246: The 6 Types of Working Genius by Patrick Lencioni

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3. 00:00:11 All right, Mike, it's good to be back.
4. 00:00:13 We are going to talk about geniuses today.
5. 00:00:16 But before we talk about our geniuses today, we need to talk about follow up.
6. 00:00:21 Or maybe we don't need to talk about follow up because we have no follow up because we had no action items coming out of the last book.
7. 00:00:29 And that's follow up.
8. 00:00:30 I do have a thing that I want to talk to you about because you and I have been dabbling around with this back and forth.
9. 00:00:36 I made Claude and Claude Coerk and Claude Coerk do some fun stuff over the last couple of weeks.
10. 00:00:46 And what I think is the most interesting revelation I've had over the last couple of weeks isn't that it could do it.
11. 00:00:52 It was that I was having it do it like in the background while I was doing other things.
12. 00:00:57 Like, I was working and teaching and mentoring and advising students.
13. 00:01:02 And I would give it these tasks and then it would go and run and do the thing.
14. 00:01:05 And I would come back to it every so often and check on it and be like, "Oh, okay, cool.
15. 00:01:08 Like, you're done with that step.
16. 00:01:09 Now, let me look at it."
17. 00:01:11 That's step number one.
18. 00:01:12 So here's the thing I was doing.
19. 00:01:14 Basically, when we work with students to advise them on their schedule, we do it off of Excel forms right now.
20. 00:01:23 So we have these Excel forms that map out all their degrees.
21. 00:01:26 And if they want to move classes around, it's cut and paste in the Excel form.
22. 00:01:29 So it's like kind of clunky.
23. 00:01:31 And then like the bigger clunky issue is the students will lose that Excel form.
24. 00:01:35 So they'll meet with you like fall of 25 and then they meet with you again in the fall of 26.
25. 00:01:40 And it's like, "Well, do you have your Excel form?"
26. 00:01:41 And they're like, "No.
27. 00:01:43 Why would I have my Excel?"
28. 00:01:43 And I'm like, "Because it maps out your degree.
29. 00:01:45 Like, we already talked about this.
30. 00:01:46 Why wouldn't you keep it?"
31. 00:01:48 So this is a web app that essentially uses their login or uses a login to allow them to have like a digital record of their,
32. 00:01:56 um, of their four-year plan.
33. 00:01:58 And I'm playing around with it.
34. 00:01:59 And one of the things that was, I thought was cool is it turned me into a product manager, not a coder.
35. 00:02:10 Like, I don't care to be the coder on.
36. 00:02:12 Like, I don't care to be the developer of the, of the software.
37. 00:02:15 What I want to do is I want to manage the product.
38. 00:02:17 Like, "Hey, this is what I want you to do.
39. 00:02:18 This is what I want it to look like.
40. 00:02:19 This is the way I want you to do all these things."
41. 00:02:22 And like, I could go back and forth and say to it, "You didn't do it right.
42. 00:02:25 I want you to do it this way.
43. 00:02:26 I want you to do it this other way."
44. 00:02:27 Um, but one of the cool things that I've been telling people about is chat helped me write the product requirements document.
45. 00:02:36 That prior to our requirements document was fed directly into code and then the first version of everything was made like off of that.
46. 00:02:44 And basically I just told it what I wanted it to be and like what I wanted it to look like and what features I wanted it to have.
47. 00:02:50 And it like handled all the other stuff on the background and did it fairly successfully.
48. 00:02:56 My one big, big, big problem right now and I realized this over the over the past two days, I didn't realize before I've been doing all this on the on the computer.
49. 00:03:04 Like, and I looked at it on a mobile version and I was like, "Oh man, this is this is garbage.
50. 00:03:09 Like, this is absolute garbage on the phone."
51. 00:03:11 So I got to fix that because these students are very much phone students.
52. 00:03:16 They're not laptop students.
53. 00:03:17 So I got to fix that one.
54. 00:03:19 But you know, you learn that stuff as you do testing and as you do QA.
55. 00:03:23 So it was fun though.
56. 00:03:24 Like, I like playing around with the stuff.
57. 00:03:26 I like being a product designer and product manager way more than I want to actually sit down and figure out all of the code in the libraries and all of those things.
58. 00:03:36 So yeah, but where are you at on?
59. 00:03:39 Have you messed around with any of that stuff?
60. 00:03:41 I mean, we were just good for them before we started the call, but where are you at on that?
61. 00:03:46 Well, I so my focus co-host, David Sparks has released what I considered to be his best field guide to date, which is the robot assistant field guide.
62. 00:04:01 OK, and I've been thinking a lot about his approach to that kind of stuff.
63. 00:04:07 So we talk about this on a recent focused episode.
64. 00:04:10 I'll put the link to that in the show notes that people want to dive deeper into this, but I'll just kind of briefly.
65. 00:04:16 Talk about what I think is the brilliant approach that David's taken to this.
66. 00:04:20 He's using co-work in Claude and he's pointing it at his obsidian vault because these are all markdown files now and markdown is great for the sort of stuff.
67. 00:04:29 It can be easily read and written and he's got basically like an employee manual that the robot assistant reads every time it does something.
68. 00:04:39 It starts with a Claude.md folder and then he's got links to the individual skills that he's built and he's got dozens of these different skills.
69. 00:04:46 And so when he says, you know, go do this thing, it actually loads the entire manual for the skill right before it does it.
70. 00:04:52 So their result is like exactly what he wants it to look like.
71. 00:04:59 And that has got me thinking to the point where I was actually running around the city last week, trying to find a Mac mini that I could set this up on.
72. 00:05:09 And you don't need a, you know, you can install it on a laptop, but the thing that is interesting to me is having that always running.
73. 00:05:15 You know, I'm recording this at the YouTube desk.
74. 00:05:18 So it would actually be kind of nice to have a computer that's just stays hooked up here.
75. 00:05:24 So I never have any tech issues because everything just never gets unplugged.
76. 00:05:30 And then also if I get done recording a YouTube video, some of those are like 10 gigs by the time I'm finished with the raw files, it can just upload in the background instead of only when I'm using my, my computer, basically.
77. 00:05:43 So tried to find one there, they're sold out till the end of April, like everywhere, even Apple.com.
78. 00:05:48 So I don't know, maybe they're going to get updated soon.
79. 00:05:51 I felt kind of bad spending that much money on an older, like it's last updated 2024.
80. 00:05:57 So probably saved me a little bit, but that is really appealing to me to have that always running because I run all my task and project management out of Obsidian, all my creative projects out of Obsidian.
81. 00:06:10 So you add in the dispatch layer with the phone and you can just like talk to it and have it do it in the background.
82. 00:06:16 I mean, we're living the dream if I get to that point.
83. 00:06:20 So I'm not quite there, but that's kind of what I've been messing with is setting all that stuff up.
84. 00:06:24 So building those skills library and things like that has been a little bit time consuming, but the end result is, I know, because I've kind of seen what David's doing with it.
85. 00:06:33 It's going to be really awesome.
86. 00:06:35 Well, and help me understand, I know what skills are. I know that you can grab skills from other people who have developed them, but what is it like to build a skill?
87. 00:06:46 Like I've not gone into that rabbit hole yet of trying to build a skill.
88. 00:06:49 Like, is it crazy hard? Is it easy? Is it, you know, like, what's the process like?
89. 00:06:55 Um, well, so basically the way I did it is I was just having a chat about this is what I wanted to do.
90. 00:07:03 And then once you kind of get it where you want it, you've run it a couple times and you're happy with the results, then you can say, okay, turn this into a skill.
91. 00:07:11 And it will basically take all the instructions that it's built. And actually, I guess a step before that, because I wanted to see the instructions that it was creating.
92. 00:07:19 It's like, okay, turn all this into like a, I forget what it, what the term was.
93. 00:07:24 I was just working on it today. It's like, uh, the standard operating procedure, though, that's basically just a markdown file inside of my obsidian vault.
94. 00:07:32 Okay. So I have that, you know, somewhere where I can look that up and I can see like how it's put things together and the specific instructions that it's using to create those results.
95. 00:07:42 And then yeah, just turn it into a skill and then it creates the file for you. And it's like double click this to install it, you know, into the cloud back and I'm using cloud on the desktop.
96. 00:07:51 I'm not using cloud in the browser. But, um, yeah, like, I don't know the technical part putting together a skill, but asking it to build it was pretty easy.
97. 00:08:00 Yeah, that's great. Yeah, that's great. All right, Mike. So that's all the follow up I have. I don't know if you have any other follow up for us today before we move into actually talking about the book. But if you do, yeah, I do.
98. 00:08:12 The life theme cohort is going to be kicking off right after this releases a couple of days after this. So if you want to join us, I would love to have you do that.
99. 00:08:22 It's open to all library members this time around. I am just opening up the library. So all you need to do to join this is sign up for a quarterly library subscription $147, $49 a month paid quarterly.
100. 00:08:39 You'll have access to everything for as long as you're a library member. But if you want to just go through the cohort and then bail, you can do that $147. That's a pretty inexpensive cohort.
101. 00:08:47 And we're going to be going through it live starting April 6. So April 6. I think it's 11 a.m. Central time is when the first session is so library will be open until then.
102. 00:08:56 So not a whole lot of time as this episode goes live, but if you want to find out more, you can sign up library dot practical PPM dot com.
103. 00:09:04 I've also put together a page dedicated to the life theme cohort. So if you want to see like a promo video, find out a little bit more about what that's all about basically a six week thing where we work together to dial in your personal mission statement, personal core value, stuff like that.
104. 00:09:18 So that is a life theme dot practical PPM dot com. And I'll have links to both of those in the show notes.
105. 00:09:24 Wonderful, wonderful. Are you ready to talk about some genius ideas?
106. 00:09:32 Yes, let's do it.
107. 00:09:34 So this book today is Patrick Lee and Lencioni's book, the six types of working genius.
108. 00:09:41 And then like the subtitle is a better way to understand your gifts, your frustrations and your team.
109. 00:09:47 This book is written partially as a fable and then partially as a here's the model. Let's understand the model together.
110. 00:09:55 I don't remember exactly how long the book was 200 and something pages, but I can tell you that like for me, this book went really, really fast.
111. 00:10:03 I thought it was a really quick read, really kind of engaging read as we as we work through it. But it's kind of.
112. 00:10:14 I feel like this one, my current, if you think I'm wrong, but like, I feel like this was an accidental book, like this was not meant to be a book.
113. 00:10:22 It was kind of one of those things where it's like, oh, we've got a thing here.
114. 00:10:26 We should probably package this into a book and actually share it with the world, not that somebody sat down and was like, I'm going to write a book about this, about these following things.
115. 00:10:34 But what do you think?
116. 00:10:36 Potentially, I definitely get where you get that feeling. This is the first Patrick Lencioni book that you've read.
117. 00:10:44 It is the first Patrick Lencioni book that I read.
118. 00:10:46 OK, so Patrick Lencioni has been around for a long time, and I've been a fan of his for a long time.
119. 00:10:54 My favorite book that he's written first one I came in contact with was the five dysfunctions of a team.
120. 00:11:02 And so I think when I first read that, I was kind of blown away by how different the style was and the the fable at the beginning.
121. 00:11:13 And then there's just like a short little section at the end where it gets into the mechanics of the concept that he's talking about.
122. 00:11:19 This one's a little bit longer because quite a bit went into this.
123. 00:11:24 I guess assessment, there is an assessment with it, but I think more it's like a framework or a model and the assessment was added on later.
124. 00:11:32 So I think maybe there's a little bit of that in your description of this, like this is new and fresh and engaging in that particular way.
