You Have More Skills Than You Think
If we ever had coffee and I asked you what your skills are, after quoting Liam Neeson from the movie Taken, you’d probably tell me one of two things: 1. I don’t know what my skills are. 2. I don’t have (m)any. The first answer might be born from the simple fact that you haven’t thought about that question ever. I once had a job that required us to do self-evaluations of our own skills. This exercise felt like an invitation to invent new ways you were awesome. We were motivated to do this because we all knew our raises were dependent on it but we still had a hard time coming up with a list of skills. My coworkers and I would scratch our heads and write things like “numbers.” My skills are numbers. That’s not a skill, that’s The Count from Sesame Street’s passion. That’s a noun. The second answer, the belief that you don’t have many, is probably because you’re human. We humans have a difficult job seeing our own skills as skills. Roy H. Williams, author and marketing expert, says, “It’s hard to read the label when you’re inside the bottle.”1 We don’t consider them skills but rather just things we do.
So during this fictional coffee, the first thing I would do is to try to help you figure out what skills you already have. I’d even pull out a stack of note cards, which would probably make you recoil a little. Because once again, we’re about to cross the threshold between dreaming and doing. Dreaming is fun. Future results are enjoyable to talk about. Present efforts are not. But I’d push through all the hope you’ve stored in someday and try my best to get you to focus on the skills portion of your CSA today.
We tend to focus on “how to get more skills” first, which is understandable. “Get more” conversations invite you to dream. Assessing what you already have forces you to be honest. One of those is clearly more fun.
But this is a critical point in this section. Because now we’re going to do some work. The goal is to create a list of our current skills so that we know what we have to work with, what might be missing and what we want to improve. Don’t worry—we won’t be using note cards in the hustle or character sections—but when it comes to skills we need a method for figuring out where we are in order to head toward where we want to be.
We’re going to build on the approach we started with in relationships. In that section, there was only one step: Write the name of someone you know who can help with your Do Over. Skills take a little more detail, but I assure you this is just as simple as the first exercise you already crushed. ■ What We’re About to Do There are only two steps to this exercise: 1. Write down ideas. 2. Look for patterns. For my high-detail friends this is like some sort of dream come true. You probably already have a note-card drawer sorted by color and size. For my low-detail friends, you are among company. I feel your lack of organization but I assure you that your career is worth it. ■ Step 1: Write Down Ideas I have a stack of cards on my desk. One of them just says, “Naps.” I have no idea what that means now. It’s possible that at one point I was creating a list of things that are awesome or perhaps brainstorming activities Winnie the Pooh likes. Hard to say, but here’s what’s important: It doesn’t matter.
I don’t want your cards to be perfect. I just want you to write. I want you to work your way into the freedom to write down any skills that you like. I say work your way into it because like most people, you’ve been taught to be safe. Somewhere on the road to adulthood we decided that dreams were dumb. We stopped wanting to be firemen and astronauts and settled for stuck and predictable. We accepted the lie that Monday must be boring.
Step 1 is all about quantity. One skill per card, as many cards as you can come up with. This is not the time to edit. For now, we’re going for volume. Don’t ask yourself “Is this dumb?” It might be, and that’s OK. All I want you to do is write one skill you currently have per card. Don’t try to cram multiple ideas onto a single card.
To get started, here are some questions you can answer about your skills: 1. What are you good at? Screw humility. This is no time to be humble. This is the hero’s slow walk from an explosion moment. What’s something you’re good, dare I say, amazing at? Do you create great marketing proposals? Can no one balance a budget like you can? I’m not talking about just in your current job either. Go way back. If you were a fantastic paperboy, write down “On-time delivery.” With relationships, we surfaced the casual ones because there’s no telling where they might lead. Same with skills. Surface them all! 2. What comes naturally? This question will generate some “Oh, this?” skills, those things you don’t even think about because they come so naturally to you. You think everyone can do what you do, but we can’t. The elaborate dinner parties you throw so easily, like Sarah and her Neighbor’s Table, are indicative that you’re amazing at event planning and connecting with others. That thing that comes naturally to you is difficult for the rest of the population. Just because it’s easy doesn’t mean it’s not a skill. 3. What do people pay me to do? If you’ve ever had a single job, this question is going to generate at least one note card. What were your responsibilities at your favorite job? Write them down, one card per skill. For instance, if you were in charge of quality assurance for software launches, write down, “quality assurance.” Increase the cards this question generates by asking, “What skill would people pay me to do?” (Hint: The answer is “Almost anything.”) 