Section 1

Do What You Are Best At

How do you create the Perfect Life? In many ways of course: that's what this book is about. But at the heart of it all is to do what you are best at. And although on some days and in some moods it seems a no-brainer, it's worth just thinking about why …

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1. Whatever you are best at tends – for you, not necessarily for everybody else – to be really enjoyable. And that reduces stress, makes it easier to leap out of bed in the morning and means you can maintain the highest standards of what you deliver.

2. If it's what you are best at, then you'll likely be better at it than most: you will be good at it and that means you can charge a sensible price for your skill.

3. When you are really good at something you tend only to get better. And that's good because you get more enjoyment out of it, you pull further ahead of the crowd and that protects your career.

4. If it's what you are best at, it will seem less like work and all those work/life balance issues which many people talk about will simply disappear for you.
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But hang on a minute, you say. I'm best at five-a-side football, she's awesome at accounts and book-keeping and he just loves chatting to people and I think he could sell anything! So, what are we ‘best at’? Football, accounts and selling respectively? I mean, maybe the latter two will work but I'm never going to get a job as a professional footballer. Never. And don't you dare give me any of that ‘positive thinking’ stuff. You see, I just don't get it. Not everybody can do what they are best at. There are already too many coffee shops and for that matter, too many management consultants. I could go on. So?

You make a good point and I'm glad you made it now because doing what you are ‘best at’ is not always obvious. No not at all. And I'm with you: it's certainly not as simplistic as ‘positive thinking’ yourself into a job as a TV chef simply because you make a mean lasagne. Surprisingly it's not necessarily as simple as doing what you are good at, doing what you can do easily, or even doing what people admire. So let's step back a bit and get some clarity.

What do we really, really mean by ‘best at’?

‘Best at’ is a subtle mix of three things:

1. Firstly, you have a definite pull, a definite attraction to that skill, that activity and that way of spending your time: it's at the core of who you are. You feel you ‘have’ to do it. Football, solving problems, fiddling with technology, playing with ideas, knowing what's going on in the world of politics, drawing, inspiring people, writing … you name it, it's your thing. You feel very comfortable with it and curiously you are far less aware of time passing when you are ‘doing that thing’.

2. Secondly, it is potentially marketable: it's a skill out of which you can make money. Note: maybe you couldn't at the moment, but there is the possibility. This might initially seem to put a damper on your love and timeless enjoyment of knitting and sewing. Not at all. The market for hand-produced unique garments is growing all the time, you simply need to multiply this love with a few easily learnt marketing and pricing skills to identify your target market.

3. And thirdly, you know this is your thing and not just because everybody else is doing it or because it's the latest fad. Nobody has told you: no parent, no careers adviser. This is your thing. Fancy a bit of jargon? You are internally referenced rather than externally referenced. This latter point is important because the only person who is going to make this plan come together is you. If it's simply what your mum wants, it'll fall down at some point. But if you are internally referenced, i.e. it is driven by you, it has a high likelihood of success. And this frustrates you because you don't really know. You know what you don't want to do. You are like most of us, then. But get on the path and you will know.
‘Best at’, therefore, is not always obvious at first glance. It is not always what you initially seem to be good at. It may surprisingly even be something you don't know that you are skilled at. Yet. It may have to evolve over time.

Doing what you are best at is just as much the path as the destination.

So – even though everybody rates Tim as one of the best five-a-siders on the planet, are you saying that may not be his thing? But surely Emille is OK; after all everybody needs book-keeping and accounts, don't they? And Firdou: well he could sell sand to the … well, you know.

Yep, I am saying that. I'm saying that finding what you're best at and creating your own personal marketable skill is the winning strategy. But I am also saying it is not obvious and it is not easy. Absolutely possible and open to all of us. But it's not some quick-fix positive think strategy. Which is actually why most people don't really get to this stage. Not that they haven't got a personal best marketable skill, but they haven't given it the consideration that it justifies. After all: getting on a quest for doing what you are best at has got to be worth it!

How do I find out what that is for me?

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Alright then, I sort of get it. But how do I find out what my personal best marketable skill is if it's not as simple as ‘what I enjoy’ or ‘what I am good at’? How does anyone?