125. 00:11:44 He does have this sort of like, I just kind of stumbled upon this ho hum.
126. 00:11:50 I'm nobody fancy sort of vibe, but I think I think I don't want to say that's like false pride.
127. 00:12:00 That's not what it is, but he could toot his own horn a little bit more.
128. 00:12:03 Like he's earned it at this point in my opinion.
129. 00:12:07 I actually think that works a little bit against the whole idea of the six types of working genius.
130. 00:12:14 OK, and I'll explain why as we go here, because this is not the first resource like this that I've come across, which is figure out how you work and how you work better with other people in your team or organization.
131. 00:12:28 So I have some specific context that I can't wait to pack there with you.
132. 00:12:32 But is this the first time you've come across something like this?
133. 00:12:36 I mean, I think the other major one would be the six thinking hats, right?
134. 00:12:41 We've done we've done that one for Bookworm.
135. 00:12:44 Yeah.
136. 00:12:44 And then what is it like the ENTJ those kind of things where you try to figure out your personality type.
137. 00:12:52 And then there's the Enneagram.
138. 00:12:54 But like, yeah, so it's like those are like the models I that come to my mind first and foremost.
139. 00:13:01 And this is I would lump this into as one of those.
140. 00:13:05 OK, gotcha.
141. 00:13:07 Well, I'll just tell us out here.
142. 00:13:08 You can slide it in wherever you want.
143. 00:13:10 So he'll be like, OK, we'll get to that later.
144. 00:13:11 That's totally cool.
145. 00:13:12 But the first thing I think of when I think of like
146. 00:13:19 cohesive teams and figuring out how people work together better is the Colby type a index.
147. 00:13:28 I think that's the one they've got a couple different versions of it.
148. 00:13:31 And that one is not, oh, you know, just trying to figure out why I'm such a pain to work with.
149. 00:13:38 And this is what I landed on and people seem to like it.
150. 00:13:40 That one is like a whole bunch of research that's gone into it.
151. 00:13:45 And the report that you get is not looking at my results from this one.
152. 00:13:49 You know, it's a this is a 12 page PDF.
153. 00:13:52 I think that Colby one was something like 40, 50 pages.
154. 00:13:55 OK, so it gets a lot more into the nitty gritty.
155. 00:13:59 And I think there's a lot of people who are who would look at that and be like,
156. 00:14:03 no, that's too much.
157. 00:14:05 I'm never going to really even I'm not going to connect all those dots.
158. 00:14:10 That's that's too much to think about.
159. 00:14:12 But that is kind of, I guess, my my preference and also my my previous experience with this kind of thing.
160. 00:14:20 So when I'm going into the working genius and coupled with his tone of like,
161. 00:14:23 Oh, shocks, you know, I just figured this out one day, it makes me feel a little bit like this is.
162. 00:14:30 I don't want to say less less professional, but maybe like less serious.
163. 00:14:37 That's not the right word either.
164. 00:14:38 I'm I'm doing a bad job of describing this.
165. 00:14:41 But do you kind of get what I am?
166. 00:14:42 Yeah, the word the word they came to mind is it's less intense, right?
167. 00:14:45 Like it's less like research driven, intense, you know, background.
168. 00:14:50 That's what that's what came to my hand.
169. 00:14:52 Yeah, but then there's a like vibe that goes along with that where because there's a whole bunch of research that's gone into this.
170. 00:15:01 And I don't know, like the Colby Institute, I don't know.
171. 00:15:07 Like the person who came up with that, her name was Kathy Colby.
172. 00:15:10 She wrote a book called the Conative Connection, which was actually really good.
173. 00:15:14 And I read that when I first started getting interested in the Colby assessment.
174. 00:15:21 Then I took the assessment and the amount of data that it gives you is kind of overwhelming.
175. 00:15:26 If you don't understand how it all works, but there's some real gold in there.
176. 00:15:31 And the stuff that is really valuable is because it's been so rigidly tested.
177. 00:15:39 That's not the right word either, but like whole bunch of people have gone through this.
178. 00:15:44 It's not just, well, I shared this with the people who go to church with me and they seem to like it too.
179. 00:15:49 That that's not exactly what he says in this book, but that's kind of how it comes across.
180. 00:15:53 And I don't think that is doing it any favor.
181. 00:15:55 I completely agree with you.
182. 00:15:57 Like I don't think I'd have ever, you know, come out with this on my own.
183. 00:16:00 But but since you're bringing it up, it does have that like, I don't know, less serious.
184. 00:16:06 I think that's you said the word serious at one point, but it's like that less serious vibe
185. 00:16:10 that like everybody can connect with this.
186. 00:16:13 Like I want to say like layman's, whereas like I come from like the world of academia,
187. 00:16:16 where it's like, Oh, everything is so like, well, we've done all these formal studies
188. 00:16:20 and we've published in the top journals and all the stuff.
189. 00:16:23 And he's just like, Hey, we were sitting around a table.
190. 00:16:24 We started talking about this stuff in after a couple of days of sitting around the table.
191. 00:16:28 Next, you know, we had this thing and resonated with everybody.
192. 00:16:30 And it's like very like conversational, if you will.
193. 00:16:33 Like his company has even called the table group.
194. 00:16:36 I know. Yeah, exactly.
195. 00:16:38 Exactly. So, okay, hold on, let's let's get into the book here.
196. 00:16:41 Mike, the introduction, I don't have a ton from the introduction.
197. 00:16:44 I don't know if you do before we actually get into the meat and potatoes of the fable.
198. 00:16:50 But basically it's just he's going to present six types of working genius.
199. 00:16:55 And you know, he's going to tell us about how that relates to teaming.
200. 00:17:00 He came out of his own struggles or frustrations with with work.
201. 00:17:06 Other than that, I don't really have a lot from the introduction.
202. 00:17:08 So I don't know if there's much you want to add.
203. 00:17:11 Well, there's the whole thing is based off of two truths.
204. 00:17:14 He says, so people who utilize their natural God given talents are more fulfilled and
205. 00:17:18 successful than those who don't.
206. 00:17:20 And the second one, teams and organizations that help people tap into their God given talents
207. 00:17:23 are much more successful and productive than those who don't.
208. 00:17:26 And even those statements, like they're probably true, but the way that he says them
209. 00:17:34 feels a little bit like, I don't want to say anything that can be invalidated.
210. 00:17:40 So it's sort of like a watered down version of it where it's just like, Oh, yeah, that sounds right.
211. 00:17:45 Yeah, that kind of bugs me.
212. 00:17:48 But I do think that he's he is right that a lot of people are not fulfilled at work.
213. 00:17:53 But also like, and this is the Patrick Lencioni style.
214. 00:17:56 So you were never going to get this going into the book.
215. 00:17:58 But I feel like those claims could be a little bit punchier if you had some statistics to
216. 00:18:05 get back it up.
217. 00:18:06 So that's that's so funny.
218. 00:18:07 I'm intrigued to see how the rest of this conversation goes because those were perfectly
219. 00:18:11 fine for me.
220. 00:18:12 I was like, Oh, yeah, that makes that makes total sense.
221. 00:18:14 Like, Oh, yeah, that makes total sense.
222. 00:18:15 Like it just didn't I didn't even think twice about them.
223. 00:18:18 Yeah.
224. 00:18:18 And see, that's the thing is like, this is a little bit jarring for me because
225. 00:18:22 this is totally what I expect when it comes to Patrick Lencioni.
226. 00:18:25 But because he's talking about a genre, that's not even a genre.
227. 00:18:29 It's a sub sub sub sub genre, right?
228. 00:18:32 He's talking about working styles.
229. 00:18:35 And I have this context of the Colby index A, which I absolutely love.
230. 00:18:40 I'm like, well, wait a minute.
231. 00:18:43 So maybe I was maybe my benefit is I'm not biased by the Colby and I don't mean biased in a
232. 00:18:48 bad way. I mean, like you have that you're primed by the Colby and I don't have that in me.
233. 00:18:53 And I will say like the Colby has four different scales and it's like quick start,
234. 00:18:58 fact finder, implementer.
235. 00:19:00 They are not easy to understand.
236. 00:19:03 If you're looking for something where I just want to get everybody in my organization
237. 00:19:08 a little bit more aligned, this is probably something like this anyways.
238. 00:19:12 It's probably something that you should reach for instead because it's going to be so much more
239. 00:19:18 accessible. It's much easier to grok.
240. 00:19:20 You're not going to have to spend an entire afternoon just kind of understanding what the
241. 00:19:23 different areas mean.
242. 00:19:26 But yeah, this is a little bit, a little bit.
243. 00:19:31 I'm not sure what the term is.
244. 00:19:32 Like my, I feel like a lot of the things that I knew about Patrick Lencioni and about working
245. 00:19:40 styles, like all that stuff that for years, just like, oh yeah, this is, this is what this
246. 00:19:44 stuff is. It's all been thrown out the window by this book.
247. 00:19:47 Interesting. I'm like, oh, this is fascinating.
248. 00:19:52 Okay. Let's get into the fable.
249. 00:19:54 All right. Just so you know, the style of the fable, if you weren't reading the book with us,
250. 00:19:58 the style of the fable was very like short chunks.
251. 00:20:01 I don't even know if I'd call them chapters because they didn't even feel like chapters to me.
252. 00:20:04 They just felt like short chunks of material.
253. 00:20:07 And the real reason that there were headers there were just to kind of
254. 00:20:11 section off one section of material into another into another into another.
255. 00:20:15 Now it, it, it follows the story of this fictional character as the character starts their job
256. 00:20:22 and then moves through their job and deals with frustration, both at work and at home,
257. 00:20:27 and then kind of changes jobs and moves into these different roles and then becomes successful.
258. 00:20:32 But then as they're successful, they're still frustrated.
259. 00:20:35 So then magically and miraculously, one day this, this woman asks, you know,
260. 00:20:40 why are you the way you are? Basically. It's like, you know, what makes you like this?
261. 00:20:44 And then that starts this conversation. And then we are led down this kind of swirly spiral
262. 00:20:50 of we get to the six working geniuses. That is a very, very, very, very high level of what it is.
263. 00:20:58 But it's a very story. It's very conversational. Like it is not by any means like a heady book.
264. 00:21:05 You're just reading about this guy. It's not a very heady book in terms of
265. 00:21:10 it. It's just very conversational style. It's very like normal person going through this experience
266. 00:21:17 where I struggled. Mike is, do you think this is like a direct retelling of what he went through
267. 00:21:26 in experiencing this? And he just gave it a fake name? And if so, why? Like, why do you need to do
268. 00:21:33 that? Like, just say like, this was me. And this is what I went through. And here's like a little
269. 00:21:37 bit of a biography of, you know, my life. It just felt that felt kind of funny that we were making
270. 00:21:43 up bull, whatever his name was last name, but whatever bull's last name was.
271. 00:21:48 Okay, so this is the Patrick Lencioni fable format. And I both love it and hated at this point.
272. 00:21:57 So the first time I came across it in five dysfunctions of a team,
273. 00:22:02 I really enjoyed the fable. And if I looked at it from the right perspective, I probably could have
274. 00:22:09 made the same statement that you just made about, you know, obviously he went through this sort of
275. 00:22:15 thing. I didn't make that connection when I read that book, but makes perfect sense that he did.
276. 00:22:22 So he tells these stories, and there's an element to these stories where it's like,
277. 00:22:28 nobody talks like that, right? It's not, this is not red rising, or any other fiction books
278. 00:22:38 that you're reading. It's a little bit gooberish. And you're just kind of like, there's no way
279. 00:22:43 that would happen. But at the same time, you're just like, I kind of like this.
