Getting an Edge through Mentorship

Book Reviews / Mentoring

Traditional mentorship programs tend to be organized via a hierarchy, with mentees being assigned a mentor to advance mentees’ careers. Under imprecise rubrics like “peer mentoring” or “lateral mentoring,” recent attention has focused on how key mentorships happen outside of institutional programs. Deborah Heiser started an organization called The Mentor Project to promote relationships with mentees that grow out of an accomplished veteran’s innate desire to give back. In The Mentorship Edge, she proposes that organizations best enable mentoring relationships by facilitating connections rather than by focusing on career advancement.

Like other books about mentoring, this book is filled with stories about unique ways this group’s mentees and mentors have connected. Mentorship books seem to collect stories of mentors going the extra mile to help a mentee. That’s the fun part because these noteworthy aspects seem to be the norm in healthy mentoring relationships. We all want to go the extra mile to help someone taste success.

Two sections stood out to me in this book. First, as a researcher centered in psychology, she grounds mentorship in Erik Erikson’s leading theory of adult development in her introduction. There’s a lot to his theory, but his description of a later life phase of “generativity” overlaps with mentorship. Wanting to give back through socially meaningful activities is a completely normal part of being an adult. We all do it, and we don’t need to don a superhero cape to mentor. Heiser captures this generative impulse that we all possess to describe what mentorship should be about. I appreciate the philosophical grounding of mentorship as a universal human need.

Second, the chapter on Mentoring in the Workplace caught my interest. Individual stories of healthy relationships certainly move me, but I’m interested in learning how mentorship scales in different industries. Through true-to-life narratives, she breaks down how mentoring can work in industries as different as healthcare, the military, and the law. She demonstrates how a lateral generativity can help even in the most vertical of environments.

By way of critique, I dislike her use of the term “lateral mentoring.” First, she puts a trademark sign every time she uses it. This unconventional branding distracts from the main message of the book. Most technical terms do not use a trademark, especially in a scientific environment. It speaks of capitalism, not scientific collegiality. Second, she tries to distinguish it from “peer mentoring” by claiming that peer mentoring is more emotional. In the field of biomedical research, this claim is untrue. Peer mentoring in the literature refers to what she refers to as lateral mentoring. Instead of acknowledging different uses, she tries to steer us to her trademarked term. This use raises my cynicism.

Nonetheless, this book paints a picture of how mentoring relationships can abound around us, and how naturally they can form (or something related to the “generativity” idea). While this book contains limited quantitative data, abundant qualitative stories illustrate her key observation that mentoring relationships stem from the mentor’s human need for generativity. I appreciate that her vision for mentorship is not limited to a fixed, hierarchical program but a culture of human relationships where we all help one another. In my experience, the best mentoring relationships are unplanned but grounded in human care.

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Rekindling the Fire: A Review of The Joy of Science

Book Reviews / Doing Research / Faculty Life

For most of us, science begins with a rush of “Wow! This is super cool!” But the emotional fire can subside after years of hard work. Negativity in popular culture can make us forget the depths of our why. To rekindle our passion to see the universe’s beauty, physicist Roel Snieder and policy expert Jen Scheider remind us of the human heart of science and lay out a spiritual center to our enterprise.

By highlighting our personal role in discovery, they provide a template for scientists seeking to both live a fulfilling life and do first-rate science. This template offers seven principles that can enrich our lives under the hypothesis that happy people produce better work. These principles are harmony, courage, vision, curiosity, listening, compassion, and integrity.

Each chapter doesn’t merely provide a “rah rah” pick-me-up; it cites the literature and analyzes the subject in a manner appropriate for scientists. The authors study scientists’ spirits, how each of us feel as we work, and present these feelings as noble expressions of human spirit. Playful, hand-drawn illustrations excite the imagination as the authors practice what they preach – and bring readers along for the ride. Sections also provide practical exercises for readers to integrate these abstract concepts into their day-to-day lives.

One of my takeaways: Modern conversation often puts spirituality and science at odds with each other. Religions, the traditional home of spirituality, sometimes tread on science’s turf, and scientists sometimes fear the untested authority of religion. In my own life, I’ve found that science and religion have a lot to learn from each other, and both can benefit from more listening, a core principle in this book. This text does not address religion directly, but the authors do describe what human spirituality in scientific endeavors looks like from two scientists’ perspectives. They speak of science not as a chore to complete nor as a grade to earn but as a “love” to explore. In academe, it’s easy to neglect such intrinsic emotional engagement with our work.

