| About the book | |
Ever feel like you?re in the wrong job, maybe even the wrong career? You may be right. But before you make another move, consider this: your brain is hardwired with a unique combination of 12 different Executive Skills?the cognitive strengths that determine how well you will perform in a particular role. Your strongest and weakest Executive Skills can make the difference between big-time career success and years of disappointment and failure. Work Your Strengths helps you avoid ?trial-and-error? career moves by matching your strengths to the jobs that call on those skills specifically. Based on the authors? two-year study of more than 2000 top-performers at hundreds of organizations of all types, from Fortune 500 companies to nonprofits, the book reveals which strengths correlate with success in different jobs. Take a one-time, free online profile to determine your unique strengths and weaknesses and then use that information to identify your ideal career path. Not ready for a move yet? Work Your Strengths can also make a world of difference in the job you?re in now. It can help you not only focus on the projects best suited for you but also recognize skills in others and assign tasks accordingly. So whether you?re planning a jump to the career of your dreams or just wondering how to make your current job easier and more rewarding, Work Your Strengths gives you the science and the system to find your success. | |
| About the author | |
Chuck Martin is the Chairman and CEO of NFI Research, a top management research firm, and a highly soughtafter speaker. Richard Guare is a neuropsychologist and the Director of the Center for Learning and Attention Disorders. Peg Dawson is a psychologist at the Center for Learning and Attention Disorders. Together they are the authors of Smarts (9780814414071). | |
| Table of contents | |
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X I I I INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Finding the Right Job . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Playing to Strengths Leads to Goodness of Fit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Matching Strengths of High-Performing Individuals . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 The Executive Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Frontal Lobes and Executive Skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 The Spread Between Strengths andWeaknesses: The Differentiator . . . . . 7
CHAPTER 1: DETERMINING YOUR OWN STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES . . . AND FINDING THE STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES OF OTHERS . . . . . . 9 Skill 1: Response Inhibition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Skill 2:Working Memory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Skill 3: Emotional Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Skill 4: Sustained Attention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Skill 5: Task Initiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Skill 6: Planning/Prioritization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Skill 7: Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Skill 8: Time Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Skill 9: Goal-Directed Persistence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Skill 10: Flexibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Skill 11: Metacognition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Skill 12: Stress Tolerance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Finding Your Own Strengths andWeaknesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Workload and Executive Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Voices from the Front Lines:Workload . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Exceeding Your Cognitive Bandwidth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Knowing in Advance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
CHAPTER 2: FINDING SUCCESS AND AVOIDING FAILURE: WHY YOUR STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES ARE THE WAY THEY ARE: THE SCIENCE BEHIND EXECUTIVE SKILLS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Executive Skills in Psychology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Executive Skills and the Brain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Executive Skills and Brain Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
CHAPTER 3: WHAT IS A HIGH PERFORMER AND HOW DO YOU BECOME ONE? SELECTING THE RIGHT PATH TO INCREASE THE CHANCE OF SUCCESS . . . . 35 Performance-Based: Consistency Is Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 Quantitative: Expectations and Results. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Qualitative: Some Subjectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Position in the Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Company First . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Multidimensional . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 How Many Are High Performers? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 Voices from the Front Lines: Number of High Performers . . . . . . . . . 48 What Sets High Performers Apart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 Voices from the Front Lines:What Sets Them Apart . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
CHAPTER 4: NAVIGATING YOUR ROAD TO HIGH PERFORMANCE: FINDING YOUR SKILLS COMBINATION TO DETERMINE WHAT INDUSTRY YOU SHOULD BE IN . . 52 Most Prevalent Executive Skills Strengths andWeaknesses . . . . . . . . . 53 Some Skills Go Hand in Hand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 Strengths vs. Commonly FoundWeaknesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 High-Performing Males vs. High-Performing Females . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Executive Skills of High Performers by Age . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Task Initiation: The CommonWeakness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 The High-Performing Pair . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Executive Skills of High Performers by Industry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Financial Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Healthcare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 Manufacturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Nonprofits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Finding the Match . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
