Success Comes When You Do What You Are

How often as leaders have you heard these comments or observed the parallel behaviors?

  • I can’t do that.
  • I’m not trained to do that.
  • It’s not who I am.
  • It’s just a job for me.
  • I’m not passionate about what I do.
  • There is nothing more frustrating to people than to be asked to do a job they a) can’t do b) don’t want to do or c) are not passionate about.For years, I did what I was asked to do. I was good at it, but not passionate about it. Then one day I was asked my opinion about a service issue, not knowing who I was speaking too (my bad, it was the CEO who I’d never met. There were 70,000 employees, so forgive my ignorance), I answered confidently with my solution.A month later I was called to serve on a senior think tank as they worked and strategized to implement my suggestion.Suddenly I was fulfilling my passion. I Was Doing What I Am.
  • Creating and designing.
  • Visionary thinking.
  • Solving problems.
  • Thinking globally.
  • Building consensus.
  • Communicating both verbally and in writing.
  • Setting goals.
  • Taking the message to the world.
  • Years later, I got to know why I was so passionate and successful with my work. I completed a Business DNA Natural Behavior Discovery assessment and was given detailed insight into the core of who I am.Related: When Botox Affects Your PortfolioRelated: Advisors: Are You Fooled By Your Own Bias?Suddenly everything lined up. I knew that trying to be successful outside my uniqueness would only bring heartache. But I also learnt what a powerful asset I am to an organization, and that alone increased my confidence.I didn’t just get to understand my hardwiring in terms of my talents. I also now know that I’m very focused, and prefer to operate alone; private, serious, and reserved; and would rather socialize with close associates than with strangers. So, you can imagine, I needed to learn how to work in a team. And having these DNA insights meant I could figure out how to do that.I also got to understand the importance of reigning in my spontaneity – born I’m sure out of my passion for what I do. This insight is just a tiny part of what the Business DNA Natural Behavior Discovery revealed to me.The phrase, often used by career specialists, do what you love is outdated. Instead of focusing on doing what you love, do what you are, based on understanding your unique talents.When leaders get to recognize that behaviors — caused by unmanaged human differences, pressure and emotions — derail performance, then they can guide their people to achieve greater self-empowerment so that they make behaviorally smart decisions, accelerating their performance to live a quality life with meaning, delivering the results the business needs.But don’t take my word for it. Give it a try and experience your own unique human performance acceleration. Then you can do what you are