What should your contribution be?

At a Stanford commencement address, Steve Jobs famously advised the students “Follow your passion.” While the advice can feel exciting, I have found it to be almost useless. I have spent years trying to identify my passion, and I have finally figured it out, but it isn’t what most people think.

For example, if you think your passion is a particular line of work I think you will run out of steam, because most jobs will eventually become mundane. So, let me tell you how to follow your passion from the perspective of Sadhguru and Stephen Covey.

Very simply, Sadhguru says you can be passionate about anything and everything. Underwhelming, I know, because the advice doesn’t help narrow things down.

So let us switch to Stephen Covey, who said all people want the 4 L’s from life. All people want: to live, to love, to learn and to leave a legacy. And when you really think about it, you can probably get passionate about all four of those things. So, Covey’s advice does help narrow things down.

Show me a profession full of loving service, where you are constantly learning and can leave a legacy, and I will show you something you can probably get passionate about. But make no mistake, the passion isn’t the job, the passion is the 4 L’s.

Lastly, you know I have to mention Drucker, because he always seems to break things down clearly and concisely. Drucker died before Jobs’s “follow your passion” advice became a meme, but he addressed the related phenomenon of people in the 1960s wanting to “do their own thing.”

In this 2008 book Management, Drucker writes “To ‘do one’s own thing’ is not freedom. It is license. It does not have results. It does not contribute. But to start out with the question, ‘What should I contribute?’ gives freedom. It gives freedom because it gives responsibility.”

And he adds “The decision that answers ‘What should my contribution be?’ thus balances three elements. First comes the question, ‘What does the situation require?’ Then comes the question, ‘How could I make the greatest contribution with my strengths, my way of performing, my values, to what needs to be done?’ Finally, there is the question, ‘What results have to be achieved to make a difference?’ This then leads to the action conclusions.”

In support of the notion that great minds think alike, Sadhguru said something very similar to Drucker. SG recommends that everyday we joyfully do what needs to be done. I agree. For example, though it was an enormous amount of work, since my company needed leadership development training, and since it matches my strengths, I created it (joyfully, most of the time) 😂

What should your contribution be?

Culture does NOT eat strategy for breakfast

People often quote Peter Drucker as saying “Culture eats strategy for breakfast,” and it is total bullshit. However, I love when people use said quote because it shows that person doesn’t know Drucker. Drucker is at the very top of my Mount Rushmore, and I can assure you he never said that quote, nor would he say such a thing.

Here is the pisser. The list of people who have used that quote include some people I really respect, and it has caused me to wonder why they would make such a mistake. I think there are at least three possible reasons.

I think one reason is this, however hard it is to understand culture it is harder to understand strategy. Reason number two is working on culture happens much more often than working on strategy. And reason number three is, people tend to think their job is the most important job in the world.

Let me start with my favorite person who has unfortunately used this inaccurate quote. That person would be Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft. He used the misquote in his book Hit Refresh, and I think reason #2 explains why he did it. Once Satya set a new direction for Microsoft, his day-to-day task was nurturing the right culture to get the company to its new destination. In other words, since culture is about executing the strategy it is more time consuming, and one could imagine more valuable.

Another person I hold in high regard who used the misquote is Laszlo Bock. For about ten years Mr. Bock was the head of human resources at Google, and in his book Work Rules! you will find both the story of his time at Google and the butchering of Drucker. And, I think my third reason explains why Bock made such a flub. A good HR department will nurture and maintain a quality culture, and it would be understandingly human for Bock to think his is the most important job.

I realize this may seem like much ado about nothing, but I mention the mistreatment of Drucker because getting your strategy right is hard enough. Nobody needs the added confusion from bullshit quotes. To help show you how Drucker thought, here is a quote from his 2008 book Management “As it becomes successful, an organization tends increasingly to take its theory of the business for granted, becoming less and less conscious of it. Then the organization becomes sloppy ... culture is no substitute for discipline, and the theory is a discipline.”

Drucker claims to have written the first book on business strategy, but he acknowledges he didn’t use the word "strategy" because it was too militaristic. According to Drucker, the first book on business strategy was his 1964 book Managing For Results. And as you can see from the quote in the previous paragraph, throughout his life Drucker tended to use the phrase “theory of the business” more than strategy.

