T Shaped Skillsets

If an “I” shaped skillset is very deep in one area and not much else, a “T” shape is a skillset that’s deep in one area (the vertical part of the T) with some general knowledge of others (the horizontal part of the T).  Generally these folks have a broader range of interests or responsibilities than someone who is “I” shaped, resulting in a broader skillset.  These individuals may also have been on the path to be an “I” shape and made the conscious (or not!) choice to broaden vs. deepen their skillset.

I find “T” shapes to be good at putting together a broader picture, or investigating new areas (think a Business Systems Analyst, project manager, etc).  Their broad skillset allows them to more easily interface with other groups and understand new topics at a higher level, while their single deeper skill can have them either leading or assisting where an “I” shape would be.  These individuals can take the place of an “I” in some areas, but you need to be careful since the depth of the “T” tends to be shallower than that of an “I”.

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The upside of a T

T-shaped skillsets result in an individual to have one area of in-depth focus.  It also results in them having at least a passing familiarity with other areas of the business, systems or processes.  This allows them to dig into one area of expertise, while also making it easier for them to flex into other areas or to draw from their other experiences.  This more rounded approach can result in more novel solutions to challenges, or help break out of challenges than an “I” shape may get stuck on.

“T” shapes also tend to be more open to exploring new areas or learning new skills.  This makes them useful in situations where different teams or groups have to come together as they can “talk the talk” of both sides.  In addition, the depth of the “T” can have them serving as the technical expert as well, eliminating the need to bring in more resources.  While each individual and situation will have it’s own requirements, having someone who is more flexible on the team can be a huge help.  This deeper expertise also makes it easier for them to work with “I” shaped individuals in a similar field; they’ll very likely share many concepts, skills and ideas.

The downside of a T

While a “T” shape does allow for some in-depth expertise, it is uncommon that it will be as in-depth as an “I” shaped skillset.  This is generally due to the “T” shape drawing energy away to build the general skillsets, however, may also relate to the interest an individual has in any one area.  Some folks simply aren’t interested enough to learn EVERYTHING about a particular area, so use the time that would be spent drilling deep to expand into other areas.  This can be detrimental as the “T” shaped skillset may not be able to handle the complexity of some scenarios, requiring more resources.

While “T” shapes have a breadth of skills, the depth of many of them may be lacking.  This could be due to a lack of need (e.g. “I know enough project management to get by”), lack of resources (“I never got formal training) or lack of interest (“I started learning XYZ but got bored”).  This may result in situations where a “T” quickly gets in over their head.

Managing a T

As noted “T” shapes offer a lot of advantages.  Not only do they have a single deep skillset, they have many other skills that can be applied.  This makes them great for throwing at problems that relate to the area of interest as they’ll be able to apply multiple tools or ways of thinking to the challenge.  This may also be hazardous since they may end up over their head.  Unless they’ve learned to raise a flag for help (or are closely watched) this can quickly lead to big problems.

The depth of a “T”’s area of focus may also not be as deep as you need for any particular task.  While they may seem to know enough, they can quickly get blind-sided by some obscure or specific thing that they don’t know how to handle.  While this can be mitigated by their broader skills (e.g. knowing how to ask for help, how to research the problem, etc.) it can lead to project delays or other challenges.  Until you’re at a stage where you can gauge their comfort, it may be beneficial to regularly check in to see what support they need.

You can support a “T” by learning if they want to deepen their focus, or expand their range.  Deepening their focus may involve getting them more specialized training, pairing them up with an “I” (or another “T”) who has the same focus, or letting them take on more challenging work in that area.  This will give them a deeper focus, but may also reduce their breadth.  Supporting their range could involve assigning them to work on projects related to their focus (e.g. if they’re a lawyer put them on something just outside their speciality), or embedding them on other teams to learn how they work.  This will increase their breadth, but may reduce the depth of their focus.

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If you’re a T

Understanding where your focus is and how wide you want your breadth to get is important to being a successful “T”.  Knowing the limits of your focus is critical to knowing when to ask for help or call in support, and will also help you learn where you can expand (if you choose to).  Knowing how wide your skillset goes will help you avoid flinging yourself off the deep end.

You may also end up being the swiss army knife on your team - the one person who can be counted on to assist anywhere.  Clearly communicating those boundaries to your team will also help you avoid situations where you’re expected to perform but have no clue what’s happening.  While your interest and skills may be broad, they do have limits!  That said, these can be great opportunities to expand your general skills since they’ll be new.

"I" shaped skillsets

Individuals with an “I” shape of skills have one focused their time on delving deep into a single skill.  This means they’ll know everything about a specific tool, concept or area, which tends to make them excellent resources for those topics.  This focus can, however, lead to other skills not being as strong as they could (or should) be.  For example, a technical resource who is incredibly knowledgable about yoru system, but cannot effectively communicate, or a lawyer who knows everything about their area but is incredibly abrasive in interpersonal interactions.

“I” shaped skillsets may not be very common in smaller environments, if only because the level of challenges that crop up on a regular basis don’t necessitate their skills.  Frequently this results in these individuals working as consultants or contractors so they can stay busy.

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The upside of an I

Folks with I shaped skillsets are incredibly important to successfully completing large and complex projects.  This is mainly due to their in-depth understanding of the topic at hand, which tends to allow them to either foresee challenges before they crop up, or deal with them if they do.  While “T” shaped folks or “broken combs” may also possess some amount of skill in those areas, they rarely get to the depth that someone with an “I” shaped skillset can delve.

This means folks with an “I” shaped skill set are great to throw at large, complex problems that fit in their wheelhouse.  Their experience and background will give them a good idea of where to begin tackling the problem, and since they’ve done it all before they’ll know what steps need to be taken and when.  Their innate desire to learn about that topic will also result in them continuing to sharpen their skill set, either through formal training, experimentation or networking with others in their field.  This makes them a great resource for trying new things and getting the most out of their work.

The downside of an I

Given the immense amount of time and focus it takes to develop a single set of skills this deeply, “I” shaped skillsets tend to leave folks lacking in some areas.  When unrecognized this can lead to some severe challenges with projects, as this individual will keep chugging along their path without realizing other areas may need attention.  For example, understanding the need to communicate changes to a project’s scope is incredibly important, however, if I’m entirely focused on a technical buildout I may not share that information in time.

The extreme depth of skillset an “I” shape offers also can make it hard to find one.  This is less a challenge for that person, and more for someone seeking those skills.  This can lead to increased market demand, as well as scarcity (think back to how hard it can be to find an expert in some smaller fields).  The focus on one particular area may also blind this individual to learning about other areas, potentially leading to not fully understanding how their work interacts.

Managing an “I”

Managing an I

The best advice I can provide here is to learn to identify when someone has an “I” shaped skill set and where that skillset ends.  Theres a number of signs that will help indicate an “I” shaped skillset:

• Long history with one technology, concept, etc. - Individuals who have specialized over a number of years in one field may tend to be “I” shaped.

