Who’s managing your talent?

Your manager, HR department, recruitment consultant? Maybe you have coach. Is it your best friend or partner? The answer is all of these and none.

Let me explain.

Your talent is exactly that, your talent. It’s your responsibility to manage and nurture the talent that you have always had. Others have input, sure, but give away responsibility for managing your talent and you turn into at best, a puppet for others to use for their own ends or worse a mish mash of ideas and thoughts of others.

I am a firm believer that people don’t change. We can adjust, we can develop, we can go toward positive natural behaviours and walk away from the negative one’s, but full on change just doesn’t happen.

If you are shaking your head now lets look at biology. You are born with a genetic make-up with a combination of genes from your ancestors. A bit like a big lottery machine. The genetic lottery machine throws out a combination of genes when you are born and that’s your lucky number. It may have given you a terrific talent for music or art or maths or a charismatic voice or long legs. What ever it gave you it gave them to you in a unique combination. You can’ t go back into the machine and pick a few more you prefer. That’s it like it or lump it. If you want to blame any one blame your parents, their parents and so on. The best you can do is just get on with it.

Now we have that sorted out; You may feel that it is limiting; but it is part of the human experience to always want we haven’t got. Also everyone else has only got what they have. Chances are if they are successful they have been making the most of their inherent talents. Yep it may be that they went to a better school had a pony or blonde hair, but stop looking at what others have and begin to see what you have;and chances are others are just as envious of you as you are of them.

Once you know what it is you have you can do something about making what you have the best it can be and to fulfil the potential; that the genetic lottery machine gave you.

First thing first, start off with an inventory. What talents do you think you have, what talents do others think you have. You may find synergy or you may find the answers you get as surprising.

Now what’s all this got to do with leadership? Well if we agree that your talent is there all along then it will mean that you may have natural leadership qualities. I again believe that leaders are born not made and that the combination of genes you have either make you a leader or a follower. If you are a follower I doubt if you are even reading this blog, so I am going to summise you are a leader you have leadership qualities and you need a bit of help and support to bring them out and develop. In other words how do you become the best version of yourself?.

1) Take a good long honest look at who you are what you stand for.
2) Get 2 other people who you know who you can rely upon to be honest and ask them what they think the answers to the above questions are.
3) Now you have a talent inventory you can score yourself. Look at each one and ask what is the best this can be? On a scale of 1-10 how close to it are you?
4) Once you know what your talents are, how close are you to making them really brilliant you can work on getting closer to the full potential everyday.

How to get close to your potential?

You need to take control, manage your own talent. When the above has been done (the hard bit) it now gets easier, it’s just consistency and discipline.

1) Keep a diary. Make notes of the challenges and success’s in your development. It’s good to make a mistake once, it’s forgivable twice a third time is a no no, with a diary youi can manage this.
2) Keep checking in. Remember those friends, tell them what you are doing, how they can help you and get feedback regularly. You never know this may even help them.
3) Read and learn from others. Look at your list of talents, seek others out who have what you have and go and see how they do it, learn from the experts in the field, Communicate with them. You never know where this kind of connection may lead
4) Help others, as you learn from others let others learn from you. Do you recognise yourself in others, take them under your wing and mentor them it could be an excellent experience for all.

It’s your responsibility to take control of your own talent and it’s long term nurturing and management.

Coaching question. 1) What would it mean for my future if my talent was truly exposed? 2) What is my unique leadership quality which makes me stand out of the crowd. 3) What is the next opportunity I have to expose this talent to the world.