What are you good at?

My first year of Business School I was failing Accounting. In a class of approximately 300 students, I came in second to last on the midterm (imagine being the loser who came in last?!). This should not have been a surprise to me. A savvy HBS admissions interviewer had predicted this moment, asking me, “What will you do when your peers are running circles around you in Accounting and Finance?” (A perfectly reasonable and astute question, given that my GMAT Quant score was just above average rather than exceptional, like that of most other candidates). Before I could thoughtfully ponder her question, my hubris spoke up, loudly. My defiant response of, “I’d ask my peers for help in exchange for my help in all of the other subjects” landed me square on the waitlist…where I remained.

I ended up at UCLA, which was where I wanted to go, rather than felt like I had to go if I got in. When my classmates did, in fact, start running Accounting and Finance circles around me, I didn’t ask for their help in exchange for mine. Instead I dramatically orchestrated an existential crisis. How could this be happening? What is the point of it all? Why me? It must be the schools’ (teachers’? other students’? government’s?) fault. Maybe I could write someone a sternly worded letter.

Rather than humbly admitting that I had struggled with the Maths since my teen years, I convinced myself I was simply out of practice and would catch right up when I decided to. Except that I hate Accounting — and not just the Math part of it. I hate all of it. I hate how black and white it is. I particularly hate the rules — they are just so arbitrary. And as far as I am concerned, arbitrary rules are unjust and should not have to be followed. Damn the man!

Because I neither liked nor was any good at Accounting, my improvement plan consisted mainly of scheduling time to do a massive amount of catch up work, sitting down to do it, getting overwhelmed with how far behind I was, then spending the remainder of the session stressing out and complaining about how horrible it was. Until I got the letter stating that my grades in Accounting put me at risk of expulsion and that I needed a tutor, I had subconsciously believed the mythology of “the gentle(wo)man’s C,” at B-Schools and assumed that surely they’d want my money enough to let my poor grades slide.

Looming expulsion was just the wake up call I needed! It prompted me to put in a few (at least 2) solid hours of concentrated effort until finally, exasperated and distraught, I visited my professor, who gave me some extraordinarily unexpected and welcome advice. He said, “You are never going to be good at Accounting, so don’t waste your energy on it. Just do enough to pass, and really rock your other classes.”

Wait, what? You mean to tell me that I don’t have to be great at everything?!? How come it took me 27 years to hear about this? What a relief! How liberating to realize what a poor decision it is to spend all my time doing things that are not natural strengths of mine, trying to make up for deficiencies rather than accelerate competencies.

Instead of expending all my energy to become subpar in Accounting, I could focus on knocking it out of the park in things that came naturally to me (which I proceeded to do, and not without a small bit of satisfaction in knowing that my A’s in Strategy meant that while I couldn’t create perfect Income Statements or Balance Sheets, or memorize all the tedious rules, I could make good strategic decisions based on them).

I increased my competitive advantage in the areas that had brought me success — vision, intuition, boldness, story telling, problem solving, and negotiation. I became a T/A for Marketing, created independent studies to develop understanding and expertise in niche areas I knew would propel me in the job market, and took an internship that would simultaneously improve my resume and give me useful data for my independent studies (efficiency!).

I also re-learned something that had first been apparent to me when I left school in 8th grade to self-teach my way to a high school diploma at 16, and again when I initially struggled in the structured undergrad environment of the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations: even within established systems, there is room for self direction and innovation at a personal level. If it isn’t working for you, then figure out what does. You benefit no one by attaining mediocrity in a pre-established path. You become exceptional when you bravely carve out a path uniquely suited to your natural abilities. Given the finite amount of time we have each day, why torture yourself to become average at something others are exceptional in?

This goes against the traditional narrative we hear throughout our lives, the noble hard work mantra we cling to, which forces us to commit greater and greater amounts of time to achieving things that have already been accomplished in the same way others have accomplished them.And while I think there is tremendous value in suffering through some things we aren’t good at to learn the fundamentals and build basic knowledge, resilience, and humility, as we move through adulthood we should be working smarter, not just harder.