• Disinterest in other areas - Not expressing interest in other disciplines, ideas, etc. while focusing entirely on one is also a good indication.

Knowing where these edges are allows you to find ways to support them, whether it be through integrating them with a team of “T” or “broken combs” to help fill out the gaps, or someone skilled in managing “I” shapes.  You can also look for groups of “I” shapes and have them work together.  This can result in multiple folks with deep skill sets playing off each other and performing great work… you just need to be careful they all aren’t blind to each others areas.

Being direct, and repetitive, with communication can help avoid potential problems as well as folks in the “I” shaped bucket sometimes end up assuming others will fill in the gaps, or simply forget to take specific actions (e.g. communicating updates).  Consistently connecting with them (or putting them on a team that’s stronger in those areas) can help maximize their impact.  Helping ensure their schedules are cleared can also be helpful as it allows these folks to focus their time.

If you’re an “I”

Similar to someone managing an “I” the best thing you can do is to be aware of where your skill sets end.  Knowing this boundary will help you work with a team (since you can call out where someone else needs to step in), and where you can choose to improve.  Knowing the depth of your skill is also important, as many folks will turn to you for all the answers about a specific area.  While you may be a super-expert, there’s always *something* you don’t know… and know that edge is just as important and knowing everything else.

Asking for feedback on how to improve your overall performance is also a great (if not uncomfortable) idea.  There’s no expectation that you master other areas or take on more work, but there may be some simple and straight forward things you can do to help keep things running.

Skill Shapes

Everyone is different (citation needed).  This part of our reality impacts every aspect of our interaction with folks, but in this particular piece we’ll look at how it impacts our work.  There are many different ways to try and quantify or qualify our differences, from things like MBTI personality assessments, to background degrees, to more.  Here, we’ll focus on our skillsets, and how our understanding of others (And our own) can impact our work.

One straightforward way to look at skill sets is to group them into “T”, “I” and “Broken Combs”.  These three classifications are useful to understand where an individual’s strengths lie, and how they can be best utilized to tackle any given challenge.  They can also be used to dig into past projects or events to better understand why things went the way they did.  I’ll start with a high-level of each of these, then dig into them more in the coming weeks.  Note that none of these is necessarily better or worse than any other - they’re just tools to help understand people a bit better (yourself included!).

Skill Shapes

I-shaped people

I (like the capital I or lowercase l) shaped people tend to have one deep skillset… and not much else.  These individuals are valuable where in-depth knowledge is needed for a particular area - specific programming languages or systems, business processes etc.  In my experience I-shaped people tend to be a bit more senior in their career or area, and likely ended up choosing to focus on a particular skillset because they find it interesting, or have a particular talent for it.  Note that this extreme specialization can make it challenging for them to adopt new concepts/ideas, which may lead to blind spots developing.

T-shaped people

T-shaped individuals are similar to I-shapes, in that they have one specific skill they’re much better at (the vertical line in the “T”), however, they also possess at least a passing familiarity with several other skills (the vertical line in the “T”).  This broader exposure of skills allows them to more easily flex between assignments, or to more easily interface with other groups as they may know some background concepts or parts of their systems.  Note that because they also possess a broader skillset, their in-depth knowledge may not be as deep as someone who is “I” shaped.

Broken Combs

Like T-shaped people, broken combs possess basic knowledge in a broad set of skills.  They differ from T-shaped people because they will possess at least 2 skills in more depth (this is where that name comes from… imagine breaking most of the teeth out of a comb).  This allows them to be subject matter experts in several areas, while still maintaining general knowledge of others.  Similar to a T-shape, however, their depth of knowledge in those areas may not be as great an I shaped person.

Each of these shapes offers its own insights, and I will be delving into each of these shapes over the next few weeks. Like many concepts these are not intended to limit or restrict an individual… instead they’re intended to be used to better understand how an individual or team will act (or to explain how it got to a specific situation).

On Forests

While it can be incredibly gratifying and satisfying to immerse oneself in details, keeping an eye on the bigger picture is also incredibly important to success. Not only does understanding how your contributions fit into the grand scale help you understand your work, it also helps you identify and correct potential problems. The challenge is remembering to look up every once in a while and seeing what the spread looks like.

Zooming out

One pitfall many folks fall into is assuming that your manager/director/leadership will be the ones to handle the big picture. They do, after all, sit behind a Bigger Desk. In many ways this is not a bad thought or approach; it’s literally their jobs to concern themselves with the big(ger) picture. This, however, doesn’t excuse those of us working on the details from also understanding, at least to a small degree, that larger picture as well. This expectation also goes both ways; those leaders are also expected to understanding, at least to some degree, how the details work.

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Ensuring everyone involved is at  least aware of the greater picture has a number of benefits - 

• Seeing how your contribution fits in - Knowing that the really boring and tedious spreadsheet work you do will help drive down cost, or make someone else’s life better makes it MUCH easier to accept that work.  Not having this knowledge can result in you internalizing negative feelings around it.

• Avoiding potential problems - Knowing where a project should be headed ,or what it is intended to do, can help you sniff out potential problems before they show up.  This can take the form of helping you rule out specific approaches, altering leadership to specific things and more.

• Broaden skillsets - Most of our time is spent in our specific areas of focus (which is good, it’s why we’re there!).  Getting exposure, and awareness, to the greater picture helps us expand our skillsets, understandings and connections.  This, in turn, rounds us out and helps us be better at our specific area of focus.

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Finding ways to keep an eye on the bigger picture can seem daunting… after all, most of the we’re just focused on our small area of the project.  There are some easy ways to see what else is going on at other levels:

• Just ask - The simplest way I’ve found to learn about the higher levels is just to ask.  Ask around your team and see what you can learn about your project.

• Get involved - Similar to asking, get involved with other aspects of your project. If you’re a sales specialist maybe get time with the operations team to see what they’re doing. If you’re on the tech side, talk to Finance. Something as simple as attending one of their status meetings, or asking them to show you their system can give you a great idea of how they operate.

Annnd a bit further

While learning about the greater forest does take some time and energy, the return is more than worth it. Not only will you get to expand your own skillsets and knowledge, you’ll also help keep the project moving in the right direction. So go ahead, take a moment to stop looking at the trees and see the forest.

On trees

Details are important, it’s where the devil is (citation needed). Details are what allow a plan to come into focus and and idea to have impact. Without them we cannot fully shape what we’re working on, and can never really be sure we’re done with our task. Despite this, we frequently fail to fully understand the details on what we do. We embark on tasks without taking the time to fully examine the minutia that defines our work. Instead, we focus on the higher-level portions - concepts, ideas - that rely on the detailed work to really stand out.