Much of Drucker’s work centrally revolved around strategy, so he is an ideal person to study. A more contemporary teacher would be Seth Godin, the man who inspired today’s post because two weeks ago he published a new book titled This is Strategy. Though I have yet to read the book, I can confidently recommend it for two reasons: 1. Over the years, in my eyes Godin has already proven his expertise. 2. I saw him promoting the book on a podcast and he accurately claimed culture is a part of strategy.

For me, nobody tops Drucker. But, I am also a big fan of Godin. So, maybe pick up his new book. And, I will see ya next time.

As crazy as it may sound...

...I believe entrepreneurship can help heal trauma.

In current usage the word trauma means a psychological wound, and in the last post we discussed a form of trauma known as an attachment injury. Attachment injuries can easily cause a fear of abandonment, and abandonment is generally experienced as rejection. It is not coincidental that both attachment injuries and a fear of rejection are common in today's society, and as a general rule the former causes the latter.

See the connection to entrepreneurship?

As Peter Drucker said, a business exists for one reason; to create a customer. As such, a business has two entrepreneurial functions; innovation and sales. The innovation is the value you offer the market and sales creates the transaction. Whether we call it sales or marketing, what we are talking about is customer acquisition. Thus, as a general rule building a sustainably successful business will include large amounts of rejection.

Dr. David Burns is a psychology professor who wrote the best-selling book Feeling Good. And as it turns out, on August 26 he posted an episode of his podcast which discusses things like self-esteem. During the podcast, as an antidote to fear of rejection, his student Dr. Matthew May talks about how Burns explicitly instructed him to go out and collect rejections.

Whether you seek love or wealth, you should probably overcome your fear of rejection.

I can show you how, because a lot of times simply collecting rejections isn't enough.

Here is the clip...

We take the good with the bad

Recently this blog has been discussing the self. Elements of the self include things like identity, temperament, personality, etc. One thing to know is that personalities can be healthy or toxic, what scientists would call adaptive or maladaptive.

Psychodynamic psychology is the modern psychology stemming from the lineage of Sigmund Freud. And as the reader likely knows, some of the language of Freud remains commonplace to this day. For example, two personalities types people have heard of are narcissistic and obsessive, and in common language most people understand those two things to be negative. But in the world psychodynamic psychology, both narcissistic personalities and obsessive personalities can be either healthy or unhealthy. Yes you read that right, there literally is a thing called healthy narcissism. Believe it or not.

One thing that has changed is the words Freud used to describe the organization of personality. In Freud's time personality had three possible arrangements: neurotic, borderline and psychotic. Here there are two things to note. First, today being neurotic is considered a negative thing. But in Freud's time, neurotic was as healthy as a personality could hope to be. And second, in Freud's time borderline literally meant the space between neuroses and psychoses, between reality and delusion. So, any personality type could present with a borderline organization.

Largely because Freudian-like psychoanalysis is a long-term form of treatment, not many people do it. So, not many people are familiar with what Freud actually meant with his teachings. Enter into this void a new and common diagnosis called "borderline personality disorder," or BPD for short (admittedly the confusion is unfortunate).

Though I am taking small liberties here, let me give a brief summary of the likely origins of BPD. I will begin with the words of a fairly well-known man named Gabor Maté. According to Dr. Maté, all human souls require at least two things: authenticity and attachment. Though he doesn't include the human need for competence, what Maté is saying is in direct alignment with Self-Determination Theory. If you would like more information on Self-Determination Theory, please review this blog's recent posts. What Maté calls attachment the Self-Determination folks would call relatedness.

Being centrally important, it is not surprising to know much work has been done on human attachment. Starting in 1969, famed British psychoanalyst John Bowlby began laying out his attachment theory. And today, it seems clear most people are probably living with some level of "attachment injury," a psychological wound (aka trauma) resulting from a deficiency of attachment. And when that attachment injury is debilitating enough, we begin to speak of BPD.

The core symptom of BPD is a destructively strong fear of abandonment. And if you know anybody with BPD, you may know how profound and pervasive the suffering can be. Though there exists more than one way to treat BPD, today we will discuss a woman named Marsha Linehan.

Born on May 5, 1943 and raised in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Professor Linehan is becoming more and more well-known due to her development of a branch of psychology called Dialectical Behavior Therapy, or DBT for short. And, the evidence is mounting that DBT is an effective method for helping heal BPD.

Side note: I apologize for the use of multiple acronyms, but DBT is how most people refer to Linehan's method and BPD is generally how people refer to borderline personality disorder.

