The Only Four Things That Matter

We live in a world of lists, thoughtful and thoughtless advice, coaching and professorial preaching. Like me, you've probably already read and internalized endless lists of that one thing, two things, three things, seven habits, nine lives, ten faces, etc.

So, with all those past lists in mind and none of them in mind, here's a list of four things that I believe, at least with regard to creative endeavors and my experience, are the only four things that matter.

I'd call these "competencies," "skills," "inclinations" and "capabilities." Of course, there's a huge question about whether any of these can be taught, learned or merely exercised and strengthened a bit. I'm pretty squarely in the last camp where a little rigorous practice can and probably will make a difference. But, if one were to score any of these on a scale of 1-10 (10 be which I do think is #1ing highest), I don't believe that you can exercise your way beyond a two point increase in any one of them.

So, in no particular order of importance beyond #1, here's my list of the "Only Four Things That Matter."

1  Empathy - the ability to viscerally and passionately understand the reality, experience, feelings, attitudes and beliefs of someone else (animals included).

2  Pattern Recognition - the ability to see a connection, spot a trend, surmise a correlation, discern a norm, an anomaly, an outlier and the relevance and relationship between similar or disparate things.

3  Synthesis - the ability to combine a number of different things in such a way that it creates an entirely new and often simpler thing.

4  Story Telling - the ability to explain things, create a narrative, convey meaning and communicate something in a clear, intuitive and widely understandable way.

So for everyone who thinks that collaboration, team work, management, vision, leadership, honesty, imagination, optimism (you might have me on this one), environment, culture, etc. ALSO matter, I'd argue each of these things have their roots and/or are deeply supported by these four things.

Whether you're hiring someone new, advancing someone, coaching someone and/or improving and growing on your own, I'd advocate taking a closer look at these four things.

With regard to "empathy," the one thing that I maintain is at the root of all creativity, design thinking, human centered design, etc., there's a simple, quick and I'd say pretty accurate assessment tool here: https://psychology-tools.com/empathy-quotient/

Thanks for listening.