On one hand I can completely understand the desire to avoid really getting into the details… it’s tedious.  It can be boring.  It takes time… and there’s SO much of it.  Even what seems to be a “simple” project contains a ton of details when you zoom in.  Asking questions like “who do we talk to about X”, or “what specific steps are needed to complete this task” makes those “simple” projects seem more complex… after all, we started with just installing a new piece of software, why does that have more than one step?

While it is true getting into details can make projects seem to stretch out, the time is more than worth it for a number of reasons.

• Understanding the whole picture - Taking time to understand the details helps flesh out the entire picture you’re looking at.  It’s similar to looking at a painting and noticing something new… suddenly you understand a new perspective on what the artist wanted to capture.

• Avoiding pitfalls - Knowing the trap is there is the first step to avoid it, and investing energy in the detail work will help uncover potential problems that may have otherwise remain hidden.  While identifying and planning for these challenges adds more time to your calendar, it will pay off by avoiding the need to fix those problems later.

• Improving your skills - Getting into the details also helps you expand your skillset.  You’ll find things you didn’t know were there, or connections suddenly become obvious.  Like any skill, over time you’ll also get better at defining the detailed work, which will reduce the amount of time it takes to reap the benefits of this exercise.

On the other hand, however, I find it baffling when folks consciously avoid the details.  I’m not suggesting that everyone involved in a project needs to be at the most granular level (indeed, executives need to exist at a high level and tend not to have time for detail work), but the project as a whole needs to be aware of details.  Even something as simple and double checking settings on an email account should not be taken for granted (unless you want the whole company to see what’s in there…).  

You can always take 15 minutes to kick around your projects details with your team.  Ask them what’s missing from the plan, and then go find that devil.

On Negative Examples

To preface this piece - negative examples are about finding attributes, outcomes, etc. that you choose to avoid, not necessarily things that have failed.

Frequently we look around a good example of what we want to do.  We find some project, or team, or event that was insanely successful and point at it as a model to follow.  This is a great approach since we can learn from that things success, and then build on it.  It is, however, also important to find negative examples - things that didn’t go the way you want, or things you don’t want to do - to learn from.  These both teach you what can go wrong, but also help provide a better definition to the shape of what you want.

Filling in the edges

Just like how negative space in artwork can define interesting shapes (or even the artwork itself), negative examples at work help us define our outcome.  They allow us to look at another project/outcome/team/whatever and make more informed decisions on how we want to operate.  As noted above, this doesn’t necessarily mean those projects/outcomes/teams are not effective or working properly… just that you choose a different route.  Some examples:

• Methodologies - Agile project management makes a lot of sense…. In certain circumstances.  Many projects, however, will not benefit to the same degree, and some may even suffer.  Watching another project struggle with the wrong methodology can serve as an example for your work, and what to avoid.

• Team structure - How teams are setup differs widely, both between and within organizations.  Looking at other orgs will help you determine the shape of yours.  Maybe the People team has a great structure that’s super successful for them, but for some reason wouldn’t work in Engineering.  Noting that difference, and being able to point out why it wouldn’t be good for your team, will help avoid

• Documentation - While there are some more standardized ways to document material, at some point it comes down to specifically how a team operates, and choices they make in cataloging information.  Understanding why another group’s decisions wouldn’t be the best for your needs will help you better shape what would be best for you.

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When finding negative examples it is important to keep any judgement of good/bad or any blame out of your assessment.  The intention is to help identify what the best solution for your particular need, not to pass judgement on how someone else operates (which may be best for them).

Planning to (not) Fail

Failing to plan

is planning to fail

It’s a rather straightforward idea, and I’d bet most of us have heard that quote at some time, but it seems like many of us don’t really understand it, or at least we don’t put as much energy into it as we should.  Planning is one of those things where you can do TOO much of it; indeed, many daily tasks don’t really need much, if any.  That said, anything bigger, or more complex, definitely benefits from more planning.  To help keep things simple, I try to break planning into three areas… from smaller to bigger - my week, projects and my career.

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For your week

Before the week begins (generally on a Sunday) I take time to review what’s coming up.  This involves going over my calendar, project tracking system (e.g. Asana, JIRA, sticky notes, etc), emails, etc. to see what’s coming up.  I spend a bit of time reviewing my recurring meetings (one on ones, team meetings, etc) just to ensure I’m up to date on the agenda and plan, but I particularly go through my non-recurring meetings.  These can sneak in over time, so I’ve found it’s very important to dig into them.  Where possible I rearrange things to make better sense of my time, for example I cluster 30 minute meetings to give me more blocks of time to work, or I bow out of things I”m not needed for.  This helps me better focus my time during the week, and lets me identify areas that need particular help.

For a project

Individual projects also get their own planning attention.  This can range from scheduling out meetings with vendors, to thinking through how to handle various stakeholders, to mapping when deliverables are needed.  While it can be annoying and a bit time consuming, the energy spent on continually improving project plans has consistently paid off in terms of better outcomes, less stress and avoiding mistakes.

I make a point to put project planning onto my calendar on a weekly basis as an event.  This ensures I’ve got the time blocked off, and also lets others know I value and prioritize this work.  I also send out weekly project updates (depending on the project these can be as short as a one-line update or as long as a page).  Writing these not only keeps everyone up to date (assuming they read them!), but also forces me to look at my portfolio and really understand what’s going on.  Time time helps support my overall project planning as I’m constantly examining what’s going on

If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll end up someplace else.” ~Yogi Berra

For a career

Planning where we are going in our career is one of the longest things we can plan for.  These types of plans generally span years, if not decades, and can seem very daunting to put together.  I try to break them down into very distant, fuzzier plans, and slowly bring up the clarify and focus as I get closer to today.  I tend to not get any closer than 1 year from now, as project or weekly planning can handle that time frame, but understanding the bigger picture is critical to the rest.  How can I decide which project to go after if I don’t know where I want to be in a year or five?  Having that knowledge gives you a lens to focus your efforts, something that helps sort through everything and provide guidance on what you should do to attain your goals.

Bring Solutions

“Don’t bring your manager problems. Bring them solutions.”

We’ve all been in situations where we’ve found something that needs to be done/fixed/corrected/etc.  Our kneejerk response to finding these things is to point them out, to tell our manager/coworker/spouse that we found a problem.  This isn’t a bad thing... After all, we’re flagging a problem for others, and that’s the second step to getting it solved (number one being identifying there’s something wrong at all).  Indeed, many folks don’t even take the first step of identifying things that need fixing, which itself is a fascinating topic.

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The weakness with this approach however, is it’s passive.  We’re telling everyone “Hey, I found something broken”, and nothing else.  There is certainly value in this, since now others are aware of the thing, however, you’re basically just making work for other people.  Now that it’s a known problem, your manager/team/parents/whoever, need to figure out what to do about it.  Suddenly someone else now has move work on their plate… work that you basically gave to them.