280. 00:22:48 Gooberish might have been the best description that you could have given that. And I like,
281. 00:22:53 again, I never go to what I've gotten there. That's so true. At times, it's like, man,
282. 00:22:57 this is kind of cheesy. Like, this is kind of gooberish, right? Like, great, great work.
283. 00:23:02 And that should not work for a business book, right? A gooberish telling of a tale should not work
284. 00:23:09 for a serious business book. But it kind of does. And it's not just this one. It's literally every
285. 00:23:15 book that he's ever written. Yeah. And I didn't mind it. Like, I liked it. Like, I thought,
286. 00:23:21 I thought the fable was good. I was like, Oh, okay, this is cool. Like, this is an entertaining,
287. 00:23:25 entertaining story. And I don't know, Mike, what does that say about me? Like, that might say
288. 00:23:29 something about me that like, I like, I think it's fine. Like, the stories are entertaining.
289. 00:23:36 I guess I was a little bit taken aback by it, because if you look at all of his other books,
290. 00:23:40 it's the five dis functions of a team, the three signs of a miserable job, you know,
291. 00:23:46 they're all stories about things. The six types of working genius feels more like your
292. 00:23:53 traditional productivity or business type book. I don't know why I knew it was Patrick Lencioni.
293. 00:23:59 I didn't think we were going to get a fable this time around, but we did.
294. 00:24:05 Yeah. Well, and maybe it's because if you didn't get the fable, this book would have been 50,
295. 00:24:11 60 pages, right? Of like, here's my model. And it's not really like book worthy. It's like pamphlet,
296. 00:24:16 you know, or, or baby book. And that's, that's the part that I'm struggling with is the ideas
297. 00:24:21 that he's talking about here. I feel like there's some real gold to be mined with some of the
298. 00:24:27 stuff that he's talking about here. And I saw some of the things that you were sharing on social
299. 00:24:30 media. And it was interesting how much this impacted you. And I think if I hadn't had the
300. 00:24:39 experience that I have with, with not just the Colby, but like the strengths finder and like,
301. 00:24:44 I love these types of assessments, but none of those assessments can you take in 10 minutes.
302. 00:24:50 I forget how many questions there were. It was like 20 42 questions. Okay.
303. 00:24:55 Which I guess 42 questions isn't, isn't terrible, but it feels a little bit short. Like you shouldn't
304. 00:25:01 be able to get an accurate read and something this complex in just 10 minutes. You should,
305. 00:25:07 if you're going to, you know, unpack all the different elements of this, not just how it works
306. 00:25:13 for you as an individual, but how do you apply this on your team? How do you put the right people
307. 00:25:18 in the right spots? I mean, those are themes that pop up all over the place in the other,
308. 00:25:24 other types of books that we read for Bookworm. That shouldn't, it feels like that shouldn't be
309. 00:25:28 able to be addressed in 50 pages. There shouldn't be room for a fable if you're going to tackle
310. 00:25:34 a topic like this. But he kind of does it real effectively. And I kind of don't know how I feel
311. 00:25:42 about that. And you say that about me, like post on social media, like this book, like hit a nail
312. 00:25:51 on the head for me. And I don't, I don't know why, but it hit a nail on the head for me. And we're
313. 00:25:55 going to talk about it once we break into the model. But before we do that, I think the biggest
314. 00:26:00 thing to come out of the fable, like the biggest takeaway to come out of the fable, you got a good
315. 00:26:03 story. But it was that question of that, like, why are you the way you are? I don't know, I have a
316. 00:26:10 bullet. Why are you like this? Like that's the actual quote is the quote is, you know, his his
317. 00:26:15 colleague, I think it's Amy, asks him, why are you like this? And that triggers this whole thing
318. 00:26:22 about like, why need to think about like, why am I actually like this? Like, I've got a good job,
319. 00:26:26 I'm doing well, I've been promoted, I'm, you know, whatever it is, why am I still like annoyed
320. 00:26:31 with myself and annoyed with the job and frustrated? And I think I don't know if I have anything
321. 00:26:37 else major that comes out of the first part of the fable other than that story, right? Do you?
322. 00:26:43 Well, I have one quote that they mentioned in the fable that resonated with me because
323. 00:26:48 that they talk about the main character you mentioned, his name is bull, how time flies when I have
324. 00:26:54 a marker in my head. Yeah. You know, as he's describing things and drawing them on the whiteboard in
325. 00:26:58 front of people, I have experienced that. I love that. When I was working with the digital marketing
326. 00:27:05 agency, that was the most fun I had is when I got everybody on the leadership team together. And
327. 00:27:11 we actually like talked through five dysfunctions of a team. And I'm up there writing stuff down.
328. 00:27:16 And as people are saying it, and I'm summarizing on people are saying, oh, yeah, that connects to
329. 00:27:20 that, you know, I see why that's the way it is like that, that's really, really fun for me. I have a
330. 00:27:25 whiteboard in my office right over to the left of where I'm sitting right now. When I was at the
331. 00:27:30 co-working space, they have a room with a whiteboard. And every other time I went there, I would
332. 00:27:35 reserve that room for the day, just so I could be like working. And then I don't know what I'm
333. 00:27:40 thinking about this particular thing. I grab a marker and just start sketching. Oh, okay, I get
334. 00:27:46 it now. Yep. Yep. And in my version of that is you say to me, wouldn't it be cool if we,
335. 00:27:53 right? And I go, oh, yeah, like, let's figure out how to do that. You know, like, let's get some ideas
336. 00:27:58 down them. And like, that's mine. So you'll, you'll see, you'll see where we're going. Let's,
337. 00:28:02 let's go into if you're good with it, let's go into the exploring the model. Are you good
338. 00:28:06 with exploring the model now? Yeah, I mean, I don't know what else to say about the fable. Maybe we
339. 00:28:11 could just kind of generally encapsulate what happens with it. So the guy who you mentioned
340. 00:28:18 going through the story keeps getting frustrated. Now he's working at this, this company, he's
341. 00:28:22 owning this company, still feeling frustrated. His wife recognizes that he's frustrated. Like,
342. 00:28:27 you got to figure this out. So one day at work, they just start sketching out all these different
343. 00:28:31 things about why he's hard to work with all the people from the team joining the conversation. If
344. 00:28:36 they land on these like three stages of work, these six different gears that we'll talk about
345. 00:28:40 and exploring the model. And kind of the big takeaway is that they figure out where everybody
346. 00:28:45 on the team fits in terms of their, their genius, they realize that they are heavily weighted in
347. 00:28:53 some areas. In some areas, there's like nobody to do that, that role. And they're gears because
348. 00:28:59 they're supposed to fit together in order for the organization to function efficiently. So as they
349. 00:29:04 figure these things out, they get better at what they do, they grow, they're hiring more people,
350. 00:29:09 they're trying to make sure that they're hiring people who fit into those other roles and have
351. 00:29:12 those other strengths that are currently lacking instead of just getting people who like are going
352. 00:29:17 to reinforce the echo chamber. I mean, there's some really, really big ideas to unpack there,
353. 00:29:23 but that long story short is, you know, everything clicks, they end up becoming much bigger, more
354. 00:29:29 successful than they ever were before. This works so well that instead of doing the thing that
355. 00:29:34 their company was doing, he's now traveling around, telling people how to implement this in their
356. 00:29:38 own companies because everyone wants to know how to do it. Yeah. And like, I think one of the things
357. 00:29:44 as you're, as you're describing it to me again, I'm remembering, it all just seemed to work too
358. 00:29:49 well, right? Like the fable was just too perfect. It was just too, too beautiful. But we'll see if
359. 00:29:56 that, we'll see if that comes into style and rating later. I'm not sure if it's going to come into
360. 00:29:59 style and rating later, but, but that was what got me about the, about the fable. All right,
361. 00:30:03 let's move on to the actual exploring the model though. Okay, so all right.
362. 00:30:08 In exploring the model, basically they're looking at the big question of why are you like this?
363. 00:30:14 And then how do we get people into these different, these different categories, these different
364. 00:30:21 geniuses, that is what they call them. I don't love that they call them geniuses. I really,
365. 00:30:27 I really don't like, I wish they would have used a different word. It's, it's catchy, it's clever,
366. 00:30:33 you know, okay, all that, but I just don't like it. Like, I think I would have just been happy,
367. 00:30:38 much happier with another world. Anyhow, so it's basically allowing you to identify your gifts,
368. 00:30:44 or I would say your natural inclination toward different types of work. We need to quickly get
369. 00:30:51 into what are those, those different ones? There's six of them, you describe them as gears. Real,
370. 00:30:56 real quick, before you get into the six types of, of working genius, right? It occurs to me that
371. 00:31:02 maybe he's borrowing that term genius from somebody else, or some other like widely accepted idea,
372. 00:31:12 or framework in the business world. I can't place it right now, but as you were talking about it,
373. 00:31:16 kind of hit me, I've heard people talk about the zone of genius before. Do you remember who
374. 00:31:22 originated that idea? No idea, no idea. Okay, but I think that probably is a good description of,
375. 00:31:28 of what these working geniuses are in general. Do you agree? Yeah, it makes sense to me that
376. 00:31:34 that would actually be a coherent train of thought. It's just like, I have no idea if that's accurate
377. 00:31:40 or not. Yeah, okay. Okay, so we go into the into the six geniuses. So you have the genius of wonder,
378. 00:31:48 ability to ponder, speculate, question the state of things, ask questions that provoke
379. 00:31:53 answers in action. The genius of invention is about coming up with new ideas and solutions.
380. 00:31:59 The genius of discernment is the instinct, intuition, uncanny judgment, your ability to
381. 00:32:05 assess an idea without a lot of data or expertise. Galvanizing is the next one, and that's rallying,
382. 00:32:11 motivating or provoking people. The genius of enablement, providing people with support
383. 00:32:16 and assistance that they need, and then tenacity is about pushing things across the finish line
384. 00:32:21 in completion. At this point, Mike, we have to stop the show, stop talking about the book,
385. 00:32:27 and we have to guess each other's geniuses. I'm making us guess each other's geniuses. Okay, so now,
386. 00:32:31 later on, we're going to find out that he says that you have two, like, four front geniuses,
387. 00:32:38 you have two that you're, I'm blanking on the terms, Mike, do you remember the terms? You have
388. 00:32:41 two of your geniuses. What are the two in the middle competencies? Yeah, there, there is the
389. 00:32:47 working genius, the activities that give you joy, energy, and passion, working competency,
390. 00:32:51 which are activities that we find neither completely miserable nor completely joyful,
391. 00:32:55 in which we can do fairly well. And then working frustrations are activities that drain us of
392. 00:33:00 our joy and energy, and we usually struggle in. Okay, so do you want to guess first, or do you
393. 00:33:04 want me to guess first? Oh, man, I'll guess. Okay, so you, you mentioned that you get excited
394. 00:33:14 when someone says, hey, wouldn't it be cool if we, and then like, yeah, yeah, it would. So,
395. 00:33:19 I'm guessing that wonder is one of them. I'm going to guess enablement is, is another one.
396. 00:33:28 Okay. All right, now I get to guess, and then we're going to reveal a tiny little bit of our results.
397. 00:33:33 Okay. I think invention is one of yours, and I think enablement is one of yours. And what I'm
398. 00:33:42 tricked up on is I think you have tenacity to, but I don't know if it, I don't know if enablement
399. 00:33:47 or tenacity is the winner, right? Like, I don't know which one of those would be the winner,
400. 00:33:51 but I think invention and then enablement and tenacity are yours. All right. Now, I will tell
401. 00:33:56 you mine. My top two are invention and discernment, invention and discernment. So coming up with ideas.