It needs a bit of work and a bit of reflection and digging. Not much, but a little. And of course it is really worth it. There are three simple steps. Why don't we go through it generally and then explore your situation and that of Emille just as examples. Our three simple steps are (1) wake up, the one where we stop sleep-walking – hoping – and start to think about this important topic, (2) get real, where we apply some day-to-day and commercial common sense to what might be truly viable and (3) take action, the one where we stop talking and start doing.

Step 1: Wake Up to the Idea. Once you wake up to the idea that you do not have to do what you are currently doing, you do not have to do what causes you constant and consistent resentment, things begin to fall into place. You see before we have this ‘ahhhaaa!’ moment we tend to go along in a bit of a rut. Same old, same old and worst of all we stop thinking. We clutch at the straws of winning the lotto, ‘one day’ and the fantasy of doing ‘our thing’ such as – with all respect –‘five-a-side’. Now you're awake you need to start observing. Get hold of an old-fashioned paper notebook and you need two running columns for the working day: what enlivens you, i.e. what you enjoy doing, what keeps you awake, makes you feel valuable, what almost, at times, you'd do even if you weren't being paid. And what is debilitating: what drains your energy, for which pay is a very important compensation. Keep this filled during the day. Here are some examples for Emille:
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But, you say: it depends. Some meetings I enjoy, those with my team or which are well run for example. Fair point: we are assuming the debilitating effect is ‘the event’ rather than the fact that they are badly run. The latter can be fixed, the former needs to be attended to. And if it helps you can eventually prioritise the two columns.

Step 2: Get Real. Now take a long hard look at that enlivening column. Could you make a career out of them? Could you make a career out of them and drop some of the debilitating factors? The answer is probably for Emille a ‘yes’. And that's the principle. But what will we do with Tim and his five-a-side which doesn't look too promising? Well, we can solve that too and we will soon. Now clearly there is a lot more we need to do, but that is the principle.

Step 3: Take Action. Stop talking about this and start doing some work. This might mean for Emille, going for a conversation about how to get promotion to allow her to focus more on what she enjoys and less on what she doesn't. It might mean having some challenging conversations with her boss in order to remove some of the ‘debilitators’. It might even mean going out on her own and starting her own business. Let's return to Emille and Tim in more detail and understand how this discovery of what we are best at really works.
But First:
Isn't it simply a bit of luxurious thinking in a challenging world?

We live and work in challenging times. Isn't a bit luxurious to be thinking like this?

Perhaps, but how about if we realise it is actually the ONLY way to a sustainable career, the only way to keep our sanity. The only real way to build up our finances for later life? Things are not going to change. This is the new world of work: increasing austerity, global competitors and more automation and less need for people.

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Tim

So, Tim. Tim currently works in IT. Has done since he left university. He's actually pretty good at it but hates the job. His real passion, as I think we have discovered, is five-a-side football. And playing that a couple of times a week plus the pub afterwards really gets him through the week. He knows he's unlikely to get promotion as he is always seen as a bit of a management challenge. To be honest he's pretty fed up and that is why he is constantly fantasising about creating a job out of his football.

The first thing for Tim on his quest to do what he loves, to do what he's best at, is to get the football stuff out of his head for a while. He's pretty well lived and breathed ft since he was a child. It got him through school, got him through college and makes his working days palatable. He's also good. But would he really want to do it for the rest of his days? Not really. Nah, it was just that it was all he knew really. And being honest he'd never tried that hard at anything else. The lads liked a good footballer as did plenty of the girls. But maybe now at 27 he needed to start thinking a little differently. So:

Step 1: Wake Up. OK: his first big challenge: he's been sleep-walking through life a lot recently. Enough with the bullsh*t! Time to start taking this seriously. He borrowed a notebook from his girlfriend (he tended never to actually write anything down) and created the two columns. The first morning on the way to work he stopped in his favourite Starbucks, grabbed a drink and a table and attempted to complete the columns. He drew a blank. Maybe he didn't Like anything? Maybe he was an absolute no hoper? Heck, this was depressing. But he sat there and eventually a surprising thought struck him: he actually did Like solving IT problems. There it went!
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And it was more than that, he liked being good at something and people needing his help and he liked helping them. Down it went:

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Funnily enough the debilitators were not flooding to mind as he might have thought they would have done; he was really enjoying this clarity. Anyway time to get to work.