Bringing solutions

Instead of pointing at a thing and saying it’s broken, instead point out how you’re going to fix the problem.  For example, instead of “We scheduled the wrong flights for our vacation”, try something like “I noticed our flights were for the wrong dates, I’ve already emailed the airline to get them changed”.  Or how about instead of “All of these new hire records have the wrong hiring manager”, try “I’ve found that 54 new hires have the wrong hiring manager, here’s a list of their correct ones that I’d like to update”.

I always try to think through what I would like to get if the problem was brought to my attention and work backwards from there before I send out any communication.  Is there background info I should be including?  Are there statistics or other numbers that would be helpful (e.g. the total number of errors, people impacted, etc)?  Are there other folks that should be informed or brought into the discussion?  These questions help me shape what I pass along, and help shorten the time from “see thing broken” to “thing is fixed”.

What’s in it for you

This approach lets others know about the danger, and also demonstrates you’ve thought it through and have a fix in place.  You’re both saving them time by presenting a fix, and also demonstrating your initiative/skill/etc in fixing it.  By presenting both at once you’re also giving them an opportunity to weigh in… maybe they have a different fix in mind, or some new approach they could teach you. Regardless, you’ll end up in a more positive spot overall… either having solved the problem yourself, or gaining something valuable as a result.

You Gotta Ask

“Better to be thought a fool for a moment than to remain ignorant for your lifetime”

I’m not 100% sure where I first heard that quote, but it has helped me immensely both in my personal and professional lives.  We’ve all had those situations where we’re not 100% sure what someone said, or what they mean… or even if they’re talking to US.  We’ve all also had that lingering thought of “well, I don’t want to sound stupid….”, so instead of asking a question, we keep our mouths shut.  And we’re lesser for it.

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Our ego’s are incredibly annoying things.  While they do have some positive qualities (helping us acknowledge when we succeed, being a CLEAR signal for failures, etc), here I’m more interested in their negative qualities as it relates to the quote above.  Specifically, our fear that our ego will be hurt if we ask a “stupid” question.  There’s many thoughts on “stupid” questions (see if you can figure out which one I ascribe to based on the quotes), ranging from “there’s not stupid questions, only stupid people” to “there’s no such thing”.  Regardless of one’s philosophical approach to them, however, we still fear asking one, because it can change how others perceive us.

Speak up

This perception is heavily influenced by the culture of the group we’re with (e.g. teams with higher psychological safety will likely perceive less threat by asking questions), but that inner fear can still exist.  Knowing how to overcome that fear is an essential skill, that not only helps you get better at asking questions, but can avoid some amazingly terrible situations.  In each of these examples (and by no means is that a complete list!), taking a few moments to speak up can avoid a world of hurt.

For example:Not getting clarification on what someone needs from you… then delivering the wrong thing.

• Not asking for follow up information on a potential risk… and then having to deal with that risk.

• Not asking how to take your medication and taking the wrong dose.

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In addition to help avoid potential downsides, speaking up and asking for clarifications also helps improve how others perceive you.  Asking questions about the topic at hand tells others you’re paying attention to what’s going on.  (While I’d like to think everyone always pays attention in meetings, somehow I don’t think that’s the case).  By extension, this signals you’re interested in the topic, which is always a good thing to show.  

Asking questions also helps others understand your level of comfort and experience with the topic.  I’m not suggesting that asking questions will make others think you’re inexperienced and a fool, but rather the questions you ask will help them know where you best fit into the solution.

Personal Growth

Questions will also help you expand personally.  Not only will you learn something new (or avoid potential problems), you’ll get valuable practice asking questions.  This sounds silly, but the more you ask clarifying questions, the more comfortable you’ll get with asking questions.   This in turn, will give you more access to knowledge, and help you improve overall.  So ask away, you can never chase away too much ignorance.

Keep communicating until they tell you to stop

Communication, like breathing, is one of things that humans must absolutely do in order to survive (citation needed).  Since we’re born until we die we’re constantly communicating something, in some way.  This means we’re effectively practicing this skills all the time… which only makes it more interesting that we’re all (generally) so bad at it.

90%

They (PMI in this case) tells me that 90% of project management is communication.  I would further this, and say that 90% of our jobs, and general existence in reality, is communication.  We tell our loved ones we miss them.  Our children communicate that they’re hungry.  Our co-workers communicate status updates.  Even NOT communicating can be perceived as communicating (after all, ignoring someone tells them something…) (also, if you don’t notice someone is trying to communicate, you’re effectively communicating to them you’re oblivious).

On the plus side, we use this skill ALL the time.  This would suggest that we should be getting better at it as we go.  On the downside, we’re rarely consciously trying to improve this skill, meaning all that practice time is effectively wasted.

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Shooting free-throws in basketball is a great analogy.  Once approach would be to just continually shoot the ball again and again and again.  Another approach would be to shoot the ball, then stop and honestly think about what you could do better (or not do at all).  The first approach might get you more repetitions, however, the second will give you conscious improvement.  Sure, it’s a bit of a pain to stop and critically examine yourself (not to mention ego-brusing at times), but the feedback gives you much better results.

Communication is no different.  Many of us get TONS of reps in during the week… but many of us also fail to stop and think about how we can make those reps better (When was the last time you asked yourself if you’re communicating the right way?).

Repeat

One of the best pieces of advice I got on how to improve communication is to simply keep doing it until someone tells you to stop.  Need help with a project?  Keep bringing it up in different ways at different times until you get help.  Need to let someone know when you’re available and you’d like to talk?  Keep talking/texting/emailing until they get the point.  This doesn’t mean send them an email every 10 seconds, but keep up the communication until you’re heard, and you know they heard you.

The good news is this skill is relatively easy to practice.  The next time you need to communicate something you feel is important, pick at least 5 different times (and ideally different ways) of communicating that.  One example of this:

1. Bring up your idea/need/etc. During a team meeting

2. Send a followup email immediately after the meeting.

3. Drop a slack message to folks the next day

4. Two days later send another followup email

5. The day after that bring it up in your meeting again

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The point here is to ensure others received, and more importantly, understood, your message.  By hitting them at different times in different ways you help ensure you cut through the noise (e.g. the 10000 other emails they have), and solicit any questions.  And if all else fails, at the very least you have a great “paper” trail of your attempts.

Flexibility

In any given day I find myself coaching team members, managing projects, investigating bugs, being blindsided by new asks, and many many other things.  Looking back, any given day represents a crazy mix of things, and juggling them all is certainly challenging.  Despite the insanity of it all, I only really find problems when I try to control the flow things, or when I push back directly and reject doing something.  Fortunately the best approach to this isn’t to just accept ALL work that comes my way, but rather to be flexible in what (and how) I accept.

