20 OCTOBER 2017

written by Mike

WHAT ARE

YOUR STRENGTHS?

It is easy to get excited about new trends, latest tech, attractive and innovative opportunities.
Even by looking at podcasting, everyone seems to be excited about the medium.
Podcasts are getting popular and more people are taking upon them – celebrities, actors, radio personalities are using the audio as the latest opportunity to expand the brand or business.

Everyone’s on it now! I’ve gotta do something!

While it is usually a right business decision to be the first mover, in my opinion analysing strengths and weaknesses and then planning strategy based on that is a better bet.
The first step should be identifying what you are best at.
Let’s say you do want to start podcasting,
Do you want to be the host? Or maybe a writer? Sound editor?
Or run an advertisement company?

Then think if you are best suited for the role.
For example, I like to sing but I know that even with the best training I would not be the best singer, I’m not naturally skilled at it.
Same with sports like basketball or football. I can train to be very good, but it’s not something that comes easy for me.
Identifying the strengths and being self-aware will help you in the long run.

Base skill does not have to be narrow either, next thing should be thinking about what do you like to do.
Maybe it’s reading books?
Does it mean that you should be an author?
Does not hurt to try, but if your strength is not writing but communication and social skills, then maybe being a literary agent is a better choice.
Connect the dots between your strengths and your likes.

Next will be getting the third leg of the stool – what job can you do?
It’s easy to say follow your passion, advice that we hear every day from people who made it to the top.
Unfortunately is not that simple.
Once you start charging money for your hobby, it’s not a hobby anymore – it becomes a job.
It doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy your work, quite the opposite – you should like it, but even with something creative like writing music or writing books it’s can become a struggle.

If you want to get paid, understand that there will be times when you don’t feel inspired, but still have to do the work.
Also, it’s crucial to understand where the future jobs and trends are going.
Over time, specific jobs fade and go away, and new ones come into place. Staying flexible and unafraid of change will help you in the coming years as automation becomes more common in our lives.

So, for now, you have a base skill, your likes and job trends. Finding something in the middle is extremely hard and may take you a while to narrow.
Also, your likes and strengths can change over time.

You may have an excellent eye for aesthetics which prompt you to train as a graphic designer which you might have enjoyed for few years.
What if you eventually get bored?
Or design stops being as lucrative as it was a few years back?

You could make a change to brand strategy, social media marketing or VR design. The turn will be easy to make as you would have years of experience behind a belt and your natural knack for aesthetics will still play a significant role.

That all sounds great but what if you are not sure what you are good at?
Not all is lost!
A good exercise would be to ask people around you, your friends, your colleagues, your workmates.
Ask them what do they think you are good at?
Is it speaking? Empathy? Drawing?

The further the relation, the better. The easiest is to ask your parents, but their answer will be the most biased.
Get ten people to take your ‘survey’. Tell them you want to change careers or looking for a new direction, looking for their help.
See if any of the answers repeat and how different are they from what you thought.

Usually, we know, deep down, what we want to do and what are our strengths.
More than often we still need external validation to take the leap and to act hence personal coaching or business coaching is always so popular.

Take personal training, it’s easy to find workout routines online and design a schedule on your own but more than often people train much harder when someone is looking over their shoulder.
It doesn’t need to be a personal trainer it may be a workout buddy.

It’s not easy to find something that you are good at, that you enjoy and that it makes you enough money to keep doing it.

I think it was Seth Godin who said that it is better to have a successful business than a passion that fails as a business.

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