CHAPTER 5: WHAT’S THE RIGHT DEPARTMENT FOR YOU? THE STRENGTHS OF HIGH PERFORMERS BY DEPARTMENT . . . . . . . . . 77 Marketing/Advertising/Promotion: Always Getting Better . . . . . . . . . 78 Sales: Not Falling Through the Cracks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Systems/IT: All About Road Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 General Management: Goal-Oriented . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 Operations: Good on the Fly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84 Customer Service: Strategically Important . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Administrative: Organized and Can Adapt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Finance: Modify on the Fly. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Accounting: Methodical Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Clinical: Organized and Starting Right Away. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 Executive Skills in a Department: Clinical High Performers . . . . . . . . 93 Right-Seating People the First Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
CHAPTER 6: DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO BE IN THE CORNER SUITE? SKILLS BROKEN DOWN BY TITLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 ` Are You in the Right Job?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 The Brains in the Corner Office. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 The Brains Down the Hall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 The Self-Correcting Directors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 The Managers with a Plan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 The Organized Employees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
CHAPTER 7: HOW YOUR STRENGTHS MATCH THOSE OF OTHERS AT WORK: WAYS TO MATCH BEHAVIORS TO EXECUTIVE SKILLS IN YOUR BUSINESS . . . 108 Shared Strengths in One Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 Shared Strengths in Two Nonprofits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 Mapping Characteristics to Executive Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115 Avoiding Potential Conflicts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Focus on Executive Skills Strengths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 Voices from the Front Lines: Strengths andWeaknesses. . . . . . . . . . 119 Healthcare: Clinical vs. Nonclinical . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 High Performers in Sales-Buyer Interactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 Observable Behaviors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Strong Flexibility: Typical Behaviors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Weak Flexibility: Typical Behaviors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 Strong Response Inhibition: Typical Behaviors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 Weak Response Inhibition: Typical Behaviors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
CHAPTER 8: AVOIDING THE WRONG PROMOTION: SORTING THE STRENGTHS OF EMPLOYEES VS. MANAGERS VS. EXECUTIVES . . . . . . . 129 Voices from the Front Lines: High and Low Performers . . . . . . . . . 131 The Failed Sales Promotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132 Voices from the Front Lines: Promoting Salespeople to Management. . . 134 Sales Employees vs. Sales Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135 Working in a Comfort Zone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 Voices from the Front Lines: Job Satisfaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 IT Executives Can Shield the Heat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 Operations: Order and Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 Administrative: Organization Is Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Customer Service: Recalling Past Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 Can Performance Be Predicted? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
CHAPTER 9: DETERMINE YOUR FIT—THE HIGH-PERFORMANCE EXECUTIVE SKILLS MAP: WHERE DO HIGH PERFORMERS WITH YOUR STRENGTHS WORK? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Response Inhibition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152 Working Memory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152 Emotional Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 Sustained Attention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Task Initiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Planning/Prioritization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 Time Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 Goal-Directed Persistence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Flexibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Metacognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 Stress Tolerance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 The High-Performance Executive Skills Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Industries by Executive Skills Strengths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Departments by Executive Skills Strengths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 Job Functions/Titles by Executive Skills Strengths . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
APPENDIX A: HOW THE TWO-YEAR STUDY WAS CONDUCTED: HIGH PERFORMERS AND THE EXECUTIVE SKILLS PROFILE . . . . . . . . . 179 Determining High Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 Using the Executive Skills Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 Selecting Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 Selecting Industry Types and Departments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184 Job Functions and Titles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185 High Performers by Age and Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186 High Performers by Company Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 The Questionnaire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 Organizations in the Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 The Study Continues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 APPENDIX B: THE HIGH-PERFORMANCE EXECUTIVE SKILLS TABLES . . . . 197 Top Six Industries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198 Executive Skills by Department: Top 10 Departments. . . . . . . . . . . 200 Job Function/Title. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203 Employees vs.Managers vs. Executives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206 Males vs. Females . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212 Profit vs. Nonprofit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212 Profit vs. Nonprofit (Excluding CEOs) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213 Healthcare: Clinical vs. Nonclinical . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214 APPENDIX C: ABOUT NFI RESEARCH. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 NOTES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219 INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225 | |