Many roles these days are anything but specific.  Job descriptions provide a rough outline of what a role is, but they can never fully capture what you’ll be doing if you get the job.  Even if they’re fairly well written, they tend to include something like “duties as assigned”, which leaves a HUGE amount of room for other responsibilities to creep in.  This craziness isn’t even touching the randomness that is smaller companies and/or startups!

Handling multiples

The wide range of randomness heading our way requires that our approach shifts from one of “I only do XYZ” to “I do a range of things”.  The trick to finding a good balance within this range isn’t to remain rigid in how we accept things, but rather to be more flexible in what we accept, and more importantly, flexible in how we reject things.  This may be further compounded by who is asking us to help out… for example if a VP is requesting help it can be a smidge harder to dodge that than someone else.

Being flexible in what work or responsibilities we accept has several benefits.  Exposure to new areas/teams/ideas helps improve our overall skill sets.  This can make our current jobs easier (by providing better context, resources, etc), and also opens doors that we may otherwise not have looked at (e.g. cultivating an interest in a new area of the company).  Flexibility also improves our relationships, either by exposing us to people we wouldn’t otherwise work with, or by giving us time to deepen existing relationships.

Being flexible in how we reject work is equally (if not more!) important.  There are times when you’ll decide you can’t/don’t want to take something on.  When asked (or “asked”), straight up saying “no”, while direct, will likely be seen negatively (e.g. “you’re not a team player”), potentially damaging your reputation but also reducing the likelihood you’ll get help in the future.  Instead you need to find a way to bend out of the way.  Suggesting alternatives (“Did you consider asking so-and-so? They’re really good at this”) and pointing out better ways to do the thing (“Instead of manually doing this, did you consider automating it?”) are great approaches that avoid the need for YOU to do the thing, while still helping ensure it can get done.

Flexibility also means being open to changing how you operate.  Especially now with many folks working from home we’ve had to change up how we work.  Resisting the need for video conferencing is basically impossible, so instead of fighting these, flex, and use them.  Sure, it requires some effort and creativity to find new ways to operate, but by making time to update team norms, meeting schedules, and other aspects of work you’ll avoid the discomfort of trying to fight the tide.

Make Time to Connect

Frequently I find myself either directly involved in, or watching, a chain of emails/texts/messages going in circles.  One person asks a question, which is misunderstood or requires followup, which leads to more questions and goes around and around and around.  It is incredibly easy to keep that chain going… after all, we know the other end is reading them, and we think we can get to agreement if we just. keep. emailing.  

Unfortunately this is rarely the case… At best, this results in wasted time as it takes several cycles to get to mutual understanding.  At worst, it results in damaged relationships.  A much quicker (and simpler) approach is to break the cycle and connect - pick the phone (or jump on zoom) and take the 5 minutes to explain things in person.

Tangled

Communications technology is a weird thing.  It allows us to instantly send messages, but weirdly this results in us being further apart instead of closer together.  This could be due to the asynchronous nature of text communication (there’s no way to tell when the receiver will read it), in the static nature of the communication medium (sarcasm, for example is REALLY hard to pickup ion text), or in the assumption that other folks will “just get it”.  Regardless, email or comment wars frequently crop up, with individuals endlessly sending messages hoping ONE of them will make sense to the other side.

We’ve all read a response from someone and wondering how the heck they didn’t understand our message.  We took so much time carefully crafting our message, only for them to somehow miss the point.  So we take more time to carefully craft a response… which is received in a similar manner on their end.  This chain eventually becomes self-sustaining and will continue indefinitely unless someone breaks the cycle (the worst I’ve seen was a ticket with 150+ comments on it running in circles).

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The problem with these cycles isn’t that the folks involved aren’t smart, or well intentioned, or anything about the person.  It’s about the medium and some assumptions we make about it.  Tools like email, slack and @ mentions are great for quickly sending a message around the world… unfortunately they also fail to capture a great deal of information.  Tone is hard to encode in text… so is sarcasm, body language, and basically all of our body language.  We tend to not see verbal communication run in as many circles because we get that additional information… we can see if someone is confused, or more easily pickup on frustration.

We also make assumptions about how we communicate and how others will interpret what we say.  On our end we assume that our message is understandable.  For ourselves this is (hopefully!) true, after all, we wrote it.  For someone else, however, this may not be as correct.  We all filter communication through our own experiences, and others rarely, if ever, have the same experiences we do.  This ties directly into how someone else would interpret our message.  Over time we get more familiar working with folks, but even WITH experience we can send a confusing message.

Finding Clarity

The trick, then, to breaking the circle of endless text communication is to step outside of it and use a different method.  Getting back to a place where non-text information is shared (phone, video chat, etc.) will reduce or eliminate many of the problems pure-text conveys.  By making communication more real-time we also provide immediate opportunities for the other parties to ask clarifying questions or point out challenges immediately.  By both reducing the feedback loop, and providing a richer communications environment, we can make our connections much more impactful.

No Extra

Extra, in some cases, is good.  Extra guac? Please.  Extra time to sleep in? Sure.  Unfortunately on a project, extra can be bad.  At best adding extra to things distorts our view of the request and makes it easy to lose sight of what is actually needed.  At worst it totally derails a project and diminishes its value to your customer.

Adding extra into our work does several things… some obvious, others much less so.  I find that instead of making things better or providing a better output, these additions detract from my deliverable.  Here’s several ways how:

Energy drain

Working on extra stuff that is “better” than our objective distracts us from what we should be doing.   We can tell ourselves we’re helping, or that we can make up the time, or that the actual request is easy to do, we’re just making it harder to complete our objective.  At best we end up putting less energy into our objective, which results in risk that we missed something important, or that the product isn’t as strong as it could be.

Diffused Focus

Working on extra necessarily pulls our focus away from what we should be doing.  Instead of critically examining our request for potential flaws, we’re day-dreaming about something unrelated.  This split focus allows us to make mistakes we otherwise would catch.  Even worse, this can result in less time to figure out the “extra” we thought was so valuable… so instead of delivering what was asked we deliver one thing that was asked that may or may not work, and another thing that wasn’t asked for of questionable use.

Missed Target

Working isn’t done in a vacuum, and we as individuals (and sometimes teams) can’t know everything.  When we make a choice to add extra to a request we’re gambling that we know what’s “best” or “right”.  While we might get lucky and deliver something that is, in fact, useful or valuable, what happens if we’re wrong?  Suddenly we have to explain why we wasted time NOT working on what someone wanted to build something that’s useless.

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I find it fascinating how hard it is to only do what is asked, and nothing more.  It should be an incredibly easy thing to do, but the allure of making it “better” is very hard to resist.  As funny as is it to say, it takes discipline to stay inside the lines.  It is true there will be times when we can push on those lines, and sometimes help redraw them, we need to be very careful not to wander outside them.  Doing so distracts us from our objective, and instead of building us up, only tears us down.

