About Superpowers

Knowledge is crack, just try it and you’ll be hooked. And you’ll find out how clueless you were beforehand, or how clueless everyone around you is. That’s what’s so wonderful about technology, Internet, etc – it’s possible (given time, effort and actual willingness) to gain expertise at literally anything.

There are so many best practices on how to hire and groom good people that would make your head spin. Unfortunately, they are only good for hiring remedial labor when you’re seeking complacent people that treasure stability, no change or accountability (ie: drones). But most businesses do not grow (or in this climate, survive) with drones. And when you look for more gifted and talented people, the unfortunate circumstance is that smart people know how to manipulate data. Things like DiSC profiles for example, can be easily skewed if you know what the hiring manager is looking for.

To date, I have only found one thing that makes good people stand apart from the army of idiots looking for a paycheck: eagerness to learn.

Literally everyone who ever used to work for Own Web Now is no longer here because they refused or showed no interest in self improvement – from reading long form books that establish expertise down to reading Google. People that wait for direction and expect to be forced/sent to training are usually directed back to the job search.

It sounds harsh, but it’s all about superpowers..

If you’re skilled enough, you get a job.

Just because you got a job doesn’t necessarily mean you get to keep it.

And it certainly doesn’t mean you’ll ever get a raise or move up.

It’s amazing how many people don’t get the above fundamentals of work in the 21st century. Like I recently wrote in the Death of a Services Salesman, the opportunity to hide and slide is only there in the infancy when everyone is trying to figure out how to make it. Once the best practices are established, the only ones that survive are first movers (people who figured it out first and created a very large client base) and the cost leaders (people that can automate and price the solution down to the bare bones)

Where does that leave people in a job?

Well. I sat around with my marketing folks yesterday and we went through the agenda for the next month. Development of superpowers was key. What I mean by that is that things are only apparent and common sense when you study and learn about them.

They are only common sense because you’re aware of them.

The rest of the people have no idea that they are being manipulated, that everything they say and how they say it reveals what they are up to, that they are being coached and guided towards the (mutually) beneficial result.

In 2010 and beyond, I am only looking for people that are looking for more & better. I don’t care what your DiSC, history, education says – because that’s largely irrelevant. A year from now we’ll be doing very different stuff than what we do today and we need people that can get from here to there on their own.