HOW TO Become the BEST You Can Be!

“You can do ANYTHING!” is the title of a hilarious Saturday Night Live comedy sketch that pokes fun at this oft-voiced bromide intended to encourage frustrated or disappointed children or young adults who're trying to find their way in life.

The following comedy sketch cleverly mocks the premise that you can do or be?anything you want. Sadly, this is the conventional wisdom many believe. However, the idea of success in any endeavor is scientifically unsupported and can be harmful when people make it their primary rationale for choosing a career.

So why is this sketch so funny? Because it makes fun of the idea that we can be successful at anything we try.?Indeed, many believe this to be true because their parents raised them this way by repeatedly boosting their childhood egos even when they showed little or no talent for a given activity. The result: a generation of adults with overblown perceptions of their talents and unrealistic career expectations that constantly frustrate them, their co-workers, and their supervisors.

How do we fix this challenging human relations problem? By answering the question many of you frequently ask: “How do I realize my greatest potential?”?If you’ll read on, you’ll learn exactly HOW to make this happen for you and your kids.?And, by the way, it’s much easier than you think.?

First of all, let me be clear, “You CANNOT do or be ANYTHING you can think of EVEN IF you work harder than everyone else around you to succeed at it.”?The simple truth is human beings have genetic limitations. But that’s okay because you can be EXCEPTIONAL at one or two things you were BORN to do. Yes, I said, “exceptional at what you were born to do.”?

The following phrase sums this up:

APTITUDES

are the key to unlocking society’s greatest asset —

HUMAN POTENTIAL.

Let’s go back for a moment to our earlier discussion about problematic childrearing. Many of you recall childhood friends who received trophies for just showing up to sporting events, and in some instances, being awarded trophies or ribbons even when they were on the wrong side of the final score or didn’t play at all. We all laugh at these “last place” or "participation" trophy stories; however, they raise serious parenting and child development questions. First: Is it wise to reward kids or adults for underperformance? Absolutely not! There’s no greater disservice to a person’s development than to be rewarded for non-performance or failure thereby giving him a false sense of competence. Second: How do we help people gain a realistic sense of competence? The very best way to empower people with realistic expectations is to make them aware of their innate talents called aptitudes? Moreover, I believe that aptitudes?represent an area of tremendous opportunity for societal healing and advancement.

What are the consequences of a nation of people who don’t know their aptitudes??Just pick up any newspaper; watch the evening news; or tune in to talk-radio.?No matter the medium, the headline stories are the same:?“Billions needed for bailout of another government subsidized industry.” “VA hospital medical errors and delays in accessing healthcare are implicated in hundreds of veteran deaths.” “Police departments overwhelmed as murder rates rise to record levels in many metro areas.” “Youth unemployment and school dropout rates continue to climb with no end in sight!”?

Some argue these problems represent symptoms of a decaying civilization. Others blame permissive parenting, the failure of public education, political polarization, or even the excesses of capitalism. In truth, there are a variety of reasons for unethical, antisocial, uncivil, or unproductive behaviors.?However, there is one aspect of society that stands out as the root cause—the lack of public awareness about individual aptitudes, how to identify them, and how to use this knowledge to choose a career.

So, what are aptitudes anyway? Aptitudes are the innate talents people have for learning and doing things quickly and with excellence. When one’s strongest aptitudes are utilized, they give a person a competitive edge over others who lack these abilities needed to be successful in a particular field of work. [1] It’s simple. When you possess the natural abilities (aptitudes) for a particular activity, you’ll be successful at it every time you try.?And, when you’re really good at something, others will see you as a top performer, a natural, or even a superstar. In short, applying one’s strongest APTITUDES are the KEY to vocational SUCCESS.

Yes, you can have success just like the stars you see in professional sports and entertainment.?In fact, these celebrities are no different than you except for one thing: For whatever quirk of fate reason, they each discovered their innate talents early in life and began applying them toward a career that required their special abilities.?So, all you have to do is get your aptitudes tested and find out which ones are your strongest. Then, you can focus your efforts on getting into a career that is matched to your strongest aptitudes. This way, you too can excel above and beyond those around you who have much weaker aptitudes for that type of work. As a result, you’ll have a competitive advantage in the workplace. What’s more, knowing your strongest aptitudes will help you identify the ideal career that will enable you to fulfill your life’s purpose.

Let’s explain how this works. Like fingerprints, every person is born with a unique set of aptitudes (weak and strong). Yes, each of you is BORN with your very own set of aptitudes. These aptitudes are essentially constant throughout your life.?Additionally, over the past 100 years, the science of human engineering has proven that when you use?your strongest innate aptitudes (natural talents) in a job that requires them, you’ll gain a competitive edge over others who lack these same aptitudes.

A great example of this aptitude advantage on the job is embodied by the all-stars of the NBA, NFL, NHL, and MLB sports franchises. Exceptional athletes in each of these sports, who qualify as league all-stars, are born with specific aptitudes (natural gifts) that enable them to excel in their respective sport.?Yes, they’re born with the DNA that facilitates their exceptional speed, quickness, agility, strength, and sports-specific intelligence. In other words, they’re naturally endowed with the talents needed to play their sport more proficiently than their fellow athletes (and the rest of us fans too).?Hence, their unique mix of aptitudes gives them a competitive edge over others in that sport. The result is that all-star athletes play superbly better than everyone else in their league and, as a result, become known to sportswriters and fans as SUPERSTARS!?