By giving us examples of how personal attitudes interact with scientific endeavors, the authors explain these seven principles’ impact in concrete terms. For instance, they help us relate our science to our students and even our children. They also extrapolate what inner courage resembles in a scientific career. Elsewhere, they dwell on staving off a sense of professional loneliness and having compassion for students who can also be lonely in their work. To them, finding joy in your work translates into bringing joy to the rest of the world through your work.

Snieder and Scheider contend that honing personal qualities can reduce the chore of getting work done while encouraging us to skip to work each day. As with most things, increased happiness requires attentive effort but is ultimately realizable. Paying attention to our innate human spirituality can bring personal meaning to ourselves and help us convey nature’s wonder better to others. This book shows us how. It reminds us that life’s beauty isn’t found just in exotic natural oases; with the right attitudes, it’s found at our lab benches as we investigate, in our scientific journals as we read, and on our fingertips as we type.

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A Dynamic Daily Devotional of Mentoring

Book Reviews / Mentoring

I love books whose contents far surpass their titles, and this one fits that bill to a tee. At first glance, it seems to have a gimmicky organization. I’m not a big personal fan of reading lists, and the thought of trudging through 75 short recommendations on mentoring frankly reminds me of having teeth pulled. However, upon second glance, I discovered that the book is in a third edition, so someone must have liked the first two enough for a publisher to invest in a third. After being recommended the book and pondering further, I took the bait and got it. Almost 250 pages later, I’m glad I had the chance to read it.

This book reminds me of religious devotional books that I read as a high school student, except this book doesn’t deal with personal character directly but instead one’s ability to develop others’ professional character. Each of the 75 chapters consist of a handful of pages – short but power-packed. I actually had to limit the number of chapters I could read in one sitting because the book left me with so much to think about! It easily can fit with the practice of reading one short chapter per day…if you can limit yourself to only one.

The book’s title takes inspiration from Strunk and White’s famous Elements of Style that, decades after publication, remains the go-to book for good writing in the English language. Spinning off that legacy, these authors want to identify what skills make a good mentor. The authors, both professors of psychology at research universities have reviewed 2,000 publications to identify specific reasons why mentorship is so effective.

Chapters are organized into seven larger sections on topics like skills, style, starting, diversity, and integrity. I’m involved in a handful of professional and personal mentoring relationships, and even though topics explicitly veer towards workplace concerns, readers can easily extract life concerns for personal betterment, too. The best way to develop better mentees, no matter the field, is to become a better mentor.

Mentoring is tough. To the uninitiated observer, mentors seem to receive tons of adulation from adoring mentees. In truth, mentors, like teachers, often are underappreciated, aren’t financially well-rewarded for their mentorship, and give to mentees way more than they receive. Yet almost universally, mentoring yields satisfaction and happiness that aren’t easily quantifiable. Research says that good mentorship leads to more career success among mentees. As the authors put it,

Mentoring becomes a way of life for outstanding mentors for two basic reasons. They delight in seeing their mentees succeed. … They also reap rich internal rewards; they know that few things compare in personal fulfillment as the positive outcomes of their investment in mentees.

This responsibility can elicit some nervousness among mentors. Educating oneself on how to mentor can calm those nerves and identify good practices to cling to. This book is easily the most thought-provoking, concise reference that I’ve read on this topic. It’s suitable for researchers, academics, and leaders who spend their lives developing the next generation’s professional skills.

The Elements of Mentoring: 75 Practices of Master Mentors, 3rd Edition, by W. Brad Johnson and Charles R. Ridley.

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Unpacking Mental Health: A Book Review

Book Reviews

The words “mental health” and “mental illness” are frequently thrown around these days in both society and academe. However, their true nature is rarely defined or understood. Much of our culture simply doesn’t know how to talk about these topics constructively, allowing their personal and societal effects to linger. Still, institutions large and small continue to underfund resources and research related to mental health as if these problems will fix themselves. In Unpacking Mental Health, Zoë Ayers attempts to address these issues while centering specifically on PhD graduate programs. Instead of providing a list of personal pathologies and remedies, she attempts to show what mental health in graduate schools can look like individually and systemically.

