Blindspot to Brightspot
Chandan Lal Patary
Empowering Business Transformation | Author of 8 Insightful Guides | The Scrum Master Guidebook | The Product Owner Guidebook | The High Performance Team Coaching Guidebook | The Leadership Guidebook
There are things about ourselves that we are not aware of. That’s why we call them blind spots.
When a person is driving, he or she has rear view and side mirrors to guide him or her. However, there will always be blind spots, or parts of the car by which the driver cannot see. We can never know what we look like without a mirror.
Our eyes are incapable of it, but other people can see us well. Even though we are unaware, the blind spot section harbors habits, preferences, dislikes, prejudices, and other things that are only obvious from a third-person perspective.
We all have such blind spots, and they are weaknesses we should fight.
Leonardo da Vinci said, “The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.”
Our blind spots are the inner-space from where we operate. Some claim it the “inner bias;” deep inside, we might refuse to accept what we don’t admire (but know) about ourselves.
Our blind spots exist at the junction of how we identify ourselves and how others identify us.
Most blind spots are based on assumptions.
I have been employing the below approach for a long time to identify my blind spots.
I asked the below questions.
- How often I share with other individuals? Self-disclosure about myself.
- How well others (seek to) know me.
- How strongly I know about myself.
- What assumptions am I making? that I’m not conscious I’m making, that gives me what I see?
- What are my assumptions while creating the decision?
- What is my emotional Blindspot’s? am I conscious of how I am dealing with my emotions?
- What are my biases esp confirmation biases, am I aware?
- How well I am taking feedback? Am I asking enough individuals to inform me about myself? am I entertaining those to instruct me more?
- Am I welcoming all types of feedback about me?
- Am I stuck with an old way of thinking? what others are thinking about me?
To discover more about my blindspot, I keep asking all my colleagues.
- WHERE to know the fact–Feedback from others about me?
- WHO to obtain feedback from- Desire to identify those individuals.
- HOW to hear feedback from honest individuals.
- What do I work out with the observation - take action?
I ask my colleagues to give me more insight about myself related to
- What do you value about our relationship?
- What do you think my top three qualities are?
- What would you say I’m passionate about?
Once they share the feedback, reflect on these answers, ask multiple individuals and compare and take action to improve.
What are you doing to move from Blindspot to Brighspot(Open/Knowledge)?