To the extent people utilize the DBT modality, most do it as a client/patient in counseling, coaching or therapy. That said, in 2020 Professor Linehan wrote a lovely and helpful autobiography titled Building a Life Worth Living. Regardless of whether or not you have BPD, the four core skills of DBT can be very helpful. They are: distress tolerance, mindfulness, emotion regulation and interpersonal effectiveness. One thing I love about DBT is, Linehan directly and explicitly acknowledges her main objective is teaching people the skills of effective living.

Why I am telling you all this? Well, it does seem to be the case that all human souls fundamentally require authenticity and attachment. As such, it also seems clear that a deficiency in either authenticity or attachment can lead to profound mental health challenges. And, the skills of effective living do seem to be a prerequisite for sustainably successful entrepreneurship and leadership.

This blog has recently spent time talking about identity and personality, and hopefully you can imagine their connection to authenticity. I have also begun introducing you to the work of Professor Liah Greenfeld, who has shown rather conclusively how deficiencies in identity formation can lead to things like schizophrenia, bipolarism and depression. And, as mentioned, it further seems clear that a deficiency in human attachment can lead to challenges like BPD.

So, am I saying any personality can be either healthy or unhealthy? And being one element of personality, am I saying an underdeveloped identity can cause mental illness? And, am I also saying insufficient human attachment can cause mental illness? Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. As I think we all know, life is complex. But, I don't believe that means it needs to be complicated.

We all need authenticity and attachment, and I think we know how to create both.

Who Even Are You? Part Three

Personality. What is it? Is it static or fluid? The answer is yes, personality is static or fluid. LOL! I think personality is static for people with a fixed mindset and fluid for those with a growth mindset.

But regardless of whether your personality is static or fluid, identifying your type is a useful part of getting to know yourself. Fortunately, today you can take a free online test and it will help you identify your personality type. The free test is available at 16personalities.com.

That personality model has been traditionally referred to as Myers Briggs, and it builds off of the psychology of Carl Jung. To the extent we understand our personality and those of the people we care about, our relationships will likely run most smoothly.

A while back, the late psychology professor David Keirsey wrote two books explaining the Myers Briggs system, and I highly recommend them. They are titled "Please Understand Me" and "Please Understand Me II."

For today, I will simply explain a brief overview of Keirsey's four temperaments, in no particular order. As a side note, each of the four temperaments manifest themselves in four ways, which is how they end up with sixteen possible personalities.

I will start with SJ. SJs are highly committed to maintaining tradition and social order. They are big on obedience and believe rules are made to be followed. In Aesop's fable of the ant and the grasshopper, they are the ant. Busy busy busy. Work work work. They are big on duty and obligation, and believe that work must come before play. They detest freeloaders, believing all people must earn their keep. Ironically, SJs often marry SPs.

In Aesop's fable SPs are the grasshopper, and they are essentially the opposite of the SJ. SPs spend their days leisurely swinging on a blade of grass, singing their song and not taking things too seriously. SPs are centrally concerned with having fun, and they revile in their freedom from constraint. So, you won't get very far trying to order around an SP. SPs tend to think life come down to luck, so it doesn't make sense to try very hard, and they like to have fun warning SJs about how they are going to develop an ulcer with all the worrying. SPs would rather eat, drink and be merry!

Combined, SJs and SPs make up the majority of the population. One key thing to know about the "S's" is they think in concrete terms, meaning Who What When and Where. They want "Just the facts, Jack." This is important to know because the other two temperaments are the "N's," and the Ns think in abstract concepts. By the way, these temperaments aren't mutually exclusive. We are all combinations.

NTs are pretty much always thinking in mental models. The reader doesn't have to follow me for long to realize I am mostly an NT. Scientific theories are mental models, and whether it is the theory of Peter Drucker, Liah Greenfeld, Edward Deci, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, David Keirsey or whomever, I am always thinking in mental models. NTs are centrally concerned with truth and knowledge, effectiveness and efficiency. That said, I can also be an NF.

NFs are occupied with the search for self, uniqueness, authenticity, meaning and intimacy. Hello?! This is literally my third post in a row with the title "Who Even Are You?" LOL! Keirsey writes "The NF's truest self is the self in search or itself, or in other words, his purpose in life is to have a purpose in life." If you think that logic sounds circular, you would be correct. And because it is the most complicated temperament, it is usually best to speak of NFs last.