Historically, many of those in power in academe did not grow up with modern psychology as a major part of the work environment. It’s understandable that they do not feel completely competent in using these concepts to train and manage researchers. Nonetheless, a need to address these issues persists as demonstrated by Ayers’ copious statistics. Graduate school is about increasing independence, but better mental health practices open opportunities for better products. This book can serve as a manual to make academics more aware of potential changes.

For example, she examines university cultures of overwork. Many professors simply train students in research with the same practices that they learned years ago. Though involved in experimenting in their field, they refuse to innovate with their educational practices. Extra projects are often piled on, leading to burnout and decreased creativity. Yet student experiences have changed, and human knowledge of educational practices has increased. Instead of piling on, Ayers suggests that academics better focus on priorities and so prevent hard work from becoming ineffective overwork.

In part two, she addresses efforts an individual can make through adjusting their personal mindset and suggests that most institutions do not adequately address graduate students’ well-being. Most university wellness programs are geared towards undergraduates, not graduate students. She suggests needs that such programs can meet. This especially includes “imposter syndrome” (she prefers “imposter phenomenon”) – an almost ubiquitous experience that can be countered by deliberate changes in mindset.

In the final part, she looks at systemic and environmental issues needing attention. Many feel disempowered to bring about these changes, which seem to span the entire academic enterprise. She explores all the discouraging “-isms” along with supervisor relationships and pressure to publish. Students can easily feel imprisoned by the system; Ayers instead cajoles readers to find constructive methods to address problems in small but practical ways. By looking at the big picture, she moves us from myopically looking at personal problems to progressively bettering the entire system. By itself, that can help students not feel alone in this conundrum but a part of a larger system learning to confront bad practices.

Finally, by identifying an expansive list of functions required for graduate education, she implicitly makes the case for team mentoring. No one professor could possibly fulfill all the needs of upcoming researchers. To address these, the academy needs to look past individual excellence towards an approach akin to team science. Ayers makes a strong case that academia as a whole needs to learn to track and reward functions beyond only producing papers. Not only will such rewards help those from underserved groups who disproportionately fill these needs, but it will also multiply the effectiveness of the next generation of researchers, a key product.

This book is obviously geared towards those in graduate school or considering further graduate education. Yet its impact might be more acutely realized through an audience of graduate advisors. These concepts and this vocabulary need to be introduced into academic culture to enhance the next generation of knowledge workers, both inside and outside the ivory tower. Psychology and neuroscience are at the frontiers of today’s advances in research, and those most skilled in their insights will prosper most in the future. While this book doesn’t offer one comprehensive, top-down answer to all persistent questions of mental health, it does identify where to focus effort. Ultimately, cultural change will likely take final shape in a generational paradigm shift, but Ayers’ book suggests ways to hasten those changes today.

More Resources

Staying Mentally Well in Academia Is a Balancing Act

Suicide Prevention in University Settings

The Key to Handling Stress Is Massive Egotism

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Fierce Conversations

Book Reviews / Communication / Faculty Life

Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success at Work & in Life, One Conversation at a Time

Although the title may bring to mind some vivid images, author Susan Scott doesn’t suggest that we talk in threatening overconfidence with unrelenting passion, but rather that our conversations be focused on genuine, eager, and truthful investigations into reality. It sounds like a lot, but the book provides many examples from the kitchen to the c-suite where these tactics are worth the effort.

Stemming from the idea that conversations do not make a relationship but rather are a relationship, the author works through communication hurdles–inviting the reader to identify their own biases and preconceived notions when engaging with others and being comfortable in delivering that same feedback. Helpful summary lists, assignments, and strategies are shared throughout the book. These assignments are as much about self-reflection as they are about providing structure to often awkward or challenging conversations that carry weight, particularly to young investigators. Highest yield for me was the “Issue Preparation Form Template” that includes tasks for identifying the issue, describing its significance, what the ideal outcome is, summarizing relevant background information, listing what has been done up to this point, options one is considering, and explaining what help they need to do it. Now summarize this in 60-seconds when talking to your mentor/boss/colleague so that you don’t lose their attention! It sounds like a push, but when asking for help, especially as a young investigator,  this structure reflects preparation, thought, and is more likely to get a favorable response.

The introspective approach the author uses to improve outward conversations is core. For example, replacing “but” with “and” when speaking about conflicts or challenges is an important way to display conflicts that are of equal importance without negating the former (i.e., “I know you want more time to complete the project and the deadline is looming. I’d like to help you and I have no easy choices right now. You seem stressed, and yet I need you to deliver this project on time with minimal involvement on my part”). This small change, in addition to the active listening and deliberate silence strategies identified, enrich interactions and help make this book into a helpful resource that can be called on when one does not feel they are being adequately heard or understood. As the author summarizes: “All conversations are with myself, and sometimes they involve other people.”