For Tim, that became his morning ritual and by Friday he had this:

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This was good. This was going well. And the breakthrough had been on the debilitating side: not being appreciated.

Step 2: Get Real. Now could he make a career out of any of this? Well absolutely. There were now some threads to this thinking. One was to go freelance with his IT skills. A more radical one was to take his love of sport and problem solving and put them together and become some kind of fitness coach. An even more radical one was to develop a portfolio career where three days a week he did IT and two days fitness.

Step 3: Take Action. He was going to:
1. Work every morning on his plan.
2. Work even harder at work. That was good for work but also good for his skill set.
3. Stop fantasising about football as an escape but to think about it as a possible mini business.
4. Decide to launch his own thing in about 18 months.
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Emille

Emille is currently working in finance for a chain of cinemas in Paris. She too hates the job but loves numbers. A perfect spreadsheet is ‘her thing’. She is brilliant at identifying the strategic and pertinent points from masses of data and tries to advise her management team appropriately. Unfortunately, they seem to be constantly making decisions by looking at apparently ‘obvious’ points such as high cost, but as Emille has tried to point out, these are just symptoms of a deeper problem … Unfortunately she is aware that she is often ignored as ‘just a girl from accounts’ and what would she know about strategy?! She has thought about doing a ‘distance-learning’ MBA but they would not fund it and she also doesn't really need it: it would just look good on her CV.

Again, the first stage for Emille is to get all the old baggage and history out of her head. Sure she loves numbers and sure she finds a lot of the ‘people stuff’ a pain. But, on the other hand, she does enjoy convincing people of a strategic direction using the power of evidence. She also needs to let go of a lot of the ‘everybody is against me’ stuff. They‘re not: they simply haven't been sensitive to the fact that they have a real asset in their midst. Only Emille can change that.

Step 1: Wake Up. Analysis was her thing, so filling in a notebook was no problem at all. What was a problem for Emille was getting her to think differently with a fresh eye about what was really happening in her job.

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Step 2: Get Real. It might initially be tempting to see a management consultant profile for Emille, but one of the things which is crucial for her is stability, and although going out on her own does not prohibit that at all, maybe it's not her first step. So, perhaps she needs to be re-engineering her role within the organisation?

Step 3: Take Action. Emille decided to:
1. Start keeping a portfolio of her successes.
2. Ask for a pitch to the management team to show how she might significantly increase her contribution.
3. Even if there is no salary increase for a while until she has proven her worth.
4. Her ultimate aim is a senior, strategic position with part-time help to cover some of her more administrative jobs.
5. She is excited about this.
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Top Tips

As you start to implement your Wake Up; Get Real; Take Action plan here are some straightforward tactics which will help you:

1. Rock Star Good. Decide to become Rock Star Good, i.e. really, really good at what you do, and aim to do this with as many aspects of your job as you can over time. E-mail is a pain if you don't have a system. If you dread the monthly presentation to the board it will cast a shadow over much of your job: decide to become really good at doing that presentation. Who knows where it might lead? We keep coming back to this point: don't be seduced by the obvious, the childhood dream, the hobby. Get good at what you do now and what you are best at will be revealed and you can begin to follow that path.

2. There is a Threshold. There is a point at which mastery can be gained in any task and with that mastery comes enjoyment. Thus simply work at becoming good at what you have to do as this may well reveal what you want to do. Notice how we have it the wrong way around so often, i.e. wanting to do something at which we have no prowess. There will be one or two who simply know in their deepest soul that they have to be a ballet star, but for most of us: get good, create mastery and enjoy doing what you are best at.

3. Do It For You. It's sometimes tempting to think: why bother? Organisations which don't appreciate you. Career paths which seem to have met a dead-end. Remember: do it for you. Doing what you are best at is not some ‘end of the rainbow fantasy’. Do it really well, NOW. You will enjoy your day more. You will discover more about yourself. It will help your career. You will have more choices open to you.