402. 00:34:05 So when I was describing that to you, I'm not going to sit there and like ponder about the
403. 00:34:08 universe, like over an extent, which I think is what wonder is, right? It's like that, that really,
404. 00:34:13 like kind of ethereal headspace of, I wonder why birds fly, right? Like, I'm not going to do it,
405. 00:34:20 but what I'm going to tell you is like, if you asked me to figure out like, how do we fix that
406. 00:34:24 bird's wing, I'm going to come up with ideas all day long about how we fix that bird's wing,
407. 00:34:28 right? Like, that's, that's the way I, I'm wired. And then I do think discernment where it's like,
408. 00:34:34 okay, I don't need a ton of data to like come up with fairly good instinct or explanation.
409. 00:34:40 Now, I also think that my training as an engineer has helped me with this a lot, right? Like,
410. 00:34:45 so how do we solve problems in uncertain circumstances? I've been trained on this
411. 00:34:49 for many, many, many years. Okay. So, so g invention and discernment are mine. What are yours?
412. 00:34:56 Uh, so mine are actually discernment and wonder.
413. 00:35:01 We are so wrong. Okay. Okay. That gets to my issue with this assessment because the whole
414. 00:35:07 fable is basically them deciding, oh, yeah, that's totally me. That's my working genius, right?
415. 00:35:14 And the way you were describing, um, was it invention? Is that the one you were describing it for me?
416. 00:35:20 It's like, yeah, absolutely. Like, if I had to pick one, inventions, probably the one that I would
417. 00:35:26 pick. Yeah. But that's, uh, that's number four for me. Is it really? So, and you told me what,
418. 00:35:32 what did you think? Mine were wonder and what wonder and enable that that's really just based
419. 00:35:38 off of your role as a teacher. And those are like, that's what you're trying to get your kids to do,
420. 00:35:41 right? Is well, adults. I got you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But no, those are my competencies.
421. 00:35:47 So you, you identified both of my competencies, but you didn't identify my geniuses. What did I
422. 00:35:53 identify any of your, what, any of your, uh, competencies? Uh, yeah. So you said
423. 00:36:02 in invention and then I forget the other one that you said, that is absolutely last for me.
424. 00:36:09 Really? Okay. Okay. Yeah. Um, do you know my, my last one? What do you think my last one is?
425. 00:36:16 Well, as I said, I don't necessarily agree with any of these results. But if I had to pick one,
426. 00:36:20 let's see. Um, you won't offend me, like at all. So don't worry about that if you're worried about
427. 00:36:26 that. Man, I, okay. So this is a limited pool of experience here, right? I'm in a guest tenacity,
428. 00:36:36 though. Absolutely. 100%. Okay. Just because it seems like when you're excited about a project,
429. 00:36:42 you got no problem doing the work. But if it's not exciting anymore, then you really start
430. 00:36:47 the question, why am I doing this? And for good reason, you know, if you don't want to do it anymore,
431. 00:36:52 you just like, I don't want to do this anymore. Do you know why this book partially resonates
432. 00:36:57 with me so much is because there are two things that are my low to my frustrations.
433. 00:37:05 And I'm reading this book going, Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Like that's my, that's my frustration. Oh,
434. 00:37:10 absolutely. That's my frustration. Like as I'm reading the fable and as he's reading the description
435. 00:37:14 of the model, I take the test. Those are absolutely 100% my two low frustration ones. And I have seen
436. 00:37:23 and I can tell you how it impact how it has impacted my life and work. Like I've been like,
437. 00:37:28 Oh, I totally know that. So here's an example of this. I love to write the proposal to get the grant.
438. 00:37:38 I like to launch the grant. And then I get bored. Like I get bored with doing the like daily grind
439. 00:37:47 work of keeping the grant going and finishing out the grant. Like I just think it's boring. Like,
440. 00:37:52 I don't think that's the, the interesting thing. And that's the tenacity part without a doubt.
441. 00:37:56 That's the tenacity part. And I'm like, okay, like it's fine. Like I'm excited about it, but
442. 00:38:01 not that excited. Like I'm, I'd rather go get the other grant, like the next grant. And I would
443. 00:38:05 have never been able to like talk about that or identify that until Lynciony's fable and his,
444. 00:38:13 in his model, which I think is pretty cool. Nice. And that's where I think that there is a lot
445. 00:38:21 of value in this. I still, man, I don't know how much you want to want to unpack the specifics of
446. 00:38:27 this, this assessment. I will say that it should come as no surprise to people that I have high
447. 00:38:38 requirements for anything that's going to be labeled an assessment. We've talked about that
448. 00:38:43 a lot before. And so this does feel a little bit just thrown together to me. It mentions at the
449. 00:38:52 beginning that this whole thing started out of a four hour whiteboard session in June 2020.
450. 00:38:59 And I don't know when this book was actually published. Do you know, do you have the published
451. 00:39:02 date? 22, I think. Okay. See, that's not enough time to really land on a solid assessment process,
452. 00:39:14 which if you don't call it an assessment, you don't have the background I do and you're not hung up
453. 00:39:18 on that word, like you probably don't care. It doesn't make any difference whatsoever. But you
454. 00:39:23 couple that with the fact that you look at the results and you go, huh, I would have picked
455. 00:39:29 something different. And that is an, that is an indication to me that maybe there's a little bit
456. 00:39:35 more work to be done with this. But okay, so interestingly is I wouldn't have picked anything
457. 00:39:40 different. Like my results make total sense to me like this actually. And I, and I don't feel
458. 00:39:45 because like I've done a bunch of survey development type stuff and all that. And I would say like,
459. 00:39:50 I don't feel like I game the system. Like when I was answering questions, I was not trying to
460. 00:39:55 answer to get the answers that I wanted. I was going with my gut instinct on what's my natural
461. 00:40:00 answer? What's my natural answer? Me too. Me too. Yeah. That's, that's the key. When you take
462. 00:40:04 assessments like this, you got to go with your gut. Yep. But the fact that we have such different
463. 00:40:09 experiences lends to your point of like, huh, maybe there needs to be a little more refinement
464. 00:40:15 on this in terms of creating the actual assessment. Yes. Yeah. So the thing that, that kind of threw
465. 00:40:21 me and I don't, I can't say this for sure without looking at how the assessment is put together.
466. 00:40:26 But if I recall, there were like 40 questions, which seemed like they mapped very cleanly to
467. 00:40:34 certain number of points for whatever category you're scoring. But then there were a couple at
468. 00:40:40 the end where it's like, given the choice between these two, which one do you gravitate towards?
469. 00:40:47 Do you remember those questions? I don't remember those ones. No.
470. 00:40:50 Maybe that was just my results. Maybe it's just because some scores were really close. But those
471. 00:40:55 types of questions at the end felt to me like they were out of place. And I feel like,
472. 00:41:03 again, I don't know this without looking at it, but it was kind of like, okay, we've got your
473. 00:41:07 results, but now we're having trouble putting these things in order. So we're just going to
474. 00:41:11 tack on a couple of questions so we can get that one, two, three, four, five, six. Okay, so
475. 00:41:17 what is the score for my working genius? What is the score for my working competencies?
476. 00:41:22 On one level, this doesn't really matter where it does matter is like, where's the line and how
477. 00:41:28 do you determine which one falls into which category? If you don't have those scores,
478. 00:41:33 I feel you do run the risk of this feels wrong. And I got to tell you, mine feels a little bit
479. 00:41:41 wrong. So like discernment, yeah. And wonder, I think, yes, also, but invention does not feel like a
480. 00:41:51 number four genius for me. And then also like the word genius, this is where I really start to have
481. 00:41:57 the issue that you're describing, because it's combined with this assessment, right? And you're
482. 00:42:01 trying to figure out where are my strengths, where are my weaknesses, whatever. Maybe there's
483. 00:42:05 some people who are just much better at flowing in and out of these different modes than other
484. 00:42:10 people will ever be no matter how much they try to develop them. Yeah, maybe my working genius of
485. 00:42:16 discernment is one tenth, the fourth level discernment that Patrick Lencioni has, you know, in his
486. 00:42:23 results. So I think there's like on one level, yeah, you just want to figure out a way to remove
487. 00:42:29 the friction when people are working together. But also I feel like there actually probably is
488. 00:42:35 a quantitative element to some of this. Yeah. And then the other thing that's kind of
489. 00:42:41 reinforcing that to me is a lot of this stuff, the discernment, the wonder, tenacity, invention,
490. 00:42:48 maybe not so much. I don't know. I'm like, there's some of these that map real cleanly and some of
491. 00:42:52 them that that don't. But these are a lot of like emotional intelligence, soft skill type stuff.
492. 00:42:58 And those skills you absolutely can develop and improve. I mean, that family business is a whole
493. 00:43:05 process built off of that. I'm actually working with my dad on an individual version of that,
494. 00:43:10 which by the time this goes live, people should be able to check it out. So if you're interested
495. 00:43:15 in this at all, successprofiler.com, I'll put the link in the show notes. But it's a $49 assessment,
496. 00:43:21 an actual assessment with 9 million administrations, 40 years of research, right, not a four hour
497. 00:43:28 whiteboard session. And you get a pre assessment, which shows you your lowest areas, it explains
498. 00:43:34 your scores to you. It doesn't just say, this is the high one, this is the low one. Okay. And then
499. 00:43:39 it assigns all this skill building. And there's a post assessment at the end, so you can document
500. 00:43:43 your skill acquisition. That's what I think of when I think of assessment. So I don't want to like,
501. 00:43:48 downplay this and say this is sort of like a Facebook quiz. But on one level, it kind of is.
502. 00:43:53 Now it goes way deeper than that. And the stuff that he shares in terms of like how he groups
503. 00:43:56 these things together. I think we'll probably talk about that as we get into more of this,
504. 00:44:02 this model stuff. But like, there's the top three and then the bottom three, those are grouped together,
505. 00:44:07 the ones on the left in the middle and on the right, those are all grouped together. Like he
506. 00:44:10 thinks about this stuff on a much higher level than any of the crazy stuff you'll just find for free
507. 00:44:17 online. So it's, it's not that you absolutely should be paying to take this assessment. And then
508. 00:44:23 the results that it gives you are valuable. But also it's, I don't know, I guess it's just me,
509. 00:44:30 it's not enough for me. And I totally get that. And, and I think one of the things that you hit the
510. 00:44:36 nail in the head with is it may be because your, your distance between some of these
511. 00:44:45 isn't as large as like mine where like I seem to clearly fit into these, these buckets more,
512. 00:44:52 more not cleanly. That doesn't make sense. But it's like more starkly, like if that makes sense,
513. 00:44:56 right? Like I'm, I'm more desperate in my, in my groupings, where you're might blend the line
514. 00:45:03 a little bit more on some of these in this, this assessment, this tool breaks down a little bit.
515. 00:45:09 And that's the type of thing that if you run it with enough people, you will figure out a way to
516. 00:45:15 deal with that. That's what the Colby index does. I forget the term that they have. But basically,
517. 00:45:20 there's a rare type of person who all of the styles are working styles are basically the same.
518. 00:45:26 They're like a chameleon. They can go in and out of whatever, whatever, whatever is needed in the
519. 00:45:31 moment, those people are super, super valuable. It's like 1% of the population and they have a
520. 00:45:36 label for it. Right. So you don't have that because it just hasn't been around long enough.