Fierce Conversations

More Resources

Not that Kind of Year: Tales of Year 1 as a New PI

The Power of Pause: How to be More Effective in a Demanding, 24/7 World

Radical Candor: Can It Work for Academics?

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Networking for People Who Hate Networking: A Field Guide for Introverts, the Overwhelmed, and the Underconnected

Book Reviews / Networking & Collaboration

networking-bookIf you’re like your correspondent, the very word “networking” sends a trickle of terror down your spine.  Even the thought of mingling at a conference fills you with dread.  But take heart!  “Networking” doesn’t have to be a four-letter word.  As Devora Zack admits, while it might never be fun, it can become doable if, instead of trying to mold yourself into an extrovert, you approach it like an introvert.  In this snarky and entertaining guide, Zack details a method that focuses on traditional introvert strengths like planning, listening, and following up, while giving you permission—indeed, ordering you—to recharge by taking plenty of breaks (alone, please) in order to increase the quality of the connections you make.

Instead of trying to collect an impossibly huge number of brief connections, Zack argues, those for whom that doesn’t come naturally should remain true to themselves and concentrate on deeper interactions with those few they identify as good prospects.  That identification often comes from planning.  (Example: Reading up online about the research interests of potential mentors or collaborators before approaching them at a conference’s welcome gathering.)  Once the contact is made, introverts should harness their good listening skills by asking open-ended questions and paying attention to the response.  Then, the next day, follow up with a personalized note referencing that conversation.  Now you’re much more than another barely-remembered name from a conference.

Zack has plenty of other tips for making networking events go more smoothly (and even for how to painlessly turn other interactions, like airplane rides, into networking opportunities).  Chapter Seven suggests arriving early so the room is less crowded and intimidating, and volunteering where possible, because a structured role gives you a reason to step away from the wall and interact with others with a purpose rather than flailing for topics of conversation.  There’s even an entire section on how to make a nametag that makes the best impression.

And guess what?  The advice in this book is just as salient for extroverts as it is for introverts.  Everyone’s networking can benefit from good planning and good follow up.

Networking for People Who Hate Networking: A Field Guide for Introverts, the Overwhelmed, and the Underconnected
Devora Zack
San Francisco: Barrett-Koehler, 2010

More Resources

To Succeed, Forget Self-Esteem

Not that Kind of Conference: Attending Clinical Conferences as a PhD

Fierce Conversations

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Writing Science in Plain English: Clarity Rules

Book Reviews / Writing & Publishing

As one might expect from the title, Writing Science in Plain English is clear, concise, and very easy to understand. In fact, it’s one of the best books on writing I’ve come across. If you only read one book on science writing, make it this one.

In short, digestible chapters filled with examples and exercises, author Anne E. Greene demonstrates how to tell a clear and engaging story with active voice, strong verbs, and thoughtful word choices. She also spends a lot of time on how to arrange paragraphs and report information in the most understandable ways. Chapter 7 is particularly valuable. When writing, authors can often forget that the data and ideas they’ve been working with for months or years is new to readers. Understanding how humans process written information—we best understand something when old information comes at the beginning of a sentence while new information is placed at the end—has helped me reframe some of my writing to lead readers through the steps to my conclusions. The many examples of good and poor placement of information in a sentence vividly illustrate the point.

In addition to Greene’s deconstructions of why an impenetrable piece of writing is so difficult to read, I most appreciated the short, to the point explanations for why each piece of advice she dispenses clarifies writing. For example, in Chapter 3, she explains that abstract nouns like “manifestations” acting as subjects in a sentence can cause confusion for the reader because they “tend to nudge the characters in a sentence into supporting roles such as modifiers and objects of prepositions where readers are likely to miss them.” Rather than handing down rules from on high, Greene tells us why the rules matter.

At less than 100 pages, Writing Science in Plain English can be read in a couple of hours, but also deserves a place on any scientist’s bookshelf to reference again and again.

More Resources

The Guiding Principle in Scientific Writing

Using Content-Lexical Ties To Connect Ideas in Writing

A Smorgasbord of Grant Writing Pointers with a Side of Wit

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Acting on the Essential

Book Reviews / Productivity

Prioritizing across roles and responsibilities is a daily task for most of us. This is especially amplified at the intersection of research careers, faculty life, and family.

