What stops talented professionals from making progress

A clash of generations

Hi!

It's been a year since I've decided to double down on my consulting practice.

In the past year I've worked with very interesting clients, both for career consulting processes and for organizational development services. My impression is that among professionals in their early 40s, 30s and late 20s there is a deep, challenging conversation about the role of a career in one's life and about how the professional experience can be more aligned with the individual's lifestyle, needs and ambitions.

The pandemic probably encouraged the development of the conversation but I don't think that it changed significantly the direction of the conversation.

Here are three main patterns that I noticed:

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🎯 Blabbing about SMART goals won’t make your team work better.

There are dozens of frameworks to define what is the right way to set goals, but many of them are just obnoxious ways to say “here’s another thing you need to do, just find time for it”.Is there a healthier way to define goals? One that doesn’t feel forced and that inspires good work and better teamwork? Maybe. Jason Cutler here explains the difference between healthy and unhealthy goal setting.

Reading this will help you set goals that can actually be achieved: Jason Cutler’s post.

👥 Sometimes the best solution is inside yourself. Or inside your team. Maybe it’s not even the best one, just the most convenient

Evaluation meetings lose their efficacy because of power dynamics; outsourced professional training can be difficult to translate in good practices for your own team; team building days - well, those are just obnoxious. Aaron Hurst introduces a new, interesting option: Peer Coaching.For non-technical skills, it’s a great option for on-job-training processes which empower the most skilled employees without investing too much money or time.

Reading this will help you find better and cheaper options for training your team: Aaron Hurst’s article.

💥 If you are tired of hearing about “learning from your mistakes”, you will enjoy “learning from your catastrophes”.

Everyone likes to speak about how mistakes are great to improve your craft - until they make a mistake, desperatelysearch for someone else to blameand find a perfect alibi for themselves. There is a much better source for organisational learning: near-miss catastrophes. Much more insightful. Also, it’s definitely a better reason to call a post-mortem meeting: you won’t learn only what you’ve done wrong, you will also learn what practices saved the day this time - and can become routine protocols.Reading this will help you avoid the next catastrophe: Kristen Senz’s article.

You should check out:Codie Sanchez is the mind behind Contrarian Thinking, a newsletter about economy, business and personal finance. She is one of the sharpest authors I’ve read, and her tweets/newsletter explain complex ideas in a very simple, sarcastic language.

Interesting stuff is happening at the Tea Hut, my Facebook group. Why don’t you join us?

Feel free to reach out on LinkedIn as well, if you want.

Unrelated.For 96 dollars per hour, you can rent a 37-years-old Japanese guy who will do absolutely nothing. He already got 3000 requests in the past couple of years.

We both know you are enjoying this. Why don’t you forward this e-mail to a couple of friends who will enjoy it as well? That would be nice of you.