Self-Awareness

Being aware of ourselves is one of the most important skills that we can learn.  That said, from my experience it also happens to be one of the harder skills for people to learn.  Figuring out a new technology or sales technique is easy - we attend the training or we tinker with the tool.  Figuring out how YOU work, what makes you frustrated, what your habits are, however, doesn’t have a class or a seminar.  It’s not something you can REALLY tinker with or take apart.  Instead, it requires a level of critical thinking and truthfully examining yourself. This is, to say the least, a bit daunting.

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On the up-side, there are many versions of things like the Meyers-Briggs (you know, that one that tells you what color you are, and how your color interacts with other colors?) test to help teams uncover their inner operations.  (Or maybe that’s the MBTI, I always get them mixed up…).  These types of exercises are useful, however I find they usually can’t get deep enough in some areas to really dig into self-awareness.  These exercises help point out how an individual may interact in a professional setting, but it ‘s up to the individual to figure out how to apply that across the board.

This makes sense, since many of these assessments are intended to help groups of professionals work together.  They both provide a common language with which to discuss how people work (“you’re an WRST? I get it now, I’m a BEST!”) and also some general guidance for the individual on how to operate.  This works great for groups that all take it together, however, I’ve found them a lot less useful for individuals.

Choices

Work presents an interesting version of this since we can’t really choose who our co-workers are… we’re kind of stuck with whomever’s there at the time.  This differs greatly in our personal lives.  We are, to some extent, stuck with family, however, we do have a great deal more control over those relationships, and who we choose to socialize with.  This makes understanding how, and why, we will/do react in specific ways even more important… we’re consciously choosing to be with these folks instead of being ‘forced’ to.

The same techniques teams use at work to improve themselves can be tweaked to help out in our personal lives.  Some ideas include:

• Regular Retrospectives - Make time each week to reflect on the week and any areas you want to improve.  How did certain conversations go?  Do you understand why you get easily annoyed at something?

• Focus Time - Set aside specific time to take a deeper dive on one area of yourself.  I find journaling is a great approach for this; something about writing things down helps get them out.

• Active Feedback - Find someone you trust to talk over what a blindspot might be or how to improve something.  This helps break down any mental preconceptions of yourself you have, but does require a lot of emotional trust in whomever you speak with.

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This isn’t to say it’s easy… even admitting something to yourself (let alone someone else) about how you think/feel/act can be hard.  That said, it’s certainly worth it.  Getting a better handle on how you will behave in any given situation both makes you more effective and also reduces any surprises on your end.  Over time you’ll also learn more about yourself, in turn making future improvements a little bit easier.

Three Doctors

There’s a parable I heard at some point that’s always stuck with me.  The more I’ve mulled it over, the more I see parallels to work (especially in my field, IT):

A parent had 3 children, all of whom became doctors.  

The youngest was a good doctor, and could cure a disease after it ravaged its patient.  Due to their skill their name was known throughout the country.

The middle child was a better doctor, and could cure disease at the sign of its first symptoms.  Due to their skill their name was known all over their county.

The eldest child was even better, and could cure disease before the patient even knew they were sick.  Due to their skill their name was known throughout their hometown.

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I particularly enjoy the inverse relationship of skill to outcome and the correlation of reputation to severity.  Everyone would agree the eldest child is the best doctor - who wants to get sick?  Despite their immense skill, however, only the people in their home know who they are.  Everyone would agree the youngest child is the most well known doctor - we all know the names of folks who’ve put out massive fires.

Skill vs. Outcome

I heard at some point that a bored IT department is a good thing.  It means everything is working as intended, there are no outages and everyone is happy.  (Think about it, how often do you go hang out with the IT folks except when something breaks?...). (Go hand out with the IT folks more).  While it is possible IT is bored because they’re totally oblivious to problems, it’s also possible they’re incredibly good at planning and preventing problems from cropping up.

You can’t complain about a problem that never happens.  The “problem” with that approach, however, is no one knows that you’ve done anything.  There’s no visible action you’ve taken that helps folks… so they don’t know who you are.  IT can, however, take steps to change that.

Many IT departments publicly release metrics on things like system up time, number of tickets resolved, how long it takes to solve tickets etc.  These metrics help tell the story that may be invisible - how many issues are avoided.  Many groups also proactively reach out to partner teams to inform them of what they’re up to.  Systems updates aren’t as impressive as putting out fires, but they do keep the house from burning down.

Reputation and Severity

Everyone knows someone who is a “fire fighter”, that person who can come into a terrible situation and somehow fix it.  These folks are certainly necessary as bad things happen… but it’d be much better if those problems never happened or were avoided entirely.  Dr. Fauchi is a good example of this.  He is handling an immense task with incredible skill… but in another reality COVID would have been contained and we’d never have heard of him or learned of his skill.

Personally this correlation drives me nuts since it suggests all the preventative work we do is essentially unknown.  Even worse, folks may get rewarded for reacting to problems instead of preventing them from happening (that said, to the best of my knowledge it’s impossible to measure things that don’t happen).

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While I have never found a single “best” solution to this challenge, I’ve found a few things that do work:

• Be proactive with messaging - Ensure your partner teams know what you’re up to (at least at a high level), and that they understand the value to them. Patching a server sounds REALLY boring, until you realize it prevent a massive data breach that just hit someone else.

• Help your team understand the importance of diligence - It feels good to be the firefighter… everyone knows who you are and how good you are (at least at putting out blazes). It can be hard to get folks to shift to prevention, but make the effort to help your team see the value. (Lower blood pressure, for one).

• Culture of sharing - Fires sometimes spring up when someone doesn’t feel comfortable raising a concern or admitting a mistake. I’ve found that calling out my own mistakes in our team communications has helped de-stigmatize this a lot (it also helps others avoid the same problem). Encourage others to do it as well, and soon folks won’t feel as bad if they do make a mistake.

Standards

Standards exist in every discipline.  Effective Dates in Workday, Boolean logic in systems, federal regulation in hiring and the color wheel in art are all examples of Standards.  It is certainly possible to get by NOT knowing them, having these tools available on demand makes getting things done significantly easier.  Not only that, it makes working with others in your field easier as well.  A shared vocabulary and understanding enhances collaboration by allowing teams to quickly share information.

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Martial arts are a great example of a group that uses standards.  Generally these are sets of movements or ideas that you need to learn in order to progress.  As a newer student these standards serve as the next hurdle towards rank advancement and as a literal standard everyone your relative experience and rank needs to know.  As a more advanced rank you realize that these don’t just serve to roughly bucket folks by what they know, they serve as the building blocks towards more interesting things.

