Tag: Tim Ferriss

Gold stars

~ trythisathomekids ~ 1 Comment

My mama told me when I was young, we’re all born superstars… So hold your head up girl and you’ll go far, listen to me when I say…

Born this Way, Lady Gaga

There’s a familiar knot in the plot line, when people who’ve found their calling reflect on their origins. It goes something like this “when I was young, my [mother / father / teacher / someone] told me I was good at [insert talent]”. Or, there’s a self realisation of this sort. A realisation that resonates and clicks in deeply.

And so it comes to pass.

Successful New York real estate agent Barbara Corcoran’s mother “pinned one thing on each kid… My thing was I had a wonderful imagination… and I fell for it, you know, and she’s right and I did have a good imagination, or at least maybe I learned to have it because of her.”

Journalist and professor Linda Villarosa had a great aunt who looked after her on Wednesdays and taught her to read “she said to me, you’re going to be a writer”.

Arnold Schwarzenegger goes to a small gym in Austria. He gets an award for a clean and jerk he did really well. That moment of positive feedback, sets him on a path and propels him forward.

In conversation with Shane Parrish on The Knowledge Project, Daniel Gross of Y Combinator and now Pioneer, describes these as “catalysing moments”. Experiences that lead to positive feedback loops, which in turn lead to where we are today.

The act of naming the talent is an important ingredient in the catalyst. With naming and categorising come shortcuts to understanding. With understanding, comes the confidence to take action.

In a world with lots of choice for lots of kids, perhaps kids with a strong sense of a particular talent have the advantage of an early knot in their plot line. Something that helps orient them and gives them a stronger sense of how they might fit in and contribute. Perhaps it makes the first (and next) steps clearer and easier to take.

In many cases, it probably doesn’t matter what the step is, or if it turns out to be the best step. There’s value in getting started, to get feedback – test, learn and adjust. As author and teacher Jim Collins argues, a key to success is not a single idea or one plan, it is the act of turning the flywheel, slowly gaining momentum and eventually reaching a breakthrough.

Without considering the counterfactual, without a randomised control trial, perhaps these moments of talent-naming aren’t material. Perhaps it’s a strategy that fails as often as it succeeds. But if there’s value in just getting started…

Try this at home [mums and dads]

Tell your kids something you’ve noticed they’re really good at, and add the ‘so what’. Perhaps your future robot boss is a brilliant constructor. Transforming the recycling into creatures and vehicles. With a talent like that, perhaps creating the machines or buildings of the future to transform how we live, is for them.

The idea isn’t to be deterministic, but to get the flywheel spinning.

Thank you to Shane Parrish (@farnamstreet) and Daniel Gross (@danielgross), Tim Ferriss (@tferriss) and Jim Collins (@level5leaders), Barbara Corcoran (@BarbaraCorcoran) and Linda Villarosa (@lindavillarosa) for inspiration and insights.

Future talent stack

~ trythisathomekids ~ Leave a comment

Like bacon and maple syrup, culinary magic lies in unexpected combinations.

Uncommon skill combinations can be magical too.

Think technology and ethnography (good on you Genevieve Bell – @feraldata), economics and psychology (behavioural economics) and design, with well just about anything.

Layer on something like leadership or storytelling, and you’re getting to what writer and satirist Scott Adams calls a ‘talent stack’. A combination of multiple skills and knowledge areas that can have commercial value and be an alternative to being the best in a single field.

Talent stacks don’t superseded notions of generalists and specialists, or polymaths, but with advances in machine learning, in narrower functions in particular, people with great talent stacks seem likely to be important lynch pins in organisations and communities.

Try this at home kids!

Today’s suggestion is a twist on the classic “What would you like to be when you grow up?”

If our kids can expect to ‘be’ a range of things in a lifetime and talent stacks can be an effective means of giving individuals more power and autonomy, this seems to be an FAQ ripe for re-framing.

Next time the discussion turns to ‘What would you like to be when you grow up?”, how about asking instead ‘What do you want to do when you grow up?’, ‘What interest/skills can you bring to a job or problem that needs solving?’ or ‘What will your talent stack be?’

Thank you Emily Painter (@CoatOfPainter) for drawing our attention to talent stacks. Thank you Tim Ferriss (@tferriss) for reminding us of the importance of asking better questions.

Postscript – (indirect) stamp of approval from the excellent Adam Grant!

 

 

Editing: old school for iterating

~ trythisathomekids ~ Leave a comment

‘Come with me. A superhero soon you’ll be’! Choose a costume: shield or cape? Boots to make a quick escape? What’s your power? Strength or speed? These are things all heroes need.

How to Be a Superhero by @SueFliess

Getting your superhero just right takes a few goes.

IMG_3641

Kids can spend hours drawing. Getting what they see in their heads down on paper. Iteration is core business.

Writing seems to be approached differently. Perhaps because dabbling is more difficult for younger kids or, in a school context, there’s a draft or two, but that’s it. Hand it in. Onto the next thing.

Editing prose – drafting and redrafting, getting to heart of the matter – isn’t fashionable, but it’s incredibly valuable in business.  Consider how written material contributes to compelling brand identifies and value propositions.  When consumers are time poor and platforms are crowded, getting to the point is critical.

Also, experts who can also write well, have a real competitive advantage.  Equipped with great knowledge and the capacity to translate complex ideas into words that speak to people? Now that’s a real super power.

Yet editing is a skill rarely overtly taught in schools.

Try this at home kids!

Here’s an activity for older kids, taken from Jason Fried’s blog post The writing class I’d like to teach. It can help encourage kids to bring the approach they often bring to drawing, to writing.

Pick a topic, any topic, and write a three page version, a one page version, a three paragraph version, a one paragraph version, and a one sentence version.

Each step requires asking ‘What’s really important?’ That’s the most important question you can ask yourself about anything….Whittling it all down until all that’s left is the point.

Jason Fried, co-founder and CEO of Basecamp in episode #329 of The Tim Ferriss Show and in a Signal v. Noise.

Thanks for the inspiration @jasonfried and @tferriss.