4. What are you afraid of? Bears, obviously, but besides these furred denizens of death there are plenty of important skills hidden inside our fears. The reason is that great passions usually come with great fears. You’ve known you were supposed to do something for years, but have been avoiding it because you’re afraid of it. Write that down. For example, I would list “writing” as one of my fears. Isn’t that stupid to be afraid to do the thing I feel most called to do? It is, but no one ever accused fear of being smart. This one might feel counterintuitive because we’re often told to answer the question “What do I love doing?” when it comes to figuring out our dreams and skills. I think that’s an important question and one you could certainly ask with this exercise, but I’ve also learned we can be afraid of the things that really matter to us. Be honest with yourself. Do you really dread public speaking or are you afraid of it because you’re worried you might not be good at it and it’s something you secretly want to do? 5. If you wrote an eBook, what would the topic be? Times are tough. Bills are due. Ma and Pa are about to lose the beet farm. The only way to save the situation is to write a twenty-page eBook that teaches eager shoppers to do something you’re good at. Are you renowned for your ability to pack ten days of clothes into a small carry-on for business trips? Have people marveled in the past at your skills in creating marketing strategies for book launches? Have you figured out a unique way to fit a fully functional wood shop in your garage but always thought of it as a silly hobby? If you had to create an eBook today, what would the topic be? If you had to write a series of three, what would be in your trilogy? ■ Step 2: Look for Patterns Now that you’ve got a few skills labeled you’ll start to notice something: Some of the ideas are related. They might not say the same thing, but they are at least cousins in the family tree of creativity. As you start to see some that are similar, begin grouping them together. Cluster them in a way that you can still see the nugget of each idea at a glance. If you create a vertical stack that covers up all the ideas except the one on top, you won’t be able to see them all at once and might miss something important. Group them in the way that works best for you. Maybe you want to group yours by “Skills I love doing,” “Skills I get paid the most for,” “Skills I want to improve” or “Skills I haven’t used in a long time.”
Don’t worry if you don’t come right out of the gate with some patterns. If this is your first go-round with an activity like this, you shouldn’t be great at it yet. Try tweaking this exercise to make it work the best possible way for you.
Please don’t get stuck using a tool that is designed to help you get unstuck. This shouldn’t be a perfect process. In fact, I hope it’s not. You should only spend a few minutes when you initially do this, then walk away. Building a Career Savings Account is a lifelong process; you’ve got time. Put your cards in a spot where you will see them during your average day. I want you to bump into them as you walk to the kitchen or garage. Some (most) ideas are elusive. They don’t walk into our heads and announce themselves; we have to capture them. And often they won’t come out until they’re positive we aren’t trying to find them. Don’t believe me? OK, so how come your best ideas come in the shower? Did you step into the shower and tell yourself, “Today I will condition my hair and try to brainstorm solutions to that problem at work”? Of course not. That wasn’t even on your brain and yet, mid “repeat as necessary” the solution hits you!
I don’t think you should bring waterproof note cards into your shower, but you should keep a stack of regular cards around. Fear would love to add the inconvenience of searching for one as a way to prevent an idea from seeing the light of day. Beat it back by keeping a stack in a few locations at home. And keep some in your pocket. It might feel a little strange, but anyone who judges you for writing down an idea and trying to be smarter about idea capture is a jerk. (You could always do this using an app on your phone but remember, there’s still something powerful about physically writing an idea down.)
The goal of looking for patterns is greater clarity into what skills you possess. If you have ten skills written down, for instance, and nine of them fall into the category “Skills I don’t use at my current job,” we need to fix that. We need to find a new job that uses more of your skills, bring more of your skills to your current job or learn the skills your job actually requires.
If you ended up with two note cards and a pattern of “I have no skills, I hate you Jon Acuff,” it might be time to phone a friend. Grab coffee with someone and ask them flat out, “What do you think my skills are?” If they’re like my friends their first temptation will be to say something about your ability to pay “da billz,” but immediately after they go to the extreme and rock a mic like a vandal they will surprise you with skills you forgot to write down. This conversation will definitely help you, but it will also be excruciating. It will feel like you’re asking a friend to list all of the ways you are awesome. Even if you set it up the right way and ask for a tangible skill and not a flowery compliment, you’re still going to squirm while they respond. Suck it up. You’re good at something. To pretend otherwise is a waste of time. The point of the note-card exercise is to generate two different things: 1. Hope 2. Awareness The first one is simple: Launching a Do Over takes a tremendous amount of hope. At the start of a journey like this, it’s very easy to get discouraged and think you currently don’t possess many career skills. Hopefully seeing them on a handful of note cards for the first time has encouraged you that just like with your relationships, you’re better off than you thought. The second goal, awareness, is something that will also come up in greater detail in the hustle section. In the skills portion, the purpose of increased awareness is to help you see new skills you might want to acquire. Whether you want to get better at your current job or find a new one, chances are you will need new skills. Seeing what skills you currently have on note cards often helps increase the awareness of what’s missing, those new skills you might need for a new job or to break through a Career Ceiling.
