A Professional Joins the Competition—and Feeling Good About It.

A colleague friend of mine just recently jumped ships–having left one major accounting firm for another. He was very loyal to his former employer, having made significant sacrifices over many years. During his time with his former firm, he clearly had the firm’s best interests at heart—just as a professional would. Think: mind-set two.

Yet, he never made partner—the holy grail for most in these types of firms.

He’s one now! As integral to the offer, his new firm offered him a partnership. He followed his own self-interests, he took the job. Good for him.

As we pointed out in The Power of Professionalism, being a professional doesn’t mean being a door-mat. It doesn’t mean adopting blind, mindless, loyalty.  And it doesn’t mean abandoning your own self-interests.

Keeping balance between your own interests and your organization’s is sometimes tricky—it requires judgment and discipline.  It’s been said that “professionals create more value than they extract”. My colleague friend did just that while at his former firm. I hope he feels good about his decision. As professional, he should.

Seven Signs An ‘Expert’ Is Slipping

1) they tend to be impatient with ‘mere mortals’

2) they tend to reinforce what they already believe or trust they know

3) they get overly defensive when others challenge them

4) their listening skills have tended to atrophy

5) new ideas are often seen as a threat or source of discomfort for them

6) frequently they tend to hang around with people of similar stature

7) they have become over-reliant on the approach that enabled them to become an expert in the first place

If these signs are prevalent, it portends an expert in decline.

What Each Of Us Can Learn From Lance’s Disclosure

Full disclosure: I didn’t watch Oprah’s interview with Lance Armstrong, nor did I seek out articles regarding such.  My exposure to the subject was limited to one article I accidentally happened on through my ISP.

This article points out that Armstrong finally comes clean with his oldest son Luke about his indiscretions after he witnessed his son defending him in front of others.  In other words, Armstrong made an arguably tough decision after seeing the adverse impact on Luke.

As we’ve learned through Stanford Professor James March’s research on decision making, these types of tough choices are most strongly influenced by either one of two factors: 1) the consequences one is subject to—what I get versus what it costs OR  2) the choice is influenced by an especially important aspect of one’s identity.   The former is quite calculated, the latter is quite intuitive.

In Armstrong’s case it appears he finally fessed up to Luke because of the  identity he held of himself as Dad.   As the article points out, Armstrong became the most emotional when the subject of his son came up….this contrasted against the subject of all the sponsorships (and money) he had lost.

In his role as Dad, Armstrong no doubt had certain expectations of himself—to do right by his kids, to protect them, to teach them properly, etc. For those of us who are parents, our identity of ourselves (as either mom or dad) is one our most powerful.  Thus, we shouldn’t find it too surprising that Armstrong told Luke after he saw the damage the situation was having on him.

That’s the power that identity had on Armstrong—as it does for each of us. Our best decisions–especially the tough ones–are by-products of situations when we’ve been willing to be influenced by our identity.

Is it any wonder then that within The Power of Professionalism  we put such emphasis on being a professional—the ultimate workplace identity?

 

 

 

 

 

Are You Comfortable In Your Own Skin?

One of the important characteristics that is almost always found in a ‘true professional’ is the degree to which they are ‘comfortable in their own skin’.

In other words, they know who they are and aren’t inappropriately fearful of a new market entrant or feel threatened by the success of others….things like that.

Seth Godin recently published a blog post entitled True Professionals Don’t Fear Amateurs. That post nicely captures a number of important points that are consistent with the premise of being comfortable in one’s own skin. Enjoy.