LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner

On Sundays, me and my lady run away, far far away, across the river, to the mystical land of Cambridge. There, among the locals, we mingle with the plebeians at a watering hole of our spontaneous choosing. There, we read the New York Times over cappuccinos and pastries. There, I turn to a favorite column of mine: Corner Office by Adam Bryant, in the SundayBusiness section. There, last Sunday, he interviewed LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, who was asked, “What career advice do you give to business school students?” His response is below. Challenge yourself. Do the exercise he mentions as soon as you read it.

The advice I give about their career path and realizing their dreams starts with me saying: “I’m going to ask you a question, and you’re going to have 15 seconds to answer it: Looking back on your career 20, 30 years from now, what do you want to say you’ve accomplished? Go.”
If they can’t answer it in 15 seconds, it probably means they haven’t thought about the answer before that moment, or they don’t have a definitive answer, which is fine, because for some people that’s a lifelong journey. But you can’t realize your goal if it’s not defined. It sounds so simple but it’s true.

So? What did you get? I enjoy these different ways of finding one’s life vector / heart song / master purpose. This take is more from the approach of looking back and being happy, versus doing what rings true with you now and every day. Ideally, the latter leads to the former.

So? What’s your answer?

First Do Cat Food

That’s right. Cat food. I have to deal with cat food. You do, too. We all do. Freakin’ cat food… and I don’t even have a cat…

Cat food is the mundane. Cat food is the every day task. Cat food is the unavoidable. Much like literal cat food, if you don’t continue to do (…buy? sell? feed your cat? feed yourself? trade on the hot and emerging cat food commodities market?) cat food, something important ceases to work. Cat food is important at the lowest level, the opposite of which are activities towards fulfilling your purpose: important at the highest level. So, while moving along your life vector is important, so is cat food, and sometimes cat food comes first.

David Allen did a Google Tech Talk five years ago: GTD and the Two Keys to Sustaining a Healthy Life and Workstyle. Of ‘Getting Things Done‘ fame, he talks about two aspects of self-management: control and perspective. Getting control is mastering workflow, where you spend time collecting, then processing, organizing, reviewing, and doing. Getting perspective works with horizons of focus, from 50,000 feet, or your purpose and principles, to ground level, or the next actions; it is here where he says we should start, and not with a vision. You have to get deck-clearing capability first before being able to think at the high level.

Now that I think about it… this is what I did almost two years ago, when I first moved to my current place, where I started what ended up being a first version of ScrumOfOne. When at a complete loss of what to do next, when I had to clear my at least mental deck, I stepped through the following list first:

Eat food. Shop for food. Pay bills. Tidy up kitchen. Tidy up room. Do laundry. Iron.

Yeah. Ironing. (And that’s all I’ll say about that.)

Much as I like the idea of dealing with cat food before focusing on vision, I’d treat chronic pains the same way, where this includes items that are annoying, always there, and are general, glaring impediments to happiness. Sure, you can work on your purpose, but if you’re struggling with food, clothing, and shelter, and you’re concerned, then this’ll sit like a gremlin at the forefront of your brain and not let you freely pursue your heart song (ooh, I like that metaphor). You don’t need to totally rid yourself of this gremlin before starting down your happy path, but it does help to have a plan.

Hi Neighbour

Love thy neighbour.
Really dig thy neighbour.
Like thy neighbour.
Be ambivalent towards thy neighbour.
Tolerate thy neighbour.
Hold a slight grudge against th-

Y’know what, we’re swinging through this emotional spectrum towards investing negative energy in thy neighbour, towards hating thy neighbour. Energy towards judging others or just holding a grudge or thinking they stink because they vote a certain way or thinking they stink because they’re walking slowly and taking up the whole sidewalk while looking down at their glowing rectangle oblivious to the flow of human traffic trying to get somewhere and I’m late and this stupid idiot is in the way and oh now he’s just stopping altogether and flatulently ignoring the rest of existence and not at least courteously pulling over to the side t- … So yeah, I have plenty of opportunity for improvement in this area, too.

Whether we share an apartment wall, or are in line to order coffee, or ephemerally glance as we pass each other crossing the street, or intently absorb the soul-goodness from this blog (you’re welcome), we are sharing time together, however short, and sharing space together, however vast. We are neighbours.

Hi, neighbour.