So, what does all-star athletic superstardom mean to you and your career success? To answer this let’s first take a look at some non-sports luminaries we’ve heard about over the years: Ludwig van Beethoven, Marie Curie, Thomas Edison, George Washington Carver, Pablo Picasso, Amelia Earhart, Albert Einstein, Jane Goodall, Mikhail Baryshnikov, John Lennon, Michael Jackson, Oprah Winfrey, Dr. Ben Carson, and Steve Jobs to name several. What do these luminaries and the superstars of professional sports have in common??Answer:?Each is considered a “natural” in his or her respective field. What makes them “naturals” is their individual mix of inborn talents, called aptitudes, which they applied in their careers with greater proficiency than their peers.

The reality is that you have the same potential for career success. Yes, I said, “you have the same potential” as these superstars. Think about it. The only thing that sets these stars apart from you is they learned at an early age (or others did on their behalf) what their strongest aptitudes were and took steps to apply these talents in their chosen careers. If you had been fortunate enough to become aware of your strongest aptitudes early in life, you too would’ve tailored your training or education toward an occupation that required these aptitudes. The good news is that it’s not too late for you because your aptitudes are the same today as when you were a teenager.?You still can become the “Dr. Ben Carson” of your workplace.?No kidding!

“Okay, I’m sold!” you say.?“How do I get my aptitudes tested?”?Answer: At the not-for-profit Johnson O’Connor Research Foundation (JOCRF) Human Engineering Laboratory. JOCRF has conducted aptitude assessments for almost 100 years for people young and old and from all walks of life. Here’s what you do: commit to be tested; save your money; schedule your JOCRF aptitude assessment; and once there, spend a day and a half enjoying a unique testing experience that’s nothing like any testing you’ve done before. What’s more, these aptitude tests were developed to consistently and reliably predict your success in the field of work you were BORN to do. “No way!” you say. “Yes, way!”?In fact, this is the quickest, most effective method for learning what your strongest natural talents are and how to match them to your ideal career. [2]

Furthermore, there are aptitudes for virtually every job known to humankind…and for many jobs not yet invented. [3] I firmly believe there will come a time when social and competitive pressures compel government and industry to use scientific aptitude testing to select and place all employees.?I envision a world with expanded scientific research into the identification and measurement of career aptitudes that will validate the JOCRF thesis that individual success is a function of identifying one’s innate aptitudes and matching these talents to a job that requires them.

What will drive this heightened interest in aptitude identification and utilization? Free enterprise of course. When free enterprise is allowed to exercise its “invisible hand,” freely competing organizations will quickly follow the innovation leader or else perish. As one producer in a free economy “builds a better mousetrap” using aptitude testing to install superior management and high performance employees, customers will “beat a path to its door” thereby enriching its owners. The more innovative organizations will move quickly toward using aptitude testing for key managerial positions first, eventually assessing all employees for the purpose of placing them in their ideal roles. These aptitude-centric enterprises will achieve gains in productivity, quality, and customer loyalty unheard of in years past.

Once a few pioneering organizations prove the value of employee aptitude testing, the sidelines will clear. Other owners who observe this hyper-success will want the same for their organizations.?As go the innovative aptitude deployment mousetraps, in the form of impeccably run enterprises, so will flow capital seeking profitable ways to be invested. As the aforementioned transformations?produce one success story after another, competitors will scramble to learn how to deploy their own aptitude-rich workforces, hoping to achieve similar performance results.

When aptitude-driven workers begin to proliferate throughout a cyber-connected world, employees will demand assignments to the right jobs based on their unique innate talents. One outcome of this movement will be the phenomenon of multitudes of employees describing themselves as “very satisfied” or “highly fulfilled” in their work. In addition, human engineering best practices will spread like wildfire from one organization to the next eventually gaining the acceptance of businesses and governments everywhere. At that juncture, the proverbial genie will be out of the bottle, making employee aptitude testing a priority even for the smallest of organizations thereby causing an explosion in the worldwide adoption of aptitude testing as a way to optimize employee performance.

What all of this means for you is that whether you’re a manager, a rank-and-file employee, or even an independent artist the most effective use of your innate talents, your aptitudes, will become the focus of CEOs, scientists, and artistic producers for the better part of this century and beyond.

What’s the bottom line? For you, SAVE VALUABLE TIME by learning what you're good at RIGHT NOW rather than "hunting and pecking" your way through life in search of your ideal career. For society, someday the joyful use of one’s strongest aptitudes will leave people with little time or desire to pursue activities involving lower states of consciousness that lead to social dis-ease.

So, what’s not to like about a revolution that truly maximizes human potential?

[1] Natural Born Manager (Indianapolis, IN: Dog Ear Publishing, 2009), pgs. 3-4, 275-8.

[2] For more information on human engineering science and to learn what scientific aptitude testing has done to improve the careers of people just like you, visit the Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation homepage.

[3] “A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if they are to be ultimately at peace with themselves.”?Abraham H. Maslow.

If this article helped you, please share it with others in your social media networks. Also, visit my website (https://www.edparr.com) to buy my book "Natural Born Manager: A Handbook for Accountability Management” in either hardcopy or e-book format. In my book, you'll find many helpful ideas that will empower you and your friends to resolve your most difficult job and career related challenges.

Cheers,

Ed Parr

See Ed's other posts here.