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533. 00:46:51 Okay, so hold on, we need to move into the next section because the next section is going to
534. 00:46:54 it's going to color this. And here's where I got a little bit confused on
535. 00:46:59 kind of the organization of the book or the structure of the book. So Mike, you can maybe
536. 00:47:03 correct this pretty quickly. So the table of contents says the context is next, right? And
537. 00:47:10 there's this context section, but mine was out of order. I had context first, and then I had
538. 00:47:16 the model and then model and assessment. So I don't know if the table of contents that
539. 00:47:20 I'm looking at's wrong or what it was. Could you quick fix that for me?
540. 00:47:24 Yeah, I think we should probably just continue to grab whatever we can from the
541. 00:47:29 exploring the model section because, yeah, there's the context next, then the model and assessment,
542. 00:47:33 but also from that model and assessment are the six types defined, which you already talked about.
543. 00:47:37 Yep.
544. 00:47:38 So we're kind of all over the place at this point.
545. 00:47:40 Okay, good. So if you're following along with the table of contents, just throw that out the
546. 00:47:44 window. We don't need that just to take in there. Okay, we get into this team and mapping.
547. 00:47:50 So we've already talked about kind of everything in model and assessment. We've talked about the
548. 00:47:53 six types of geniuses, the fact that they break down into genius competency and frustration.
549. 00:47:58 So kind of all of that, all of that comes together.
550. 00:48:01 Well, actually, let's, let's, before we get into team stuff, let's talk about the
551. 00:48:04 response of disruptive geniuses and then the phases of work.
552. 00:48:07 Okay, cool. So responsive and disruptive geniuses.
553. 00:48:11 Responsive geniuses respond to external stimuli to put it into action.
554. 00:48:15 Disruptives are they initiate or they provoke change. So you're thinking about like, what's my
555. 00:48:22 role on as a genius? Like, am I trying to like be proactive or am I trying to just kind of
556. 00:48:28 respond to these things that are coming to me? And he would say that the three responsive
557. 00:48:33 geniuses are wonder, discernment, and enablement. So those are the ones that are going to respond
558. 00:48:38 to external stimuli. And then the three disruptive ones are the invention, galvanizing, and then
559. 00:48:43 tenacity. And those are the ones that are going to be the more proactive ones moving forward.
560. 00:48:49 And then Mike, I'll let you, if you're willing to, I'll let you do the next one.
561. 00:48:53 Yeah, so then the three phases of work, which is like the two on the left, the two in the middle
562. 00:48:59 and the two on the right, the ones on the left are ideation. So that's wonder and invention.
563. 00:49:04 Ideation is the part of work associated with identifying needs and proposing solutions.
564. 00:49:08 Then the next part is activation, the part of the work where you evaluate the merits of the ideas
565. 00:49:13 or the solutions proposed and rally people around the ones worthy of action. That's
566. 00:49:17 discernment or galvanizing. And then implementation is the part of the work where you answer
567. 00:49:23 the call to action and push through the final stages of completion. And these are enablement
568. 00:49:32 and tenacity. Now, these, I think, roughly map, roughly, to the Colby stuff. I'm trying to find
569. 00:49:43 headed open here earlier. I've got my Colby results from whenever that was, but it doesn't look like
570. 00:49:52 it's open anymore. Give me just one second. Okay. The index, like the four different skills that they
571. 00:49:59 are charting is fact finder follow through quick start and implementer. So you can kind of see how
572. 00:50:05 those overlap there. Fact finder is, well, first of all, I'll share my score. So they're out of 10.
573. 00:50:13 Fact finder is seven, follow through is six, quick start is three, implementer is three.
574. 00:50:17 So fact finder, before you do anything, you go research the heck out of stuff. I'm going to find
575. 00:50:21 the best way to do things. Follow through. Okay, that's kind of the, maybe that would be implementation,
576. 00:50:29 but they actually have an implementer scale. So the follow through is sort of like, we're going
577. 00:50:33 to see this through to the end. Say I'm going to do this amount of follow through and make sure it's
578. 00:50:36 done. Yeah, I guess quick start is like, hey, we got this idea. Let's go do something with it.
579. 00:50:43 Sort of like the invention and then implementer really is, in this case, it's someone who is like
580. 00:50:50 building physical models and things like they have the implements in their hands, as opposed to just
581. 00:50:56 like conceptual thinker, sort of a sort of a thing. So yeah, there's a lot of overlap
582. 00:51:04 between these types of things. And so maybe it's just, you know, you pick the flavor that you like
583. 00:51:09 the most. Yeah. Okay, so this is where I was trying to get to is this idea of how are they
584. 00:51:17 going to use this? Or how have they use this? And I think this is like where maybe your
585. 00:51:25 idea of assessment and like the taking of this is different than what I think they are driving
586. 00:51:32 forward at the table group and through Lencioni. So in Lencioni, like they come up with this thing
587. 00:51:38 where they make this map, this team map, and they put widget down the center column, which by the
588. 00:51:44 way, did you realize it said widget before it presented widget? Because I didn't and I was like,
589. 00:51:50 Oh, how clever is that? It says widget. I did. It kind of bothers me to tell you all bothers me
590. 00:51:56 too. Real bad. It feels very forced, like galvanizing who uses the word galvanizing in the workplace.
591. 00:52:05 Nobody. Yep. Yep. It bothered me. I don't know if I realized it until this image. And I was like,
592. 00:52:12 Oh, it says widget. Oh, man, I was like, dad, going and I was so much happier when it was just
593. 00:52:18 like random words that were like not associated in my brain with some acronym. Right. So you got
594. 00:52:23 widget going down the center of this thing. And then what you do is you map the people in your
595. 00:52:28 organization to those different geniuses. And you say like, who's in this genius? Who's in this
596. 00:52:33 genius? And when it's going to give you a systems look at all the people in your organization,
597. 00:52:39 and it's going to help you understand where they are. But you don't just map the geniuses,
598. 00:52:43 you also map the frustrations, because what you want to see is you want to see like,
599. 00:52:47 do we have a lot of people who are either a genius in this area or a frustration in this area?
600. 00:52:54 And if we do, essentially what we have is we have an imbalance. And when we have an imbalance,
601. 00:52:59 we need to handle this because our team is not going to function as efficiently as they could
602. 00:53:04 if we didn't have this imbalance or if we were able to balance this out more. And I think this
603. 00:53:11 is the driver of this assessment. This is the point of it. This is why you do it. This is why
604. 00:53:18 they want to do it this way. It's because you could then take this and you can essentially
605. 00:53:24 balance out your team better and overall distribute the genius work among more people and distribute
606. 00:53:33 the frustration work among more people. And you can get back to that thing where more of the work
607. 00:53:37 that I do is the work that resonates with me and the work that resonates with the gifts that I have
608. 00:53:42 or at least the gifts that the survey tells me that I have. And I think that drives it home
609. 00:53:50 making it different than your Colby type A. Where your Colby type A is I'm really trying to understand
610. 00:53:56 like who I am and like me. And like it's trying to normalize it essentially across the population
611. 00:54:03 or like the general, you know what I mean? Like it's a survey or an assessment in the
612. 00:54:07 truest form of an assessment where we're trying to get to normal curves and standardizations and
613. 00:54:14 those kind of things. And this is not. This is trying to say like what's my team makeup
614. 00:54:21 and how do we balance the team better? And like I really think that's a big difference between
615. 00:54:25 what we're trying to do here. And I think that that was like kind of as you're I'm listening to
616. 00:54:30 your talk because I would have never thought this until we had this conversation. I think that's a
617. 00:54:34 big point of their work. Well, yeah, I agree. That's a big part of their work. I agree. That's a good
618. 00:54:40 perspective to take. That is exactly what the Colby is for though. Oh, really? Yeah. So like you
619. 00:54:46 get your breakdown. But then also you literally create the map of the people on your team. I
620. 00:54:54 administered the Colby as the integrator in our organization. So I got everybody's scores and you
621. 00:55:01 can compare this person to this person. And it will tell you when they're working together,
622. 00:55:05 this is likely where the friction is. You can also do it for your entire organization. Be like,
623. 00:55:10 we're heavy on fact finders. We got no quick starts. Do you remember when when Colby came out,
624. 00:55:15 like how long ago? It was a long time ago. So I came across at first when I was working with Asian
625. 00:55:20 efficiency. But a lot of the business consultants who do any sort of like team culture work will
626. 00:55:32 in the back in the day, they would use the Colby type A. Now maybe they use something like the
627. 00:55:37 the six types of working genius because a lot of it is really just to start the discussion amongst
628. 00:55:42 the people on the team. So one of my big takeaways when I was going through the Colby type A is I'm
629. 00:55:49 a high fact finder. So my initial, if I am trying to figure out what to do, my initial response is
630. 00:55:56 I'm going to go research it. But I remember like comparing that with somebody else on the team,
631. 00:56:00 it was a high quick start. And we were working together on this project and recognizing that
632. 00:56:05 when they don't know what to do, their initial thought is to just try something. And I'm like,
633. 00:56:11 whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's just think about this for a little bit. And it caused friction. So
634. 00:56:17 then obviously, if you're working with a consultant, they can have you roleplay and do all these
635. 00:56:21 different types of exercises. So you practice responding to someone who has a contradictory
636. 00:56:31 style to you in a way that they can understand it. You're trying to just really just empathy,
637. 00:56:36 understand it from the other person's perspective. But that is what the Colby type A is for is like,
638. 00:56:43 where is the friction in terms of the people on your team that are working together, not in terms of
639. 00:56:49 do we have the people with the right skills to do the actual work? It's kind of assumed that
640. 00:56:54 you've got competent people at every place in the organization. And then it's just like, okay, so
641. 00:57:00 we've got the people with the right skills, but we're still not getting the work done or we're not
642. 00:57:04 getting done as effectively as we want to. Where are the bottlenecks? A lot of those are emotional
643. 00:57:10 energy bottlenecks. And how do we alleviate that sort of stuff? And that's this kind of
644. 00:57:15 stuff that I find just completely fascinating. So I could dive deep on that and study it all day
645. 00:57:21 every day. So yeah, I guess that's really just like the personal difference between the Colby
646. 00:57:28 type A has been around forever. And there's all this research that's gone into it. And honestly,
647. 00:57:33 maybe there is that now for the six types of working genius to I remember when this first kind
648. 00:57:37 of came on the scene and people were starting to use this as part of their hiring process.
649. 00:57:42 I tend to think if you're going to use something as part of your hiring process,
650. 00:57:45 you want something that's battle tested a little bit more. But I do think that the overall point,
651. 00:57:51 we got to get complimentary people on the team. That's important. So one of the things that
652. 00:57:59 how do I put this delicately? You and I are probably pretty, but we have a lot of people in our world
653. 00:58:09 who are fairly conservative. And one of the pushbacks with conservatives is, I don't know how to describe
654. 00:58:17 it like surface level diversity, right? Diversity just so we can say that we're diverse.
655. 00:58:27 I know a lot of people who like absolutely hate that idea. I think there's a lot of value that
656. 00:58:32 comes from getting people with different perspectives and different strengths and different skills,
657. 00:58:37 even if they think totally different than me and they would do things totally different than me,
658. 00:58:41 that can actually be a strength when you leverage it. And that's kind of his point here.
659. 00:58:46 So the point I'm trying to make is like, if you're going to figure out how to build a diverse team,
660. 00:58:53 I think the way you want to look at it is in how people approach the work. So like the basis of
661. 00:59:02 everything he's talking about in this book is really the key. And there are probably geographical
662. 00:59:11 pockets where, yeah, everybody is a white guy. So we want an African-American woman on the team,
663. 00:59:18 just because like we got to disrupt this pattern a little bit and ultimately that'll make us better.