Soutata

I had a dream where I was talking to this super-genius bad guy who just explained and rationalized his super-genius evil plot, the scene for which ended with the following exchange.

Hell, it all comes down to some of the most ancient advice there is! You gotta ganstah yo strengths and soutata the rest!

Soutata?

Yeah. S-O-U-T-A-T-A. Look it up.

This stuck with me for the rest of my dream, since I’ve never heard of that (and I wanted to look it up), such that when I woke up, I struggled to extract from my unconscious this particular portion of the night. With nothing significant from a subsequent Googling, I submitted this transitive verb’s definition to Urban Dictionary. Still waiting.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, a few words on some of the most ancient advice there is. Let’s gloss over ‘gangstah yo strengths’, since Tom Rath neatly covers how it feels good to be a-ganstah-ing yo natural talents and skills in his StrengthsFinder 2.0 book. From an economic perspective, leveraging your natural inclination is efficient. Businessy folks would talk about core competencies. Taoist folks might call this active expression of your Tao, your Te. I folks say, “Yep, got it, makes sense, move on, dot org.”

I happen to think the “soutata the rest” part is where we might be trippin’… over ourselves; and just like literally tripping over ourselves, the struggle lies in how we get in our own way. We take a job for the sweet six-figure salary, while enduring the sour 80-hour weeks away from family and friends and self. You want to come out of the closet, but social pressure instead dictates starting a heterosexual family: 2.5 kids, a dog, a Volvo, suburbia. You are indoors all day, sitting in front of a glowing rectangle at a desk, secretly a slave to the glowing rectangle in your pocket/purse, and are too tired at the end of the day to do anything other than crash in front of another glowing rectangle on the wall; yet, you wish you had the time and energy to restore vintage motorcycles outdoors, jam with the band, and craft interior design for dollhouses. And yes, I know somebody who does all this.

Getting in our way isn’t just doing stuff we don’t like instead of what we do like, but stuff we don’t like as well as stuff we do. This is the going out even though you’re exhausted. This is schmoozing and endless small talk with strangers even though it feels fake. This is the uphill battle of learning a new thing you hate, don’t see yourself ever using, and are just doing it ’cause somebody told you to. These are not strengths, but we do them anyway ’cause we feel we have to.

Do you have to? (And don’t you love that question?) Do you absolutely have to? Have you considered the life and death ramifications of simply… not? The opportunity cost is doing something else more fun, exciting, and internally fulfilling, most likely in line with yo strengths. Are you willing to trade your strengths for ‘the rest’? Or do you want to be “the best in the world” (‘world’ meaning some niche market) via strategic quitting as per ‘The Dip‘ by Seth Godin? In light of the gifts unique to you, quitting ‘the rest’ might be the best thing for you.

You gotta ganstah yo strengths and soutata the rest.

C’mon, Urban Dictionary. Accept my submission.

That First Tiny Step

You have a dream. OK! Fine! You have a few dreams, but let’s pick just one. What’s it like? What are… the symptoms?

Hello, America. Do you suffer from something that is any or all of the following?

Well then, America, you have a dream!

Scrum is great for breaking down an epic-sized, daunting thing into a story-sized, conquerable thing, and then openly managing that. The ScrumMaster in me would sit you down, and after 5 seconds stand back up and walk with you to a whiteboard, since those are fun, then help you construct a Product Backlog based on your vision, prioritize that list, then draw a line in the sand on the whiteboard and bellow, “Behold, O America, for the next fortnight, sallyeth thee forth and kick ass,” while pointing to the stuff above that line.

Now, America, I do look forward to our date over Spanish lattes to bust through this in a fun-filled manner, sallyething thee forth ‘n’ all, but until then, ask yourself: What is that first tiny step towards my condition dream? What’ll get me that tiniest bit closer? What takes almost no time and no effort, yet dips my toe in the water?

This’ll of course depend on the disease dream. For me, that first tiny step was purchasing the following KORG Kaoss Pad 3.

Schuper Schweet, I know. How does this affect my dream?

  • It is still large – that’s how they tend to be.
  • It is not as far away, I just brought it closer.
  • It is clearer, since I have a tool with which to work.
  • It is still exciting – that’s how they tend to be.
  • It is less out of my league and more in my gym bag next to my desk in my apartment.
  • It is still possibly too awesome, and I’m getting a better handle of it, since this one piece fits in my hands.

Sallyeth thee forth and kick ass – take that first tiny step.