Remember Relationships get you the first gig, skills get you the second. You have more skills than you think. Writing them down and looking for patterns is a great way to discover that.
Don’t let fear hide a skill you’ve always had or wanted to pursue. Just because you’re afraid of doing something doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. If you have a hard time filling out note cards, tag a friend in to help you.
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How to NOT burn bridges in the workplace
Some people are not going to like you. There are people you work with right now who don’t like you. There are people at your last job who don’t like you. You don’t control what other people think about you. Your Do Over might mean staying put at a job and improving it from the inside out. It could mean jumping jobs to another company. Stay or go, you’ll have the opportunity to burn some bridges along the way.
Farewell foes, you say, throwing a match on a bridge you plan to never see again.
And yet, boomerangs return. Good ones and bad ones. The bridge you thought you were done with completely has a strange habit of coming back into the picture. You will work with some of the people you singed again. You will see them at industry events. They will be called by future employers for recommendations. They will be friends of other employers. You are not done with those relationships.
Some bridges need to be closed. They’re toxic and harmful. You didn’t light them on fire, you simply walked away from them and ended the relationship. But I swear, the fewer bridges you can burn in your career, the better your Career Savings Account will be. It’s hard to build new relationships if you’ve got some old ones in the vault that are still smoldering.
Have you found your dream job advertised Need a selection criteria that that will win you the position It doesnt matter if you are a CEO, co
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Even Stupid People Get Promoted
You don’t like Brenda. She’s not just a foe, she’s your arch nemesis. Your Joker to Batman. You can’t stand the way she laughs, she’s not very good at her job and is a serial microwave popcorn burner.
It would be far easier to treat her with disdain. Perhaps not out-and-out disrespect, but it would be fun to talk behind her back. To join the “Brenda sucks” fan club, or if there’s not one, form your own. You could be the president. Your mom always said you were destined for office!
But here’s the problem: Brenda could be your boss someday. That might feel impossible right now. There’s no way management would promote her. She’s the worst! Can’t they see that? Don’t they know she’s a credit thief, a meeting elongater, and so dumb she makes up words worse than “elongater” in her e-mails? They couldn’t possibly make her your boss. And yet, that could happen.
I have seen far worse people than Brenda promoted. So have you. To argue otherwise is to believe that only amazing, noble, talented, kindhearted people hold positions of power at companies. Have you ever worked at a company for longer than seven minutes? Then you know that’s not true.
I’m not going to address your attitude by trying to turn you into a nicer person more prone to help old ladies cross the street. I’m going to help you avoid burning the bridge with Brenda because even stupid people get promoted.
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Leave Jobs with One Finger Raised High: Your Thumb
When I left my first job at Details Communications, I left like they had deeply offended me. I drove home t and actually stopped at the border to take photos commemorating my triumphant exit.
I quit. I didn’t just quit, I escaped! I broke free of the shackles of employment. Hurrah! Take that, day job!
I know that’s easier said than done. There are some bad jobs out there with bad bosses and bad coffee. I’m not asking you to be fake and give long, deep hugs to people who spent the previous day verbally assaulting you.
Don’t lie. Don’t be fake. That’s why it’s just a thumb. One thumb up. The more you can do that, the more relationships you’ll leave intact behind you and the less bitterness you’ll bring with you.
If your boss doesn’t see it, a coworker will. They will invite you to join the “We hate our jobs club” at your company, which is the worst club to join if you want a great career.
If your boss and coworker don’t see it, other potential employers will. How do I know? Because you’re going to get new job opportunities from places you least expect. Like casual relationships that follow you on Twitter.
Your intention might be to criticize the last place you worked, but that criticism lands on the shoulders of anyone who is still there. You might not be saying, “I was smart to leave and anyone who stays at that company is a fool,” but that is how it could be misinterpreted. Disagree? Sure, no one ever misinterprets statements other people make online.
What if You’ve Already Burned Some Bridges?
Leaving a job is an imperfect art form of which I have achieved finger-painting level. No matter how well you leave it, there are bound to be some hurt feelings, which again, you have no control over.
But what about the bridges you did burn? Through immaturity, arrogance or anger? What about the times you did indeed bow out with one finger raised but it was not the thumb? What then?
Apologize.
Not because it will perfectly repair the bridge. Not because you expect them to apologize in return for whatever wrong they did. Not with any expectation.
Apologize because it’s the only way to get the soot off of your hands. It need not be complicated; in most cases an e-mail will suffice. I
