Bring out the superhero in you!

I should really start this article by apologising for the misleading title. It's very unlikely that what I have to tell you will effectively turn you into a superhero but, at the very least, applying the concepts below can definitely contribute to you feeling like one!

I stopped procrastinating and finally decided to put my thoughts together and create a systematic approach to better answer the question I so frequently get asked (insert pause here to sound truly knowledgeable) and even more often (only this one really) ask myself:

How do I become better at what I do?

So I did what any consultant worth their salt would do: I came up with a framework.

Now, for those of you who are not that familiar with consulting jargon, a "framework" is the perfect consulting term. It sounds incredibly smart at the same time being vague enough to prevent your audience from challenging you on it (generally resorting to a careful nod or a puzzled look).

I decided to follow great examples such as the US Army College giving us the VUCA model, McKinsey delighting their clients with its 7S framework, BCG using its strategic positioning matrix and of course Toyota introducing us to more Lean ways of working.

After some intense brainstorming (mostly between myself and my alter ego) I came up with the R framework. As with all great frameworks it is simple to understand, intuitive to apply and easy to memorise. In fact, I am very confident (it might just be the narcissist in me) that after reading this article you will always think of this framework when someone asks:

How R you?

So, let's dive straight to the juicy bit and realise what the R framework is all about, shall we?

R is the shorter version of 3R which is the long(er) name of this framework. It stands for the three main attributes of an heroic individual, namely: reliable, resourceful and resilient.

Reliable

Look, this is by far the number one quality of a professional not to mention it can make or break one's career. When friends and colleagues tell me they feel the need to prove themselves, in my head, what they are really saying is "I want people to perceive me as someone they can rely upon". And that's OK. Reliability is not a spectrum. You are either reliable or you aren't. Just like integrity (you can't have 99% integrity) but starts with an R.

Young professionals often overreact in the face of failure. They missed a deadline, they didn't prepare that presentation as thoroughly as they should, they got emotional and replied in a more intempestive, untimely manner and suddenly they assume their reputation is gone.

If you can relate with the aforementioned statement I have some good news for you: as long as they are exceptions and not the rule, you will still be perceived as reliable.

Actions such as consistently arriving late to work, showing up late to meetings, giving excuses, accusing someone else instead of assuming responsibility for your acts, setting overly optimistic expectations and then missing them, however, do take a large toll on your reliability and because of its binary nature there is a high chance someone will describe you as being unreliable (I know, it does sound unfair but it's not something you can't recover from though sadly people prefer to oversimplify instead of exercising a fair judgment by saying actually he is, probably has gone through a rough patch and might be getting better but I really can't tell now and will rather dramatise by reverting to: we just can't trust him).

Being reliable is about the big things as much as it is about the smaller ones. It's your baseline, it shows that you have your act together and understand that responsibilities are to be taken seriously whether it's a multi-million business proposal or an early morning internal meeting to discuss what crackers should be on the table in the next Christmas party.

When it comes to reliability consistency is everything.

Resourceful

Next in line is resourcefulness. And whilst reliability gives you the foundational ground to grow upon, being resourceful can indubitably make you stand out of the crowd. Resources can take a myriad of forms, the most common ones being people (connections), advice (aka actionable knowledge) and assets (no, I am not referring to the weed re-seller down the street).

If you are doing things right, by now, you will have cultivated a broad, well-nurtured network you can tap into whenever you find yourself in times of need. Game changers are typically not brilliant at doing but unmatchable at finding someone who can do it for them.

So, when you listen to someone saying "I am not sure I can help you with that but I sure know someone who can!" a handful of times there is a high chance he will turn into your go-to person very quickly.

Advice is also a great resource to have. One can have all the experience in the world and yet fail miserably at putting it into an actionable form. Advice needs to be tangible and, even if not directly telling what to do, it should provide examples of similar circumstances and what were the outcomes of specific decisions. Work on this skill by giving more feedback, positive and constructive so that you learn how to phrase sensitive topics in a way that will lower people's natural resistance to criticism. Become a coach and try to explain what you consider to be obvious and routine to someone who never tried it before or who is just starting. Discover journalling so that you can organise your thoughts in a more logical, sequential manner. Explore debates and welcome opposing opinions so that you can practice how to find common ground and build consensus without making a discussion or argument a zero-sum game.

Last but not the least, assets. These can be books, online resources (Ted Talks, webinars, academic papers can be wonderful resources and are so easy to access), documents you produced yourself or came across during your career and decided to save and re-use, podcasts you saved for later, wonderful articles you found on LinkedIn, to name but a few.

I must admit I am still learning how to get better at organising and making some sense out of all the things I have collected throughout the years. I have essays from my university times which I store because I think some of the points I wrote about were solid and are still relevant Today, I have my personal, curated list of inspirational clips I like to recur to when in need of a strong morale boost for my team and a whole set of tomes on subjects such as leadership, entrepreneurship and consulting models that I only really use when I feel like writing a LinkedIn article after midnight because I can't be bothered to go out partying.

Resilient

If I had to point out one type of person I really can't stand is a whiner. We all whine a bit and that's fine, healthy even. What is NOT OK is people who forget the difference between a brief, innocuous complaint here and there and becoming the victims of their own lives.

Life is hard, we can all agree on that and people are too self-centric to go off their way and take time to really appreciate all the great things you do. And that's fair since most of the things we do are only great in our heads anyway (sorry Elon if you are reading this post).

Unlike reliability which you can turn into a habit, resiliency is both the result of the environment you are in, i.e. the way you were brought up, how you were taught to deal with adversity and especially how much perspective you can put in place when faced with a challenge, hardships, misfortune and how much you are willing to master this skill.

Practicing resiliency is tough and it certainly helps if one stops believing that everything revolves around him/her and that maybe some mistakes are really not that bad after all.

Resiliency is the third R-word in my pseudo-serious framework because sadly we all have our own demons to fight. Some of them can feel very real and are so deeply ingrained in our hearts (read brains) preventing us from living life to the fullest, seizing the present, appreciating one another or simply smiling more regularly.

How many times have you worked with people who are so quickly discouraged by a stumbling block, who lose their motivation when the solution isn't obvious or presents itself as hard to reach, people who doubt themselves when outside their comfort zone?

Don't let these thoughts settle in. Rely on yourself as others rely on you. If you don't have all the answers find the closest resourceful person so that you too can add to your pool of resources and most importantly, act like a superhero and become resilient because, as Hollywood shows have taught us, bad guys never die at first try and you will have to keep up the momentum and get tougher if you are gonna conquer evil throughout all seasons.

Finally, if you feel like it, be rebellious even but do let me know so that I can update the framework. Thank you.