Man-with-a-hammer fixation
This text is intentionally a little bit provocative to address the challenges we might face while working in different circles. Strong belief system is a good thing, but it might become also a challenge.
There is a good old saying: "to the man with a hammer, every problem tends to look pretty much like a nail".
And there is more. Because of his talent and passion to hammer he decides to become a hammer professional. Next he learns, that with his passion, decisiveness, discipline, and hard work he can accomplish what ever. Great!
He gets his first project: to cut a tree. He opens the toolbox, takes the only tool: hammer and starts working with sky high motivation. Eventually, after passionate and hard work, the project completes successfully! Great again!
The great successes makes him even more confident about his hammering skills and that hammer is the most perfect tool in the world. This all strengthens his belief system, and values, tremendously. It is always easy to give advices from the audience, but if there would be another way to cut trees, how to help him to open up his belief system and convince him about other useful tool options?
And there is more. He learns that persistence is a good value to protect himself from all sort of disruptive attempts to confuse him playing his own game, so it is just better for him to trust only himself and follow his instincts and beliefs. He knows he is right. He truly believes. He has the experience and he is absolutely confident.
But we all know, he has the Man-with-a-hammer fixation.
Although, this example is simple and clear, the real life isn't. At the same time one should both be focused to get in the goal and be open-minded to live in time. Where goes the line between to stick in good old and to adopt new? When to be persistent and when flexible? When to persevere with one truth and when to pivot with a second thought? When to use hammer and when chainsaw?
If you think there is only one truth or one size fits all, think again, because you might have found in yourself a symptom of Man-with-a-hammer fixation.