Professional connection

Professionally standards are generally learned earlier in our careers.  We go after a bachelors degree to get a solid understanding of fundamentals.  Our first jobs teach us basic skills like problem solving and communication.  Our first year(s) coding are spent learning terminology and concepts.  In many cases standards can be codified and taught in a structured way, for example a course at university.  They can also be taught in an unstructured way, copying an existing piece of art/code/whatever, for example.  The former relies on an instructor to help guide you, which is great since you benefit from their skill and experience.  The latter relies on your own self-exploration, which is great since you learn how to learn.

For me it gets interesting once you know the standards in your field.  In them martial arts, for example, the standard forms are interesting and have a very important place in training… but they’re ‘boring’.  They’re the same… we know them (although I can easily argue you can always learn more from them).  Understanding the underlying lessons in them, and then applying them to something new, now that’s interesting.  The same is true in other areas.  We’ve all written a “for” loop that counts to 10, but getting to apply that idea to a webpage that solves a real problem is MUCH more interesting and satisfying.

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Unfortunately reality is a bit grittier; the group you work with my not have the same set of standards.  While this provides an advantage in terms of differences of opinion and skillsets, time and energy can be lost if part of the group relies on standards that, well, aren’t standard.

I find that a lot of groups need up-front time spent agreeing on what the standards are (or even understanding they exist).  This shifts the focus from “lets go build something cool with our collective background knowledge” to “lets agree on what the tools are”.  This can easily feel like a delay in getting to the work at hand, but it is time very well spent.  The start of a project should include time to level set on standards including what specific terms mean, what methodologies or tools will be used and how to communicate.  This will reduce the change of a misunderstanding as to standards and free up time to innovate.

At the end of it all standards are just that.  Standard.  Knowing that something will be the same, regardless of where you happen to be or who you work with, is incredibly powerful.  This common language allows you to look into new topics, and explore old ones in new ways.  They also serve as a fallback, something you can use and rely on when things get pear-shaped.  The trick is to share your standards with others, and to be on the lookout for opportunities to apply them in new and creative ways.

Forward Movement

“When in doubt, go forward.”

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Much of martial arts is about retraining your body.  We’re born with a huge number of instincts, reflexes and hard-coded behaviors to help us stay safe, which are great from an evolutionary perspective… but they’re not always the best approach.  For example, when we fall, we naturally extend our arms towards the ground, absorbing the impact on our palms and joints.  This is great for keeping our heads safe, but at the cost of our arms.  Retraining our body to fall differently, absorbing the impact along the side of our body, results in more safely hitting the ground.

Another example is sparring - our natural inclination is to move directly way from someone attacking us (The “Prometheus School of Running Away from Things”).  This knee-jerk response attempts to put distance between us and danger, but  we’re likely to trip, and will eventually just get run over as they continue forward.  To be successful in a fight, this instinct has to be reprogrammed to instead move in, towards the perceived danger.

Moving in

Ideally we’re able to avoid danger by avoiding it, but when needed this forward movement has a number of advantages.  Once you’re in a dangerous situation it’s usually better to be closer to the source.  This helps keep you out of a danger zone (e.g. it’s really hard to punch someone who’s only an inch away), and also allows you to take steps to neutralize the threat.  In the martial arts context this means closing the distance with your partner so you can protect yourself and attack them.

This physical concept can also be applied in non-phyiscal situations.  While the threats we experience at work at (hopefully) more metaphorical in nature, we can still benefit from moving towards then, rather than away.  Recognizing a teammate doesn’t fully understand what you’re asking them to do, for example, is a threat to your project.  They may not take the correct action, and result in a poorer outcome.  Once you’ve recognized this threat, instead of ignoring it and hoping it’ll take care of itself address it head on and have a discussion with that teammate.

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This could also take the form of actively planning future projects now instead of waiting.  The threat in this case is missing deadlines or even entire portions of the project due to no planning.  Actively engaging and moving towards this threat will at the very least help you understand the potential outcomes.

Moving TOWARDS the danger is also not something that is expected… after all, we’re hardwired to run.  In a fight this gives you the advantage of surprising the attacker (e.g. they won’t expect you to get closer to them), which gives you an opening to strike back and escape.  At work directing the challenge directly and straight on results in quicker resolutions, and helps positively improve how others perceive you.

Of course we cannot enjoy this strategy without first undoing what evolution has provided.  This is a long and uncomfortable process, but one that is wholly worth it.  Physically, we train this by standing in a corner and moving up towards someone as they punch/kick at us as we move towards and past them.  This is essentially exposure therapy, and helps your brain understand it’s not as dangerous as it seems.  Over time, you’ll get more comfortable moving in towards a threat, and eventually it will become a habit.

Comfortable being uncomfortable

Work offers similar situations.  Any time a perceived threat crops up, go to it directly.  Have someone you have challenges communicating with?  Don’t wait for them to approach you, grab some time and talk it out respectfully.  Notice an error in a system or insufficient documentation?  Don’t hope someone else will address it, proactively solve it.  The exact form this takes will vary based on the threat you find, but by practicing moving to the threat you’ll find you can resolve it significantly easier, and more quickly, than by running.

This approach definitely falls into the “get comfortable being uncomfortable” bucket.  Discomfort, I have found, is generally an indicator you have room to grow in some way, and this is no different.  The good news is that discomfort eventually disappears, and you’re just left with a good habit of forward movement, on that lets you deal with threats and exploit opportunities.

Conceptually speaking...

Learning a new thing is always a process.  We begin by learning rote skills, the mechanical movements necessary to reproduce a specific result.  Then we progress to application of those mechanical skills, and eventually end up learning underlying concepts in whatever it is we are doing.  Take writing for example, we first learn how to physically hold a pen or to use a keyboard, then we learn how to make letters appear (so much tracing!), then onto making words appear, then sentences and finally paragraphs.  Once we have mastered those basic mechanical skills, we move on towards applying them to novel situations - writing new things.

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This general progression appears everywhere.  In the martial arts we begin learning how to stand, or how to breathe, or how to focus where we’re looking.  These are then built into more complex moves, how to punch or kick, and then strung together into sequences of movements called forms.  Once we understand those basic building blocks we can compose any series of movements we like.

Professional skills are the same - we learn what the various buttons do on a machine we operate, then we learn how the machine works, and eventually we’re making widgets.  We learn how to perform basic tasks, we teach others those tasks, then we get to define what those tasks are.

Where I find it becoming interesting is after we’ve learned those mechanical skills and what we get to do next.  Must we ALWAYS have at least 3 sentences in a paragraph?

What happens if we don’t?

Must we ALWAYS turn to the left after a specific kick in a form?  What happens if we turn right… or don’t turn at all?

I find myself wondering what is beyond the rote mechanical skill.  It’s important to know the basic standard skills (they’re called standards for a reason - having a shared lexicon is incredibly important), but after you know them how important is it to follow them explicitly, and what happens if you don’t?