4. I vs. They. One thing to get really good at it is taking ownership of your own destiny. Of not blaming others. Of not complaining about things which are out of your control. Life isn't always fair. And organisations are certainly not. You can get a discussion with your boss. You can save money for the course. You can watch less TV and read some books on the topic.

5. You Will Change and Grow. That's not a problem: it's what you want. The ‘perfect life’ sees you growing because that's what we are meant to do. Through growth we feel fulfilled. Do not be concerned that just when you get that strategic marketing position at your firm, you start becoming so good at it you feel like going out on your own. And then two years later you want to start talking about it and writing about it and want to get an academic position so you can do more research. That's brilliant. That's Life. That's doing what you are best at.
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A Few Questions If I May?

1. Somehow my case doesn't seem as ‘simple’ as the ones you have illustrated? I've tried the exercise but it hasn't really taken me very much further with my thinking.

Give it more time. Everybody gets there. Everybody else's case seems simpler. But do remember we may have been thinking in different ways for a decade or more. This exercise can take a bit of time to seep in. But it will eventually. And by all means continue reading this book, e.g. the chapters on creativity or making decisions which come later will undoubtedly ‘spark’ the breakthrough if it hasn't come already.

2. Nowhere here do you talk about the risks of chasing or following your dream. Some jobs may be dull but at least they pay the rent.

All jobs have risks, very few jobs are 100% secure any more. Your job, your career is increasingly what you make of it. And the best way to get ‘security’ is to do that about which you are passionate. No job is ever sustainable ‘just because of the money’. So are you actually taking a risk by wishing to do what you are best at, or as you express it ‘chasing your dream’? No, definitely not. There is much more risk in not finding that place in life.

3. Surely all jobs have their less attractive aspects. But that's life: we can't run away from everything we don't like.

There are a few things here. All jobs are riddled with the efforts of those who are less than professional, e.g. the manager who runs long, boring, unstructured meetings. Agreed – that's not something to run away from: that's something to address. But there are some people who just don't want to spend their days in meetings however brilliantly run they might be. That's what we're talking about here. And with effort and consideration they do have that choice. And with a ‘Rock Star Good’ mentality the few meetings they do need to run or attend can become tolerable, even enjoyable.

And Now Back to You
1. This is important to you: little can compare to the critical nature of getting on the right path for your career, so slow down enough that you can give it due consideration. Due attention. Due TLC.

2. Keep a notebook – for weeks if necessary – of ‘enliveners’, those activities, tasks and ways of spending time which make you feel good, are often timeless and (secretly of course) you might even do for free. And also of the ‘debilitators’, those things which make you lose energy, which you hate and almost no amount of money can really get you to enjoy.

3. Be honest about what you want to do. Many people will have advice on what you should do to be happy, wealthy etc. Listen to their advice of course, but ultimately the decision must be driven by you. ‘Shoulds’ are rarely sustainable.

4. Remember, the path to success is a combination of an enlivener and something which is commercially viable and comes from you. There will be a successful combination there.

5. The core strategy is wake up/get real/take action.

6. Explore, and in the quest for something which is commercially viable, play with multipliers, i.e. it is not one thing (loving technology) but the fact that you love technology and you love precision drawing which might lead you into graphic design.

7. Now create a plan to make this happen. If you are worried about having the energy to make this happen or where to find the time or how to get some creative thoughts and which choices to make … that's all coming up in future chapters. And a lot more.

8. Remember the key tips to use on the path:

(a) Rock Star Good. Decide to become Rock Star Good, i.e. really, really good at what you do and aim to do this with as many aspects of your job as you can over time.
(b) There is a Threshold. There is a point at which mastery can be gained in any task and with that mastery comes enjoyment.
(c) Do It For You.
(d) I vs. They. One thing to get really good at is taking ownership of your own destiny.
(e) You Will Change and Grow. That's not a problem: it's what you want.


9. So: start the process of getting on the quest to be the best version of you.

10. Read on!
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