The dogma for scientific careers – especially those driven by extramural funding – is that giving your science priority over all else is a crucial academic survival strategy. Yet now, we are confronted with valid needs for institutional service, challenging new teaching structures, contributions to professional organization and community groups, and special projects. The need to choose wisely is paramount.

Searching online for guidance about establishing one’s “why” and setting and reaching goals retrieves best sellers and webinars pushing productivity methods for filling every waking minute and working ten times harder than others. Alongside is coaching advice to follow your bliss and simplify work and life to achieve flow and balance. Actionable steps framed by research evidence and consideration of personal values rarely coexist in this genre of career self-help.

Bringing both into focus is why we love Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less. Greg McKeown’s lucid and practical guidance weaves together a balance of encouragement and probing to identify, own, and control your direction with realistic advice about how to implement changes to stay focused on what is essential to your success. He includes just enough requisite case examples and research findings from fields like neuropsychology to be convincing without breaking pace.

His practical lineup, perhaps even more valid now than when published in 2014, asks:

  • What is the core mindset of an Essentialist?
  • How can we discern the trivial from the vital few?
  • How can we cut out the trivial many?
  • How can we make doing the vital few things almost effortless?

His main order of business – bringing focus to the cloud of activities that we feel we have to do, need to do, or just find ourselves doing – is made to order for academic faculty in early career and plays just as well to those in mid and later career seeking new energy by sharpening their focus on what is essential, compelling and generative.

He hits the nail on the head so often you come to love the hammer even as you see that what he’s aiming for is a renovation of how we run our lives. CliffsNotes would include these blows:

Core concepts

  • The way of the Essentialist is the relentless pursuit of less but better.
  • Essentialism is not about how to get more things done; it’s about how to get the right things done.
  • We forget our ability to choose and we learn to be helpless. Drip by drip we allow our power to be taken away until we end up becoming a function of other people’s choices. Regain your choice.

Necessity of un-committing

  • Sometimes what you don’t do is just as important as what you do.
  • Many capable people don’t reach the next level of contribution because they can’t let go of the belief that everything is important.
  • The reality is that saying yes to any opportunity by definition requires saying no to several others.

Actions to take

  • Be unavailable at times: we need to escape in order to focus.
  • Play: it expands our minds in ways that allow us to explore…makes us more inquisitive, more attuned to novelty, more engaged…helps us to see possibilities we would not otherwise have seen.
  • Recognize that if we under-invest in ourselves – our minds, bodies, and spirits – we damage the very tools we need to make our highest contributions.
  • Learn that if an opportunity isn’t a clear yes, then it is a clear no.
  • Practice until saying “no” gracefully doesn’t have to mean using the word no.

Reflect and refine to shape what is essential to you

  • What do you truly want out of your career in the next five years?
  • If you could be excellent at only one thing, what would it be?

McKeown’s examples build insights and provide coaching on topics like a repertoire for saying no, how to gauge what is essential, and teaching yourself to uncommit. They provide an actual roadmap, unlike so many books that convey only the theory of success or glimpses of the wins of others.

Before you agree to coordinate a new webinar series, or link together the neighbors who are COVID-homeschooling, or to be on the faculty senate ballot, get this book and dig down to what is essential to you. Then choose to do that.

More

McKeown Essentialism Videos

Five Minute Appetizer about Essentialism

Greg McKeown’s Big Idea speech at the 2018 VitalSmarts REACH conference.

 

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Practical Writing Advice from a Writing Teacher

Book Reviews

How to Write an Essay Like an Equation, by Eric Sentell, PhD, a writing instructor at Southeast Missouri State University, offers step-by-step advice for communicating ideas clearly. While some sections are more applicable to undergraduate essays, most chapters feature strategies to strengthen and clarify any writing. The book will teach you how to highlight your main ideas, link thoughts and sentences, and edit your own work.

Early chapters cover writing with the audience in mind, thesis statements, and paragraph structure. Chapters crucial for teaching or editing your own scientific writing include:

Content-Lexical Ties (Ch 6): Emphasizes “techniques for enhancing the organization of your writing and achieving the mysterious ‘flow’ that writing teachers talk about.” If ideas flow seamlessly, readers find content easier to comprehend—useful when yours is one grant to review in a stack of dozens. Sentell shares four methods of tying your sentences and ideas together, including repetition, related words, categories, and transitions, and provides examples of the effective use of these methods.