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So far I’ve found it easiest to identify in martial arts movements.  It doesn’t REALLY matter if you right, then left, or left, then right.  The underlying concept behind the movement is to teach you how to move.  I’m seeing similar patterns in my work - learning how an Excel function works is great, but the concept of an “if” statement can be applied across every system we work in.  Zooming out a bit further, the concepts behind many soft skills generally don’t have a specific application, but rather require you to understand them conceptually.

This is certainly a reflection of where I happen to be at in my own growth.  Beginners, for example, should be given clear, repeatable directions to follow; before we can play with concepts, we have to understand the mechanics.  This also leads to some amusing situations when I’ve taught, and forgotten the “correct” way a movement goes.  Inevitably I’ll get the question “But Rob, don’t we turn right after that move?”.  After a few seconds of remembering the “correct” way I’ll respond with “Yes, but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter.  The intent is to teach you how to move, not how to turn right”. 

This approach to looking at the importance of underlying concepts, and not just the mechanical skill is one that shouldn’t be applied at all levels of learning.  Beginners especially need the mechanical approach as it reinforces learning and ensures they share a common baseline.  For example it’d be incredibly hard to talk about writing if everyone didn’t know what a period was, or if some of us used vowels differently.  Similarly it’d be challenging to train up new team members at work if everyone on the team taught them different ways to do the same task.

Once someone is comfortable with those basic thoughts, begin to shift the focus to what’s behind them.  Why we choose to take a certain action is more important than the action itself ... knowing the difference is even more important.

Like flipping a switch

We’ve felt the butterflies in our stomach, or the bottom drop out of our stomach as we’re given bad news, or felt a spike of terror when something unexpected / threatening happens to us.  Our bodies ability to change our energy level rapidly to match a situation is a great built-in mechanism… but this natural mechanism has at least one glaring weakness - by default we can’t consciously control it.

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This is a problem, because there are times when our energy level needs to be higher, or lower, or a different cycle than it is naturally.  Having a difficult discussion with someone you love requires keeping your energy controlled and level so you can focus on the topic at hand.  Going to the gym for a sparring session requires selectively raising and lowering your energy.  Working on a project at work requires keeping your energy stable so you can keep your focus.

Disciplines like the martial arts, yoga, meditation, etc. help train us to first be aware of our energy, and eventually control it.  This control gives us the ability to more finely control when and how our energy is used.  Going into what should be an incredibly boring meeting about financial statements?  Knowing how to raise your energy will help keep you awake.  Only have 1 hour a week to train in the gym?  Consciously raising your energy, and keeping it there despite anything else that is going on, will help you get the most out of it.  Escaping a burning building?  Putting a leash on your energy will help you from making a mistake.

All about control

Learning that your energy can be controlled, and how you can control is it an important thing we all learn.  But HOW we do it is also important.  We can’t always, for example, take half an hour to “amp up” or get control.  Sometimes you need to be ready to go NOW.  This may be due to an extreme circumstance (the burning building from before), or just because something unexpected popped up (an employee comes in with a problem).

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I’ve found this to be less of a “powering up” process, and more like switching a light switch.  The exact situation that is unfolding around me certainly impacts this (escaping from a burning building would have a much different impact than sparring, for example), but the mechanism is the same.  It’s the mental difference of “ok… so, I need to get ready for X.. deep breath.. Give me sometime” and “ok, go time”.

Flipping this switch is something we can learn through practice.  The trick is just to put yourself in situations where you need that switch “on” and get a feeling for flipping it.

Flexing your focus muscles

Focus is an interesting thing.  At times we can hold our focus on something for what seems like forever, getting lost in a flow state.  At other times, we can’t bring even the smallest amount of focus to the situation and are easily distracted.  While it seems like focus is something we cannot control, it’s exactly the opposite… focus is 100% at our command.

Choice

It’s easy to say tell yourself “oh, I just can’t focus right now” (even more true with today’s notifications, popups, etc.etc.etc.).  For me, however, this is an excuse, a choice.  We’d rather be somewhere else, with different people (or no people), doing something else than where we’re at.  Personally I find this especially true sometimes at work, there is a limit to how many times I can sit through a meeting on the same topic.

When this happens, we choose to unfocus and essentially drift.  This is something I see when teaching martial art classes with younger students.  They’d rather be at home playing video games, or hanging out with their friends, or doing anything other than working out.  This desire then leads to them making a choice to allow their focus to drift.  (As an aside I’m constantly amused at how surprised they are that their instructors notice this… it’s INCREDIBLY obvious when someone isn’t paying attention).  

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I see this in myself sometimes as well… I’d much rather not be at work grinding away at a report, so instead I allow my focus to drift to other things.  I find little “important” projects to work on, or suddenly learn that a training video really should be completed immediately.  

The trick I’ve learned is that focus isn’t something that comes and goes randomly (despite how much it feels like it sometimes).  Instead it is something we can consciously control and master.  Focus is a mental discipline that, like a muscle, can be strengthened and flexed at will.  Just like building any muscle, however, the hard part is putting in the effort and time to master its use and improve it.  The step of realizing this is possible, however, is just the beginning… actually doing it is something else entirely.

Start Small

Just like building any skill, start small.  For me, writing these articles has been great training in focus.  I put aside ten, fifteen minutes every few days and just write.  The intention of this drill isn’t to create something worth sharing, or get better at writing (although those can certainly be outcomes), it’s to practice focusing on punching the keys.  Part of this may also be put aside time to just focus on reviewing and editing my ideas.  The point isn’t that I’ve chosen writing, it’s that I’m consciously deciding to practice focusing on one thing.

This approach can be applied to anything.  In martial arts training (or any physical discipline) we may choose to focus on a single movement or step.  Working that step, and thinking through each individual part of it, no matter how small, helps build our focus.  At work we may choose to focus on one part of our job for a period of time.  I personally find that I need to do this when building project management plans, so I consciously decide on time to focus on that… and only that.

These seemingly small conscious exercises have multiple benefits.  They help us with the skill we happen to be working on (better project plans, more graceful form), but they also help train our ability to focus. 

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By stealing some concepts from weightlifting we can also work on increasing our gains while we practice.  You don’t get really strong / big arms by lifting light weights a few times, you get bigger/faster/stronger by lifting more weight, or lifting it more times, or lifting it in less time.  The same holds true for focus.  As we get better, we need to consciously work on focusing more intensely (blocking out even more distractions), in odder circumstances (try working with a toddler nearby and you’ll know what I mean) or for longer durations (set aside an hour instead of 30 minutes).  By flexing our focus muscle in more demanding situations it will get stronger.

None of this can happen, however, without our conscious effort.  We rarely get better at things we don’t bend our will to, and even those we do won’t see nearly the same level of improvement.   

Steps to improve focus

1. Remind yourself you’re in control

2. Set aside time to practice focusing on something

3. Record how it went

4. Make it more challenging (more time, different circumstance, etc)

5. Repeat 2-4