664. 00:59:25 But I think you can kind of take that too far. A lot of the online teams that I'm a part of,
665. 00:59:30 like nobody cares what your religious beliefs are. Nobody cares what your skin color is. Nobody
666. 00:59:35 cares where you live. It's really just like, how do we ideate better? How do we think and work
667. 00:59:42 together, especially with like, what's the term? Not remote teams, but distributed teams, right?
668. 00:59:51 We're all over the world. We're all over the place. The thing that matters is really like when we
669. 00:59:57 get together to work on something, how do we communicate? How do we hand stuff off back and forth?
670. 01:00:04 You know, that's where the culture work really is important. And this is such a big topic.
671. 01:00:10 I'm thinking of like a digital body language by Erica Dewan, which is all about like,
672. 01:00:17 don't make people feel stupid when they're on a Zoom call. And like, how do you communicate
673. 01:00:21 effectively? Like that could be a part of it. A lot of like this could be a part of it.
674. 01:00:26 Communication expectations and like how we are actually going to do the work at the organization
675. 01:00:31 and documenting all of that and sticking to the rules that we agree we're going to play by.
676. 01:00:37 So everyone kind of knows what to expect. Like that's a part of it. But the whole like larger topic
677. 01:00:44 of getting all these people together on a single team and figuring out how you can do more of
678. 01:00:51 what really matters. Like that's super exciting to me. If I could just, you know, fill in the blank,
679. 01:00:57 whatever my dream job would be, I actually would love to be one of those business consultants
680. 01:01:02 who shows up and has everybody take the Colby, has everybody take the six types of working
681. 01:01:06 genius. Okay, let's look at all these results and let's analyze this. And you can kind of see
682. 01:01:10 the light bulbs going. I'm like, Oh, that totally makes sense. Just the other week, Bob, you did
683. 01:01:15 this and really take me off. You know, Oh, well, I won't do that anymore. I had no idea. Yep.
684. 01:01:19 Exactly. That'd be, that'd be a beautiful job.
685. 01:01:23 So, I mean, yeah, like I, I agree with you. They, they get into this in the next section,
686. 01:01:28 which is the working genius and organizational health. So if we want to go back to that other one,
687. 01:01:32 feel free to, but we're having different people when these different geniuses helps with your
688. 01:01:40 organizational health. And one of the ones I want to really dig in on ties into a book that we,
689. 01:01:46 we just recently read The End of Burnout. And it's this idea of like, if you're in a role,
690. 01:01:52 where it's hitting something that is a frustration to you. And where I'm less,
691. 01:01:59 I don't know, like, where I'm less convinced is that widget is the six. Like, and I don't really
692. 01:02:04 know if I even care if widget is the six. Like, like, that's not the point. Right. The point is,
693. 01:02:08 is like, if I'm working in roles, or I'm working on parts of projects where it just completely wipes
694. 01:02:15 me and I'm doing too much of that in my current role, it makes total sense why I get to the end
695. 01:02:21 of the day and I am wiped. Like, I'm absolutely exhausted versus the other day when I get to come
696. 01:02:27 in and I get to do one of those roles where like, it gives me energy and it brings me joy. And I
697. 01:02:32 come in and I'm like, Oh, yeah, like, today flew by. It was like I wasn't even at work. Like,
698. 01:02:37 I was just having fun and everything was great. And like, that assessment alone of like knowing
699. 01:02:43 that these, these six or that you can think about it from this perspective of like, okay,
700. 01:02:48 I look at my job and I go, am I what resonates more with me? Okay, according to this, to the survey,
701. 01:02:55 right? It's in, it's invention and discernment. All right. So now I look at my job every day and
702. 01:03:00 I go, am I doing invention and discernment type things? Okay, if I am, can I relate that to, oh,
703. 01:03:06 that was actually like a fun day, like I enjoyed my work that day. And then am I looking at
704. 01:03:11 galvanization and tenacity? And it like, was that a good day for me? Or was it, did it feel like
705. 01:03:17 a slog? Did I feel like I would just got beat up the entire day? And what I can tell you, Mike,
706. 01:03:22 is a hundred percent, if it's a galvanization day, I feel terrible at the end of the day. Like,
707. 01:03:29 me having to herd the troops, me having to get people to like, keep going, keep going, keep going.
708. 01:03:36 And this is where I think another really interesting thing comes out of this book. And it's not,
709. 01:03:41 it's like, I, it's going to be broaden out the word, the word organization. If I think of my
710. 01:03:47 family unit as an organization, and I think of what I have to do right now with four young children,
711. 01:03:54 there is a lot of galvanization. Like, there is a lot of like, all right, boys,
712. 01:03:58 we're going to clean this house. Like, let's go. Like, we're going to, we're going to get this
713. 01:04:02 job done. We're going to get ready for soccer practice. We're going to get ready for whatever.
714. 01:04:05 And it's like, and I feel like I'm constantly galvanizing and I'm constantly galvanizing.
715. 01:04:10 And Mike, I'm going to tell you, based on the survey, that's a frustration area of mine.
716. 01:04:14 And this is why at the end of the day, sometimes I feel absolutely exhausted, right? Like, you know,
717. 01:04:19 and it's like, I don't want to feel that way. But this just isn't one of my natural, you know,
718. 01:04:25 giftings is to, is to galvanize, you know, those galvanize the, those young kids to, to do these
719. 01:04:32 things. It's also the reason why I'll tell you this. I've known for the longest time,
720. 01:04:36 I'm not the best at teaching below ninth grade. Because like, when I say like, hey, let's go do
721. 01:04:42 this thing, my expectation is you're going to go do this thing. I'm not going to have to come back
722. 01:04:46 every two or three minutes and be like, Hey, are you doing the thing? Are you doing the thing? Are you
723. 01:04:50 doing the thing? Are you doing the thing? And it's like, that is a really eye opening,
724. 01:04:55 revelatory part of this model that like makes me kind of overlook and not even worry about if
725. 01:05:01 widget makes sense, right? Like, like, I'm not even, I'm not even there. I'm going, Oh, my,
726. 01:05:07 I haven't thought about work like that. And I need to start thinking about work like that.
727. 01:05:11 And that was a big one for me. Like that was a, a real eye opening moment for me.
728. 01:05:15 When I, when I compared it to work life and organizational health and burnout and those kind of things.
729. 01:05:21 Yeah. And the, the million dollar question is, uh, so you're tired at the end of the day,
730. 01:05:28 and you still need to galvanize. So what are you going to do about that?
731. 01:05:31 Yeah, exactly. Drink some coffee and, and just get after it, right? Good, grit and
732. 01:05:36 Barrett or grit and Barrett or whatever it is, you know, yeah. And that actually leads to the
733. 01:05:42 larger point, um, with all of this type of stuff, I feel is like there are sometimes when you just
734. 01:05:47 got to push through and you got to do what needs to be done. And there are certain decisions that
735. 01:05:54 you've made where they're non negotiable. Uh, I am a father now, like that, where there's no,
736. 01:06:03 no going back on that. Exactly. Exactly. So you know, you, you figure out how to make it work.
737. 01:06:10 Uh, I think the danger is when it, when, uh, you're in a workplace where you also have to do that
738. 01:06:18 all the time, because that's the one that I feel like we should be willing to renegotiate more
739. 01:06:24 frequently than we do. We feel like we're stuck where we are. And, uh, at least I know what I'm
740. 01:06:31 dealing with. And that's not as scary as the, the unknown thing that's out there. So if someone is,
741. 01:06:38 you know, considering this stuff for the first time and they're trying to decide what do I actually
742. 01:06:43 do about this, I think at the beginning, it's, it's nothing. You just start to know this. Yes. Yes.
743. 01:06:48 And you realize, okay, so when this happens, it really kind of grinds my gears and I don't like it.
744. 01:06:55 And I have less in the tank when I get home for the things that really matter to me.
745. 01:07:02 So I'm going to make a note of that. And if it keeps happening over and over and over again,
746. 01:07:07 at some point, be willing to say I have power agency, whatever, like I can,
747. 01:07:15 I can choose to find a different work environment. I can choose to find a different way of providing
748. 01:07:21 for my family. And I think maybe for a lot of people, it never gets to that point where you're
749. 01:07:25 actually that frustrated that you want to want to quit. But until you start to realize how this
750. 01:07:31 stuff works and you weigh that decision, every little thing feels like lemon juice in a paper cut.
751. 01:07:38 It does. Yes. It's just like, Oh, here we go again. Here we go again. I deal with this all the time,
752. 01:07:44 even if it's been like three months since you actually dealt with this the last time, it feels
753. 01:07:48 like it's happening all the time. So recency bias and all the all the emotional stuff.
754. 01:07:56 So I think the the approach I would recommend people take is figure out how you're wired,
755. 01:08:05 figure out how that fits in with the work environment that you happen to be in,
756. 01:08:12 recognize that no work environment is going to be perfect. It's never going to be completely
757. 01:08:15 frictionless and you're just going to be in your zone of genius all the time. Right. But then make
758. 01:08:20 a conscious decision about whether you want to stay here or not. Instead of just feeling like,
759. 01:08:24 Well, I don't know what else I'll do. So I guess I just keep going. Like that's not a good approach.
760. 01:08:28 And eventually you'll start to resent that the fact that you feel that way. And that's when you
761. 01:08:34 make some rash decision and you have a midlife crisis jump off the deep end. Like it doesn't
762. 01:08:41 have to get to that point. You can kind of make like calculated decisions about this
763. 01:08:46 based off of this data that you collect over time if you're paying attention to it.
764. 01:08:51 All right, Mike, do you have anything else before we hit the my hope and we hit his last
765. 01:08:56 comments on the on the my hope and anything else about the model that you we didn't hit?
766. 01:09:02 Well, I like the description of the genius gaps. So you can debate whether widget is the right
767. 01:09:09 framework. But he kind of pokes the holes like if you have lack of wonder, then the team is
768. 01:09:16 failing to take time to step back and ponder what is going on around them. If you have a lack of
769. 01:09:21 invention, the team is stuck trying the same approaches again and again to no avail. Lack of
770. 01:09:26 discernment team find itself overlying on data and models to make decisions that are best made
771. 01:09:30 using simple judgment. Lack of galvanizing when no one is rallying the troops and provoking action.
772. 01:09:38 The team's potential remains untapped. Lack of enablement where a team has a sense of frustration
773. 01:09:43 because no one's pitching in to help and no one is adequately responding to the pleas of the
774. 01:09:48 galvanizer and then a lack of tenacity is when the team doesn't finish programs and projects.
775. 01:09:54 So like again, that's helpful to recognize those sorts of things. And if you're in a HR
776. 01:10:00 position and you're trying to assemble the best team possible, I think you want to recognize where
777. 01:10:06 those those holes are. But that's just one data point too. It's not like you have to fill these
778. 01:10:12 holes at the expense of everything else. That's the other thing with with this type of stuff is when
779. 01:10:17 you get into this sort of thing and you're reading a book like this, it's like, oh, this makes so
780. 01:10:21 much sense. This is the missing piece. We're going to redo everything and we're going to do
781. 01:10:26 the six types of working genius as the first step in the hiring process. Probably not a great idea.
782. 01:10:31 There's probably a lot of stuff that you're currently doing that is working really well.
