My #LinkyBrain Confession

Last week I stumbled across the term #LinkyBrain which was appearing across my LinkedIn feed. The articles I read immediately resonated — I am a “LinkyBrain” and here is my confession.

Before I dive in, a bit of background. The LinkyBrain movement started last month with Doug Scotts confession (http://www.droug.co.uk/month1-life-jim-not-know/) and seems to have grown exponentially since then — If you want to know more, have a read of Alex Dunstons post or take a look at https://linkybrains.com

I have been lucky enough to work in digital agencies for the last 14 years, since leaving university which constantly gives me new challenges and keeps my LinkyBrain busy. I started out as a developer, but got bored of sitting behind a machine at a desk all day so my job title for past 10 years has been some variation of project / delivery manager.

Here are some things I have learned about by #LinkyBrain:

1. I make big impulse decisions & they seem to always turn out well. If I spend too long analysing something, I might talk myself out of it and regret it later
2. I just ‘get’ things — I get frustrated when others don’t, as I want to move on to the next thing
3. I like learning new things, but like putting them into action more
4. I drink too much caffeine — maybe this is why I can’t sit still!
5. Despite being successful, I have imposter syndrome (how did I get to the postion of ‘Global Head of Delivery’!)
6. Everyone who knows me (except my wife) would probably say I’m an extrovert, but I’m pretty sure I’m an introvert
7. I like causing chaos and disrupting the status quo to see how things will turn out
8. I’m still a child at heart — I don’t understand why other parents in the trampoline park are sat drinking tea instead of trying to do backflips
9. I’m lazy — if there is an easy way to do something, that’s how I will do it — why waste time trying to do things the hard way
10. I like helping & mentoring people — I’m not so good at accepting help
11. If something interests me, I’ll learn about it until I get bored and move onto the next thing — the result is that I’m a super generalist
12. I like building things with my hands and cooking — I think this is to counter that everything in my professional life is digital
13. When I set my mind to something, I’m super productive and so a great job
14. I absorb things from those around me. For example if I’m working with a designer, my presentations become prettier.
15. I love workshops — getting loads of brains together and coming up with new ideas and solutions excites me
16. My brain is great at making connections, doing maths and logic — When I work with people who have different & complimentary skills we can achieve much more than on our own
17. Conversations get much more done than long emails back and forth
18. Difficult conversations only get harder the longer you leave them
19. Inefficiency frustrates me. If I can find a way to make something easier, or quicker I will do
20. I encourage reuse of things I know work, so we can focus on the new / hard things
21. I find it quite easy to empathise with people and understand their drivers and goals — I use this to help us both achieve what we want
22. Writing is difficult

If any of this resonates, I’d encourage you to write your own confession and learn more about #LinkyBrains

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