“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift” – Albert Einstien
The master skillsets have become dominantly technical and analytical.
In Silicon Valley, it’s hard to ignore the salaries that coders command. In Houston, you can’t overlook the job security of becoming an engineer. And in New York, applying math skills to the finance world has undeniable upward mobility. (BTW, these are the areas of the US where I've gotten to live over the past decade or so of life.)
These environments tell clear stories: being quantitatively qualified and analytically robust come with the trappings of success - high salaries, job security, and upward mobility.
As someone who finished advanced calculus in high school and consistently scored in the 99th percentile of standardized tests in math, I can safely say that the analytical side of my brain has plenty of talent, abilities I continued to explore in college through math and science electives outside of my major. (I promise this paragraph becomes less of a brag as we go.) I was able to apply those skills to the analytical challenges in consulting during the first years out of school at Deloitte. But truth be told, whenever my head was in Excel for 8+ hours a day, I wasn’t happy – instead, I was most joyful when I was interfacing with people. When I’m using my qualitative skills more often, I’m at my most effective and productive.
Looking back, it’s pretty clear to me that I focused too much effort on strengthening the skillsets that were more blatantly tied to "success", especially early on in one's career. Quantitative skills also mimic themselves in that they're measurable; they can be quantitatively identified and easily evaluated. By contrast, qualitative skills are a little tougher to pin down even when they may make you happy. In an effort to grow those strengths where I’m most passionate, I recently made a concrete list of qualitative skills that you can also use to focus on the oft-neglected – but extremely important – so-called “soft” skills. The below are tactical, scalable, and extremely employable. Have a look, and let me know which you identify with and which you would add to this list!
A Quick Ode to Your Qualitative Talents
- Creating - If a tremendous amount or high quality content has to be written, designed, filmed, or edited, you’re the one everyone else turns to. You can churn out high quality material and learn quickly how to flex into different types of content creation. Within the bounds of efficiency, you enjoy spending time composing (or even writing emails) and still love every minute of it. Writing is meaningful to you because your writing gets people to deeply care while also clarifying complex concepts
- Prioritizing – While there is a time and place to take your time, there’s a lot you want to get done, and get it done well! You don't like wasting time. You work with your teams to cut to the chase and not only get things done, but get the RIGHT things done for everyone's benefit
- Sharing Ideas and Getting the Word Out – You may have been a town crier in a past life. If your team has to contact customers, reach out to suppliers, or connect with potential partners, you get very excited. You love finding new, creative ways to conduct marketing efforts and determine how to bring value to others
- Leading and Managing Difficult Conversations - You relish in solving interpersonal challenges, and that involves working through tough communications. You might be extremely difficult to embarrass, and you certainly don't shy away from uncomfortable conversations; you dive right in and find a way to get to win-win solutions
- Getting Excited and Getting Other People Excited - Enough said. Unequivocally, your past team members and managers may have all said that you bring intense soul and energy to any setting. As a bonus, if you’re genuinely excited about what your team is doing, this excitement is guaranteed to be exponentially contagious
- Building and Telling Stories - No matter the medium - PowerPoint, writing, or even video - you enjoy both the process and the outputs of storytelling for businesses and for people
- Problem Solving – You love brainstorming solutions to issues and testing the ideas out to see what works for a business. You also love asking and answering tough questions and understanding how you’re not only solving the problems within an organization, but problems for clients and customers through a new solution
- Starting, Building, and Maintaining High Quality Relationships – You’re great at striking up conversations with anyone, building on existing interactions, and continuously following up to learn as much as possible about the lives of others
- Connecting the Dots Among Unlike Topics – You might find life metaphors in everything. You enjoy building on these metaphors, sharing them, and learning about what others think about them
While it’s important to have a touch of practicality when it comes to our careers, the truth is that if we’re too practical, we miss out on the opportunity to become the full expression of who we are meant to become. 100% of the time, that’s someone who’s never existed before. If you have these skills, you’re meant to use them, shamelessly, and you don’t have to wait for the world you live in to celebrate them.
If you’re waiting for permission to celebrate these talents, here it is: You can celebrate these talents, and you can celebrate them now.
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