he wrapped the eulogy to a close, though, the minister shared that my dad's last two words in every conversation with his family were Be careful. The minister then turned that word careful around, suggesting that it meant, in my dad's life, full of care.

Oh, how I appreciate my Deliberative friend.  And I celebrate my Deliberative father, whose care was shared not with glee and glib, but with a deep wisdom and from deep love.

Happy birthday, dear friend.  And I love you, my dear father.

For more information on Gallup's approach to Strengths, or to take the Clifton StrengthsFinder™ online, go to https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com/

The Parable of the Produce Stand

Riotous colors in a grey stone alleyway of a tiny village in the Cinque Terre. Eggplants, peppers, beans, tomatoes, squash.... that scene on the Cinque Terre has stayed with me.  I offer up this image of summer splendor to illustrate what I'll call The Parable of the Produce Stand.

At a surface level, let's look at three observations we can make from the photo:

1.  Variety:  An array of different fruits and vegetables are crated by variety.
2.  Robustness:  There's absolutely nothing anemic about the produce in the picture.
3.  Offered for use:  The produce is displayed to be bought and consumed.

What lessons from this produce stand can help us increase our productivity and happiness?

1.  Embrace our uniqueness.  

Each of the thirteen or so varieties of fruit and vegetable in the photo has potential to make a unique contribution. There is no eggplant parmesan without eggplant. No stuffed peppers without peppers. No classic red sauce without tomatoes.  Like those fruits and vegetables, we each have potential to make unique, signature contributions. Our uniqueness is in fact measurable: Of the seven billion people on the planet, no one can contribute from the same collection of talents, skills, knowledge and experiences as you. No one. Those factors form your uniqueness, and your best contributions will come not when you try to be what you're not, but when you become more of who you are, building on and giving from your uniqueness.

How do you do this?  Start by learning exactly what your unique combination of talents is.  By far the most accessible, specific, and insightful tool I've seen for this is the Clifton StrengthsFinder®, an online assessment you can access at strengthscenter.com.

2.  Build our robustness.  

Those fruits and vegetables look healthy, colorful, appetizing.  They've been carefully planted, tended and harvested to bring out their maximum flavor.  So, too, we need to build the robustness of our own talents with intentional tending and feeding.

Let's say you've taken the Clifton StrengthsFinder®, you have self-awareness about your unique talents, but you don't know how to develop your potential. Build your talents into strengths by intentionally using them. Think of your talents as a muscle that will get stronger with exercise.  Focus on a particular talent theme for a week at a time, intentionally leveraging it toward goals you have. Build knowledge and skill that complement your talents.  If you'd like additional support, rev up with a Strengths Coach who can help you develop and apply your talents productively toward goals in work and life.

3.  Offer what we have to give.

While the produce in the picture looks beautiful, it's not a still life intended to amuse visitors along the Cinque Terre.  It's a working produce stand, where the fruit and vegetables are intended to be purchased and consumed.  So it is with our talents:  They're meant to be shared.  While it's sad to think of beautiful produce that spoils, never having contributed flavor and never having been consumed, it's sadder still to think of people whose potential to contribute is never realized.  The world misses out.  And, when we don't get to use our strengths regularly, we may miss out on some of the hope, confidence and satisfaction that are byproducts.  When we do focus on using our strengths, we are happier and more engaged in our work.  How much happier? How much more productive?  People who focus on using their strengths are three times more likely to report an excellent quality of life, and six times as likely to be engaged at work.

Each of us has utterly unique talents, knowledge, skills and experience to contribute.  We need to be and are needed to be productive. When we contribute what we uniquely can and have meaningful impact, now that is fruitfulness worth celebrating!

I hope you'll remember The Parable of the Produce Stand. You have great capacity to be productive. Embrace your uniqueness. Build your robustness. Share what you have to give.

For more information on Gallup's approach to Strengths, or to take the Clifton StrengthsFinder™ online, go to https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com/

Slaying the Giant

Thanks to Malcolm Gladwell’s David and Goliath:  Underdogs, Misfits, and The Art of Battling Giants, I’ve given more thought to David, that shepherd boy who volunteered to attempt to end a deadlock between armies of the Philistines and Israelites as the head-to-head competitor against an armored, gigantic warrior. 

Gladwell’s insights into the ancient story are intriguing:  Goliath is presumed to have the upper hand, while David appears to be the classic underdog, equipped as he is with only a slingshot against Goliath’s armor and sword. In fact, David has a superior projectile technology that he exploits to prevail against a massive, nearly blind man weighed down with armor. In Gladwell’s words, The powerful and the strong are not always what they seem. Illustrating this theme through the stories of such people as stellar litigator David Boies and childhood leukemia-slayer Dr. Jay Frierich, Gladwell derives conclusions about ordinary people confronting “giants” ranging from armies and governments to misfortune and oppression.

I see each of Gladwell’s human success stories through an additional lens, a strengths lens: Each of Gladwell's heroes has unique personality traits that have been developed into strengths and used to achieve particular goals. These strengths aren't fungible from person to person.  

Let’s take David, for instance.  While we may surmise that David volunteered to battle the giant, in part, because he had confidence in his ability with the slingshot, my guess is that not just any shepherd proficient with a slingshot would have volunteered to carry the weight of the conflict alone.  Confidently and audaciously, David not only volunteered but then refused his king’s offer to equip him with armor. (Who, we might wonder, says no to the king in order to do it his own way?)  David used strategy and speed to his advantage, firing quickly at the strategic target of Goliath’s only vulnerability, his unprotected forehead. David sought, claimed and excelled at the clutch player role.

We all have outcomes we need to bring about, in work and in our personal lives, and we each have a unique combination of talents that we can leverage toward those outcomes. Not all of us thrive as clutch players, needing to summon our best in a heated moment of pressure.   Instead, some of us are planners whose strengths best shine when we are unhurried and have ample time to anticipate risks, obstacles and problems.  Some of us give our best when we are focused on building relationships and sensing others’ feelings.  Some of us shine best when we have time to immerse ourselves in thought, reflecting deeply on ideas, generating new ideas and approaches.  Each of us is different and gives our best when we are giving from who we already are.

Many of our most powerful talents are so innate to us that we are unaware of them.  When we know what our talents are we can strategically aim those talents at the outcomes we need to bring about, using our most effective route to success.  When we know the talents of the people with whom we work, we have a force multiplier as we can strategically align ourselves so that each of us contributes in our most powerful and effective ways, energized by being who we are and contributing what we do best.

We aren’t all clutch players, nor should we be.  We need to pick targets that we can hit, given our particular strengths, and aim our unique bag of tricks to slay the giants before us.

For more information on Gallup's approach to Strengths, or to take the Clifton StrengthsFinder™ online, go to https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com/