The Paramedic Method of Editing (Ch 7): Includes a checklist for paring your writing to the essentials, reducing reader fatigue and allowing the critical details to shine. Again, useful examples abound.

Sentence Boundaries (Ch 8) and A Practical Style Guide (Ch 9): Answer questions like why sentence fragments are fragments and how to correct them (or not write them in the first place). These chapters also provide clear explanations of when to use specific punctuation marks and what the effects of each are, among other details about sentence-level style.

You want this book if you find writing to be a fuzzy, amorphous activity and want clear steps to follow for creating solid written work. Happy writing!

Dr. Sentell is also an Edge for Scholars blogger. Check out his posts on writing for your audience and making writing memorable:

How a Jail-house Letter and Goat Research Can Get Your Grant Funded

How to Make Writing More Memorable and Persuasive

Other must-read books on writing:

Dreyer’s English

The Art of Scientific Storytelling

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StrengthsFinder 2.0: Discover Your CliftonStrengths

Book Reviews / Faculty Life

He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened. – Lao Tzu

I cannot sing, dance, or act. Regardless how passionately I longed as a kid to be a Broadway triple threat, my desire could not compensate for lack of talent. Lining the pockets of coaches and teachers for years would never have moved me beyond the level of barely competent, at best. Fortunately, I recognized the folly and pursued the path of visual artist. A path well-chosen.

Do you need reassurance that your path was the right vocational choice, or do you need to reevaluate the decision you decided on? StrengthsFinder 2.0: Discover Your CliftonStrengths from Gallup and Tom Rath can help.

The backflap verbiage unpacks the book’s title: “In 1998, the Father of Strengths Psychology, Don Clifton (1924-2003), created the original StrengthsFinder assessment and its 34 talent themes. In 2017, Gallup changed the name to ‘CliftonStrengths’ in honor of its inventor. Rooted in 40 years of Clifton’s research, CliftonStrengths has helped millions discover their innate talents.”

To summarize: CliftonStrengths is the assessment tool and StrengthsFinder 2.0 the book, is the portal (via an access code) to the online assessment (170+ questions) as well as a guide to implement the results.

70 years ago, Dr. Clifton asked: What would happen if we studied what was right with people rather than what was wrong? What if we identified and developed what people have in abundance naturally?

The premise of the book is that the key to human development is building on who you already are. And that’s a motivating notion to mull over as we continue to hunker down.

I am larger, better than I thought; I did not know I held so much goodness.                                                                                                                            – Walt Whitman

How to use this book:

  • Take the test. 30 minutes later you will be anointed with 5 “strengths” (or rather 5 talent themes, but “talent theme” won’t sell a book).
  • Read about each of your strengths. The book describes all 34 in detail and provides 10 helpful “Ideas for Action” to develop your talents at home and work.
  • For leaders: Use the results and leverage the strengths of your team! A how-to-work-with-others section for each strength will help you ensure they thrive and flourish.

Here’s a compilation of my co-worker’s results (names have been changed):

If a leader devised a project that required a person of action, amenable to last minute changes, to contribute to the grand vision and enthusiastically promote it, a wise and strategic leader would look to Andrew. Andrew would shine and reward the leader with genuine engagement.

Assigning the task to anyone else would be a mistake. Rachel, for example, would be miserable with the promotion and outreach aspect, and could potentially sink the whole endeavor along with her morale.

A wise and strategic leader would instead assign Rachel a project that benefited from her behind the scenes talents. Another approach might consider how her and Andrew’s working styles complemented each other on the same project.

Asked to evaluate the usefulness of workplace personality tests in general, one of my co-workers shared:

They can be great — if the assessments end up actually being utilized. A lot of times people take these tests, get their results, share them, and then forget about them. Imagine if leadership, tasks, and follow-through were all box-ticked based on the result of each team member’s personality. Imagine if our strengths were put to use: someone else could take up the slack for our so-called “weaknesses” – because that would be their strength.

In search of inspiration as you shelter at home or transition back to a workplace? Consider this book. It just might brush the dust off your finer self, or, you might find, in the words of Quiet author Susan Cain: “…a new found sense of entitlement to be yourself.”

More Resources

The Key to Handling Stress is Massive Egotism

To Succeed, Forget Self-Esteem

Think You’re an Imposter? Here’s How to Know for Sure

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