783. 01:10:34 But also consider this when you're making your decision. And then the other thing I've jotted
784. 01:10:40 down on my notes is the elevation. Do you remember the GTD definitions of the elevations of the
785. 01:10:48 different time horizons? I don't remember that. So I'm going to mess this up probably, but
786. 01:10:53 the runway is like your immediate next actions. 5,000 feet is weekly, monthly, whatever. And as
787. 01:10:59 you go higher, like the 50,000 foot view is your life as a whole. Okay, so basically different
788. 01:11:06 elevations, you're looking at what you need to do in a different timeframe. That's sort of what
789. 01:11:11 he's alluding to with these different elevations for the different working geniuses. So he mentions
790. 01:11:17 that tenacity is 5,000 feet to the ground level. And he'll man is 10,000 feet galvanizing 15,000 feet
791. 01:11:22 discernment 20,000 feet invention 25,000 feet and one to 30,000 feet. So I think these these
792. 01:11:30 ways of working or these different perspectives bring more value when you are considering things
793. 01:11:37 from a certain perspective. And I just thought that was interesting. I don't know that there's
794. 01:11:42 something tactical that you would actually do with this, but yeah. Yeah, it's great. The only
795. 01:11:48 other one I had coming out of this was he walks you through the different phases of a project,
796. 01:11:54 brainstorming, decision making, launch, status review and problem solving and how the different
797. 01:11:59 geniuses come into play there and where roles are stronger than others. Which again, I think to
798. 01:12:06 your point is, it's very practical. If I'm a CEO or if I'm a chief operating officer or something
799. 01:12:12 like that, I look at the team and I'm like, wait, why are we so, why do we struggle so much in this
800. 01:12:16 area? And it gives me a lens. As you're describing this, Mike, I'm thinking to myself,
801. 01:12:22 how cool would it be if you and I or if somebody took all of these models that we like experience
802. 01:12:29 in these books and we just plastered a wall with them, like made a big mural of all these models
803. 01:12:35 that way, like we're just walking through our office and we're like, Oh, yeah, I remember that model.
804. 01:12:38 Oh, yeah, I remember that model. I remember that model, right? Like, not that any one model
805. 01:12:43 is the one model to rule the mall or the one that's going to save them. But like, you just
806. 01:12:48 remember all of the model because I'm sure you in your life have probably seen 150 models
807. 01:12:53 out of all these books. Yeah. Well, so that that's the thing is like, this stuff has to be
808. 01:12:57 top of mind in order for it to be of any use that whatsoever. So I actually have printed out on my
809. 01:13:02 bookshelf back there in one of those like crystal cases, my Colby scores. Nice. And when I was working
810. 01:13:08 at the digital marketing agency, not everybody did this, but I've seen I had meetings with people
811. 01:13:12 who would do this. They would, you know, where it says Mike at the bottom or Corey at the bottom
812. 01:13:18 for your zoom name, they would actually put their Colby scores. Okay, seven, six, three, three,
813. 01:13:23 so that when I'm on a zoom call with somebody who is a quick start, I can see their scores right
814. 01:13:28 there and like, Oh, that's right. You're a quick start. That's why you're you want to do this thing.
815. 01:13:33 And they can see that I'm a fact finder. Oh, that's why you're dragging your feet. And this is so
816. 01:13:38 hard to work with you right now. But just recognizing that then it's like, okay, well, we can compromise.
817. 01:13:42 Now that we know what's going on, it actually it would it helps a ton, doesn't it? Right? Like,
818. 01:13:45 I mean, absolutely helps a ton. So I can totally see why you why you would want to do that. Okay,
819. 01:13:50 let's move to the last part where basically, and I think it's short, but I think it actually adds
820. 01:13:56 a lot of color to the entire book. But the title of it is my hope for working genius. And basically,
821. 01:14:03 there are little phrases in here that kind of rounded things out for me. He uses the phrase,
822. 01:14:10 reduce their misery. Okay, like he's seeing this as like the widget and the geniuses is a way to
823. 01:14:18 like really, really reduce the the frustrations and the misery that he experienced. And like other
824. 01:14:24 people might experience he then ties that into the fact that they've gotten good reviews on
825. 01:14:29 people having done the assessment and it actually impacting them in a positive way. And that's
826. 01:14:34 cool. Like, I don't think that's just marketing. I think that's actually people are doing this.
827. 01:14:39 And they're reporting back and going, Hey, this really was effective. This really,
828. 01:14:43 really worked. So not to be like rude to you. So hopefully you'll take this in the wrong way.
829. 01:14:48 People don't care about their Colby score. You know what they care about? Widget works,
830. 01:14:53 right? Like the widget is helping them. And it's, and it's making their life less frustrating
831. 01:14:57 in that he uses like the, the, the phrase or combination words, more peace, less guilt,
832. 01:15:05 like less guilt, less judgment, less burnout. Like, like this is really what we're trying to,
833. 01:15:10 we're trying to get out here with, with this model. And I just like, I don't know, Mike, like I
834. 01:15:16 can see how this is effective. It resonated with me. I can see how it's effective.
835. 01:15:22 I didn't have the again, I don't mean this in a negative way. I didn't have the bias of the Colby
836. 01:15:26 score because I've never done that before. So it's like this model was like, okay, this,
837. 01:15:30 this checks out. Like this seems to resonate. Yeah, I, I hope it sticks for you.
838. 01:15:41 My, my initial thought with the way this is presented, and I think the initial criticism
839. 01:15:47 that people will have with this sort of stuff is probably broadly applicable to everything Patrick
840. 01:15:52 Lencioni writes about is like he's pretty much speaking to leadership teams, right? So if you're
841. 01:16:02 a manager or a CEO, this is great. I now know that I am most effective when I am in this particular
842. 01:16:13 zone of genius. So everybody else in the organization, you fall in line. So I can operate in my
843. 01:16:22 zone of genius. If you're not at the top of the totem pole, though, what do you do with this?
844. 01:16:28 And if you don't have a champion who is having everybody put their scores at the bottom of their
845. 01:16:34 nameplate, what do you do? And even if you have somebody who is championing it,
846. 01:16:41 there's still going to be a little bit of back and forth. And I think there's kind of a built-in
847. 01:16:46 power dynamic there, which can maybe rub some people the wrong way. It's like, oh, you're the
848. 01:16:50 CEO and your time is technically the most valuable, like the most dollars per hour that you are
849. 01:16:58 working should be the visionary, I would argue, the CEO, right? So from a company perspective,
850. 01:17:06 it makes sense that, oh, well, we should do everything we can. So they can be in their zone of genius
851. 01:17:10 and do the best work that they can because it's most valuable to the organization. But what if
852. 01:17:14 you're down there at the bottom and you just got to roll with the punches and you're like, man,
853. 01:17:18 this sucks. There's nothing I can do about it because we hired too many galvanizers or too many
854. 01:17:24 tenacityers. And then I think about going to my boss and I have that meeting, I'm like, all right,
855. 01:17:30 boss, here's the deal. I am not a galvanizer. And all the tasks you have me doing are galvanizing
856. 01:17:37 tasks. And he's like, what are you talking about? What do you even mean? Well, let me tell you about
857. 01:17:43 Patrick on C on these model, this widget model, blah, blah, blah. And I can just, if the organization
858. 01:17:50 hasn't bought in, the application of this gets very, very difficult, very, very fast. And I don't
859. 01:17:57 know what to do with that. Like I, right now, like that's, I'm stuck on what to do with that.
860. 01:18:03 Yeah, whereas something like that Colby is really your working styles, like, it's sort of like a
861. 01:18:11 personality, but it has nothing to do with the type of work necessarily it's being done. So for
862. 01:18:16 example, on scale one to 10, if you are in the low end, that's kind of like the, you resist it,
863. 01:18:22 the middle end is kind of the middle, like, Florida to six is average, you know, and then the seven
864. 01:18:28 to 10 is like a strength. So if I hi, a fact finder, for example, others will try to simplify or
865. 01:18:34 explain something I try to strategize. Okay, so I try to get as many specifics as possible when
866. 01:18:39 I'm putting that strategy in my report, it's saying, be precise, rate probabilities, correct
867. 01:18:43 errors, define differences, question frequently and thoroughly, don't generalize, make snap
868. 01:18:47 judgments, give yes or no answers, answer off the top of your head, decide without prioritizing
869. 01:18:50 reasons, because that's just the way that I would work. So someone says, you know, go do this thing,
870. 01:18:54 this is the way that I'm going to approach the work by default. Okay, it doesn't mean that I should
871. 01:18:59 do that every single time. There are times when I do have to trust my gut and just, you know, do
872. 01:19:04 something. But recognizing that my natural instinct is to go do this, and that that's the way that I
873. 01:19:09 will do the best work possible is when I'm allowed to flow in that that allows me to kind of organize
874. 01:19:15 how I'm going to get the work done the way I see see best. So I don't need somebody's permission
875. 01:19:21 in order to function as a fact finder, like my list of tasks doesn't change at all. But the way
876. 01:19:26 that I approach it does, they also talk in this report about like the pyramids of mental energy,
877. 01:19:31 they call it. So my highest one is strategize. Okay, so they have like this whole breakdown,
878. 01:19:35 37% of the time I'm strategizing doesn't mean I'm never maintaining, I'm never stabilizing,
879. 01:19:40 I'm never envisioning, but recognizing that if I'm always functioning as an implementer,
880. 01:19:45 when that's my lowest area, I will be exhausted. So that should be about 15% of my time based on
881. 01:19:51 my results. Okay, it's okay to do that for a little bit. But if I continue to do that,
882. 01:19:56 it's going to wear me out. So I can organize my own stuff and then go talk to my boss and my
883. 01:20:03 manager and be like, Hey, so the way we're doing this has been really stressful for me.
884. 01:20:09 All these galvanizing tasks, I'm not really a galvanizer, right? You're not throwing it back at
885. 01:20:14 him. You're saying, you know, this is, you know, what I this is the problem I see with the way that
886. 01:20:20 we're working. And then propose a solution. Yeah. Right. The solution where Oh, I'm not in my zone
887. 01:20:25 of genius is really like, Hey, jerk, why don't you galvanize for a while? Like, that's not going to
888. 01:20:30 go over very well. It's kind of like, what do you actually do with this if you're not in the right
889. 01:20:36 spot? All right, Mike, let's let's move on to action items. I don't know what to do with this
890. 01:20:45 model. Like, I don't know what to do with this book. I don't have any action items that jump out
891. 01:20:50 at me. I can tell you that like, I found this book to be very enlightening. But I don't find this
892. 01:20:59 book to be enlightening in a way that like, I'm going to then go do a bunch of things based on it.
893. 01:21:07 Like, and I'm going to commit to the fact, again, for a second week in a row, even though I feel bad
894. 01:21:11 about it, I don't have any action items coming out of this book. I don't even not even like print
895. 01:21:16 this out and put it on the wall, because it's not that complicated. Like, I can remember this,
896. 01:21:20 like the things that are going to stick are going to stick. I don't need to print this one out and
897. 01:21:23 put it on the wall. So Mike, I don't have any action items. I don't know if you do, but you didn't say
898. 01:21:28 anything during the show. So I am going to assume you don't. But I think the one action item from
899. 01:21:34 this book is take the assessment, which that's kind of weird, actually, that it's not included in the
900. 01:21:39 book, to be honest. I thought it would be kind of like, yeah, a strengths finder is the assessment
901. 01:21:45 isn't expensive. But the book, plus the assessment, it's getting there. So I would love to see that
902. 01:21:54 actually be included with the book. Well, yeah, we both completed the only action item we could
903. 01:21:59 possibly have. This goes to, again, the idea that I actually think this is more of a corporate thing,
904. 01:22:07 or a company thing, where the company is going to buy a bunch of versions of the assessment,
905. 01:22:12 the individual, it's a little less, like, we weren't even worried about that. Like, if the
906. 01:22:16 individual want to take it, wants to take it, that's fine. But we're not targeting that audience,
907. 01:22:20 like this, if you will. Okay, style and rating. My book, I start. Mike, I like this book.