We are likely to find frustration doing things we don’t like and aren’t good at, and satisfaction doing things we like and are good at. The caveat to this is if you love something and you aren’t good at it, then you might consider pouring the time and energy it takes to bring you up to proficiency, and perhaps that love will be enough to carry you to greatness. Otherwise, you are doomed to a very hard-earned mediocrity.

Don’t waste your precious time and energy — figure out what you are good at and commit those resources to become great at it.

-Your Hire Self

Hire Power Questions

How do you know if you are good at something? How do you know where your talents lie? Like all self-directed pathways in life, you can start with a self-assessment.

1. What am I known for? What do people think or say about your talents? What do they tell you that you are good at? Sometimes actions speak louder than words. What do they come for your help on? What do they trust you with or ask assistance on? What do they ask your advice about? What can they rely on you to know or do? If they were on a career-centric “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” when would you get the “phone a friend” call? If they were picking teams, what would you be the first draft pick for?

2. What are the outputs of my work? What have you created, made, or completed? What does your work show? What is in your portfolio? What are the fruits of your labor? What have you got to show for yourself young lady/man?

3. How have I demonstrated my talent? Sometimes the things we create are not things someone is willing to pay us to do at this stage of our career. If you can’t identify outputs/outcomes to your work, then what have you done to show where your talents lie?

4. How has my work been received? Unfortunately, being good at something exclusively in your own eyes is not going to get you very far in terms of your career. How have the things you are good at been recognized by your boss(es), colleagues and peers? How has your work led to (or not led to) promotions, raises, opportunities, awards, good reviews, etc.? And if it hasn’t led to these things, why has it not led to them? You know, besides the fact that that your colleagues are morons who wouldn’t know good talent if it slapped them in the face…

5. What does my academic record show? What do you have training in? What subjects have you performed well in? Be careful to recognize that getting good grades can be a skill in and of itself, which does not correlate with actually doing well with the subject matter in an applied setting. That being said, if you have spent years learning a subject, you probably have at least some foundation in it.

6. What can I do well with very little time or effort? What takes you less time than it takes others? What can you complete with minimal effort or relative ease? This is not to say that you should always do things that are easy, rather that ease shows propensity, which means you can do more complex aspects of this work more easily than someone else without that propensity might do it.

7. What can I do better than anyone? What is your momma most proud of? What does she tell stories about to all of her friends? When do you shine? You aren’t one to toot your own horn, but if you were, you’d probably talk about how great you are at _______?

8. What is my proudest achievement? Winning a hundred team beer pong tournament in grad school like I did isn’t applicable here (although it is as good as currency in some circles). I mean, for serious. What have you overcome, defeated, triumphed over, in your hero’s journey?

9. Under what circumstances am I most productive? Understanding what you are good at includes understanding how you are good at it. Do you do your best work on a team? Under time constraints? In low-pressure situations? In creative environments? All alone? After exercising? After a solid procrastination session?

10. If I were asked to teach a class about something in ten minutes, off the cuff, what would I teach? What do you KNOW that other people should know too? What would you be comfortable enough to teach? What is your spouse or lover sick of hearing you talk about, you stinking know-it-all?

11. What am I ready to let go of? On what have you spent too much time and energy trying to become proficient, only to be left frustrated and fruitless? What is sucking away energy that could be used to excel in something else?

12. What am I not good at? Ok, this question is for the advanced among you. Some of you may be facing a meta-problem here because you are not good at knowing what you are not good at. If you can’t think of anything you are not good at, then please stop reading my posts because they aren’t going to help you. Either because you aren’t ready for them or because you are perfect and don’t need them. Maybe you could write a post about how I can be more like you?

13. Where is most of my time and energy going? Are you spending your time maximizing your natural abilities, and minimizing time spent on things that don’t come naturally to you? Or are you constantly running one step behind, trying to compete with someone whose natural talent in an area means that you are always coming up short?