You see, the "N" stands for intuitive because "I" was already taken by introversion. So just as the Ss think and speak in concrete terms, the Ns use their intuition to think and speak in abstract concepts. Hopefully you can already spot a pattern. Knowing the difference in personalities, and knowing that I am an intuitive, when I communicate I consciously reminder myself to always include concrete examples for the S temperaments.

I hope this helps.

Again, please take the free test at 16personalities.com.

You see next time 😊

Who Even Are You? Part Two

According to Liah Greenfeld identity is the core structure of the human mind, and I think she is correct. Professor Greenfeld defines identity with four simple words, saying it is "The relationally constituted self." To put a little more meat on the bones of that definition, Otto Kernberg says "We call the combination of an integrated sense of self and an integrated sense of significant others identity."

Being so centrally important, it is great news that we are able to consciously develop our identities. An obvious first question would be; How?

Habit number two of Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is "Begin with the end in mind." And if you have read the book, you know Covey gives us an exercise to perform (though I doubt many people actually do it). The exercise is to write your eulogy. Obviously, writing your own eulogy is a way of beginning with the end in mind.

Unrelated to the work of Covey, while speaking with Professor Greenfeld she told me she assigns the same exercise to her university students, because she has found it to be a useful way to cultivate your identity.

Peter Drucker has a similar but different exercise, which requires a less explicit contemplation of your own mortality. Drucker explains that his exercise goes back to at least Saint Augustine, but reveals he first learned of the exercise from economist Joseph Schumpeter. According to Drucker, Schumpeter and Augustine, everybody must answer the question "What do I want to be remembered for?"

To state the exercise in more humorous, and potentially more triggering terms, the French absurdist philosopher Albert Camus advocated contemplating the question "Why shouldn't I kill myself?" In other words, what do we have to live for?

Drucker said if we don't do this exercise we will waste our lives, and Greenfeld has shown how a malformed identity can lead to profound mental illness. So whichever way you look at it, the stakes are high and you should probably do the exercise!

Who Even Are You?

For as long as I can remember I have been interested in core knowledge and first principles. We have all heard it said that each person is as unique as a snowflake, and to a degree it is true. That said, if you keep drilling down you will eventually discover we are all the same.

Like the old cliché says, we all bleed red. Another example was given in the last post, which was about something called Self-Determination Theory. It seems pretty clear that all people need competence, autonomy and relatedness.

Recently, I gave an overview of the French word anomie. For our purposes here, a workable synonym for anomie is confusion. Modern society is very confusing and, in moments of vulnerable honesty, most people will admit they don't really know who they are. Who you are is a key part of your autonomy.

I also mentioned Liah Greenfeld, and I want to give you her deceptively simple hypothesis about the human mind. Stated in two identical ways, Professor Greenfeld says the human mind is "culture in the brain" or "individualized culture." To me, it often makes sense to compound the phrases and say the human mind is individualized culture in the brain.

At the risk of getting nerdy, let us touch briefly on a word which has become very popular. That word in meme. As usually happens, now that the word meme is used widely it is also widely misunderstood. Here is where I will get slightly nerdy. A nerdy definition of meme is "An artifact of consciousness." In simpler language, a meme is an idea.

Images with captions are common memes online, and they certainly are memes, but they are only one type of meme. Memes can also be more general (things like is transportation, weaponry, or even television) and it can be said that memes are fundamentally what separate humans from all other life forms.

We have all heard of DNA. A simple explanation of the purpose of DNA is to function as biological instructions on how to live. Suckling is an instinct DNA has put into mammals for survival. If the newborn doesn't suckle, it doesn't survive. All mammals possess DNA and it functions as the biological analog of memes. 

As already mentioned, the memes most people are familiar with are online memes, and they are usually humorous or thought provoking. But in the totality, memes function similar to DNA in that they constitute psychological instructions on how to live. Are you with me? Combined, memes create something we call culture. And again, yes, the funny online memes are one form of meme.

In western civilization one of our key jobs as humans is to give birth to ourselves. Psychological birth, which is painful and scary. And because it is painful and scary, most people simply default to doing what other people are doing. One of life's great ironies is, when people are free to do whatever they want they usually imitate each other. Short term this is a less risky strategy. But long term, it can be catastrophic because you may wake up one day and wonder "Who the hell am I?!"

It is not the intention of this blog to provide psychotherapy, but one thing we all have in common is we are trying to understand this big complex thing called life. Please stay with me.