908. 01:22:27 Like, I mean, I, like, I liked it. I liked the fable style. I thought it was easy to read.
909. 01:22:33 I thought it was enjoyable reading the fable style. There were some, like, gooberish, like,
910. 01:22:37 I'm going to steal your word again. There were some gooberish moments in that thing. But at the
911. 01:22:41 same time, like, I was there for it. Like, it didn't, it didn't distract me from anything.
912. 01:22:47 What was the one guy's name that cracks all the jokes in the fable? I can't remember his name at
913. 01:22:52 all, but I don't remember. You know, I'm talking about that. Like, there's the one guy who's like,
914. 01:22:56 the stereotypical, like, goofball, and it's cracking all the jokes. But I liked it. I liked the model,
915. 01:23:03 actually, like, I thought that was good, where I'm going to knock it is widget. And I don't mean
916. 01:23:09 that in that I actually care about widget, like the acronym widget. I'm going to knock it in what
917. 01:23:15 we described earlier is it feels like forced, like it feels like that was made up to make a clever
918. 01:23:23 acronym or to try to make an acronym. And it just feels like not, I don't think I want to say this,
919. 01:23:30 disingenuous or like anything like that, because I don't know if it's that aggressive,
920. 01:23:34 but it just feels like they were trying too hard. The other one is like, when we bucket things in
921. 01:23:39 two by two by two. So two of these are your genius, two of them are your competency, two of them are
922. 01:23:45 your frustration. I wanted to go like, well, why? And they make a comment later in there that that
923. 01:23:51 holds true with the assessment that holds true with the assessment is like, two people like they
924. 01:23:55 tend to resonate to to, but that seems very like nice coincidence, not like we knew this, you know,
925. 01:24:05 or we like, we went into it open minded and that came out two by two by two is more like,
926. 01:24:10 there's two, two, two, and oh no, by the way, the data, the data verifies it as well. Like, so again,
927. 01:24:15 I might be reading into that too much. I don't know if I am, but the two by two by two thing felt
928. 01:24:20 a little bit like forced, if you will. So like, that's where it's getting a knock for me is it's
929. 01:24:26 getting a knock for me on the idea of like the actual framework itself, less the book like I thought
930. 01:24:33 the book was fine. I didn't have any really issues with the book in terms of the structure,
931. 01:24:37 in terms of the writing style, in terms of any of that, I thought it communicated effectively.
932. 01:24:41 I'm going to knock it fair or unfair. I'm knocking it for the model itself, I think,
933. 01:24:47 which I don't know if I'm allowed to do that or not, but I'm going to. And this is going to be a
934. 01:24:52 four star book for me. So this is a four star book. So Mike, I'll turn it over to you now.
935. 01:24:57 All right, man, the the fable that you mentioned, you couldn't remember the people's names
936. 01:25:07 for the different characters. That's the danger with the fable approach, because the names don't
937. 01:25:14 matter at all. The fable doesn't really matter at all, especially for this particular,
938. 01:25:21 this particular book. I like the topic, I like the thinking around the framework. As you were
939. 01:25:29 describing it, it occurred to me like with widget, that feels forced, right? And my next thought
940. 01:25:39 after I recognize that is how many other places in this approach, the grouping of the
941. 01:25:50 ideation versus activation versus implementation is confirmation bias for the way that we want
942. 01:25:57 to work as opposed to this is what the data is actually telling us. So I don't necessarily
943. 01:26:05 think that's wrong, though, either. So this is the hard part of describing this for me. It's not
944. 01:26:12 my cup of tea. I think that that should be clear in terms of the ideal assessment for the way that
945. 01:26:17 people work together effectively is something that is much more research based. And to be honest,
946. 01:26:22 I don't even know if it's the Colby. That's the one that I'm the most familiar with. There's
947. 01:26:26 got to be other stuff out there. But I've seen the results of the Colby. It's all based off of
948. 01:26:33 though the research and someone who can analyze that research and say, you know, this is the way
949. 01:26:41 that you're wired. This is the way that they're wired. This is how you you navigate this this
950. 01:26:46 friction. And starting from the basis of, you know, this is the way you're wired based off of the
951. 01:26:53 results. I mean, I have questions about how accurate that is. Maybe they're unfounded,
952. 01:27:00 but I look at those results and I'm like, I don't know that that's me. And the next thought is,
953. 01:27:06 okay, so we're going to now base conversation about how we work together most effectively.
954. 01:27:13 Based off of this assumption, I feel nervous about that like red flags. So I think this is a
955. 01:27:21 cool book and I would recommend this, but I would recommend it from a source of professional
956. 01:27:28 curiosity, not as this is the solution to alleviating the friction in our workplace.
957. 01:27:37 Okay, I think you go into this, you take the assessment, you understand the ideas here,
958. 01:27:43 and you figure out what of this is actually useful. And it's not, you know, all this assessment says
959. 01:27:50 I'm this way. And so I am going to reorder my life in order to accommodate these results that
960. 01:27:55 it's given me. That's the, that's a wrong approach, no matter what assessment or no matter what test
961. 01:28:01 you take. So no single assessment is going to give you the blueprint for how you should live
962. 01:28:08 your life. But I like to view all of these things and the reason I like taking all these is I feel
963. 01:28:11 like every time I take one, I get a little bit of a new perspective, a new way of thinking about
964. 01:28:17 things. For this one, if you were to ask me what that is, I kind of don't know.
965. 01:28:26 Like looking at my, let's see, where are those results? I've got to find them again. My working
966. 01:28:31 geniuses. See, I have trouble even reminding or recalling what they are because they don't make
967. 01:28:37 sense. Well, and while you're doing, while you're finding them, the one thing is, I think you had
968. 01:28:41 said about taking it and letting it form the context, unless your organization buys in and
969. 01:28:47 everybody does it. I think if your organization buys in and everybody does it, it adds more value
970. 01:28:52 to that. But like you're right. Like otherwise, it's more of like a not grain of salt. Like I
971. 01:28:58 don't want to say grain of salt, but kind of I kind of do want to say grain of salt. So I don't
972. 01:29:02 know if you found them or not yet. But yeah, I did. My highest ones are wonder and discernment,
973. 01:29:08 but not in that order. So I don't know. Actually, the results that they give you on page eight,
974. 01:29:15 they've got these different working genius pairings. I would love more information on this type of
975. 01:29:22 stuff. I thought the same thing. This is what I wish was in the book besides the fable.
976. 01:29:28 Right. So here's how this stuff fits together. Here's examples of how these work together,
977. 01:29:33 you know, rather than the fable itself, but also I don't fault him for that because it's Patrick
978. 01:29:37 onceyone. That's, that's his thing. But that's the best version of this, this for me. I do think
979. 01:29:43 it's interesting. I think it's probably the most approachable version of this that I've come across.
980. 01:29:49 Like the Colby is not the thing to fart. The best version of that, by the way, that I've come
981. 01:29:55 across is actually a program called unique ability. It was put together by Dan Sullivan. And there's
982. 01:30:01 like a unique ability 2.0. It's like this big workbook where actually you take the Colby,
983. 01:30:07 it puts in your scores, you take the strengths finder, you put in your scores, and you take like
984. 01:30:13 the results of these different types of assessments, and then you map out your different strengths
985. 01:30:16 across these different assessments. And then there's a whole bunch of like values work that you do on,
986. 01:30:21 on top of that. I think that's like, you really want to apply this to your, your life. That's the
987. 01:30:25 way to do it. But if you're looking for something that's just kind of kind of get you moving in this
988. 01:30:30 direction. I think this is a good book. And I think kind of like the, the reaction that I saw
989. 01:30:36 from you on social media, if you've not really considered the sort of stuff before, your initial
990. 01:30:40 response is, Oh my gosh, this is amazing. It's a whole new world. So right person at the right time,
991. 01:30:48 like this book could absolutely change your world. I'm going to meet you at the, the four stars. I
992. 01:30:53 got some nitpicks with it. Not my ideal assessment, but I did like it. And I think it's pretty good.
993. 01:30:59 Now I would generally recommend it. Awesome. All right, Mike, let's put the six working
994. 01:31:04 geniuses on the shelf. What's next? Next is the way of excellence by Brad Stolberg,
995. 01:31:11 which I think we will either love or hate. But yeah, that'll be, that'll be a fun one. What's after
996. 01:31:21 that? After that is how to live a meaningful life using design, thinking to unlock purpose,
997. 01:31:26 joy and flow every day. It's by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, which we've read a book of theirs before
998. 01:31:33 design your life. And this is another one in their series. So I'm going to give you some pre-homework
999. 01:31:41 for this if that's okay. Oh, dear heaven. Yes, go ahead. No, this will be easy. But I remember
1000. 01:31:47 probably a couple of months ago at this point, those two guys actually appeared on the Nathan
1001. 01:31:52 Berry show. Okay. And they talked about their new book project. And I would encourage you to
1002. 01:31:59 listen to that episode before we cover that book. And because hearing them on a podcast was very
1003. 01:32:07 different than reading the book itself, they are, I was really, really impressed, just spoiler alert.
1004. 01:32:14 Feel like you could just sit and talk to them about this and they could flow on this topic for
1005. 01:32:18 probably three, four hours without missing a beat. I just added an action item. So Mike,
1006. 01:32:22 you gave me an action item, which is a non working geniuses related. You know, listen,
1007. 01:32:28 it's an action item. So there you go. All right, Mike, do you have any gap books for this break?
1008. 01:32:36 I don't. I mean, I hope I will have one that I can come back and say I read this, but yeah,
1009. 01:32:41 it didn't get any additional gap books read. Yeah, I don't have a gap book,
1010. 01:32:47 but can I talk about a gap book that I read not on purpose? It was one of those ones that came to me.
1011. 01:32:53 So it's called the education reformation. And it's about like starting new schools. And it just
1012. 01:33:00 randomly like somebody was like, hey, you should check this book out. And next thing you know,
1013. 01:33:03 do you ever get one of those books where you just open it up and then like a day and a half later,
1014. 01:33:07 you're done with it. And you're like, wow, that just happened. That wasn't like I wasn't expecting
1015. 01:33:11 to do that. So that was one the education reformation. But all right, Mike, I think that does it for us.
1016. 01:33:18 We want to thank the the Pro Show members. This episode, we talked about Mike going to
1017. 01:33:25 sponsor games and his experience with sponsor games, which was very fun and made me more jealous
1018. 01:33:31 than I've been than I was before when I saw a social media post. But if you're interested in being a
1019. 01:33:36 Pro Show member, it's a longer ad-free show. The bootleg is released usually like a week or two
1020. 01:33:43 early right after as early as we can, basically, as early as we can turn it around. You get a
1021. 01:33:48 bookworm wallpaper. Mike has generously shared his reading masterclass with us. So that's through
1022. 01:33:54 Patreon. You can go to bookworm.fm/pro. It's $7 a month. And it just helps us with kind of the back end
1023. 01:34:01 stuff of keeping the keep in the show going. So if you're a Pro Show member, thank you so much
1024. 01:34:05 for being a Pro Show member. And if you're interested in being one, just check out bookworm.fm/pro.
1025. 01:34:12 All right. And if you are reading along with us, pick up The Way of Excellence by Brad Stolberg.
1026. 01:34:16 and we'll talk to you in a couple of weeks.