The Phantom Skills : When Our Brains Trick Us Into Thinking We Have Abilities We Don't Actually Possess
Kumaran Anandan (????? ??)
CTO/Chief Mentor, working with teams to achieve extreme objectives through high performance. ??Mentor-Investor (only startups)
Everyone has heard of phantom limbs - the phenomenon where amputees continue to experience sensations in their missing limbs.
John, an avid runner, knew firsthand how disorienting and uncomfortable phantom limbs could be. After a terrible car accident left him with both legs amputated, John struggled to adjust to life without his legs. But he eventually learned to use prosthetics and even started running again. However, no matter how hard he tried, John just couldn't shake the feeling that his legs were still there. He would feel tingling and itching in his phantom legs and sometimes even feel as though he was running on them, even though he was using his prosthetics. It was as if his brain couldn't accept that his legs were gone.
But wait!! phantom limbs aren't the only things our brains can trick us into thinking we have.
Just like phantom limbs, "Phantom Skills" are a discrepancy between reality and perception - we think we have a certain ability, but our performance doesn't reflect it.
David learned this the hard way when he was promoted to manager at his company. Despite having no previous management experience, David was confident in his ability to lead and motivate his team. As it turned out, David's confidence was unfounded. He struggled to delegate tasks and his team's performance suffered as a result. But David refused to accept that he wasn't a natural leader. He convinced himself that he "just" a needed a little more time and continued managing his team.
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It wasn't until his team's project was significantly delayed and over budget that David finally faced the reality of his phantom management skills. He was demoted and had to work his way back up to a management position.
To avoid the pitfalls of phantom skills, it's important to practice the following as
By facing our phantom skills head-on, we can continue to grow and improve as individuals.
CTO/Chief Mentor, working with teams to achieve extreme objectives through high performance. ??Mentor-Investor (only startups)
1 年Thanks for the share Kannan Bakthavatchalam
Automation & AI | Early Childhood Care & Education | Wildlife Conservation
1 年You probably meant supernumerary phantom limb rather than mere phantom limb, because a phantom limb existed in the past, whereas the supernumerary phantom limb never existed before. But, yes, I guess I am just belabouring the point. Thank you for writing this though. I have faced that exact problem early in my career. I was promoted fast due to my tech & team building skills, but then somehow I was expected to bring in large deals too. I've always had a problem in discovering by talking to people, by building trust. But I've always excelled in winning deals once the basic trust has been built to get enough details about the problem. But I thought I could do this too since I had contributed extensively to build winning deals. And then I had a great fall, went in a multi year depression, and finally realised that it's something that I not only don't have but also that others are far better at it than me and that I must merely collaborate with them.
Leadership-Productivity Coach ? 7 LinkedIn TOP Voice Badge holder ? Agile Coach, SAFe 6 SPC, SAFe 6 RTE , Scrum Alliance Certified Agile Leader(CAL1) CSM, ICP-ACC? ICF PCC Pathway? Life Long Learner ? NLP Practioner
1 年excellent post Kumaran Anandan. Really thought provoking and makes one introspect
Programs Manager at PMI Bangalore India Chapter
1 年T H A N K S! Kumaran Anandan sir for writing on a topic which is normally not even thought of forget of being discussed. I understand there is a trust deficit and a leadership deficit, including governance issues, in our country, society be it at the unit level of the family (the parents) or at the organization (at functional, at the department level, at divisional level and at the corporate level) or at the society (be it at the village level/city level or district level or state level or at the central level). Is it perhaps because we are practicing unconsciously the phantom skills of leadership. And we do not have checks and balances in place and even if it is there, we are doing it subjectively with our unconscious biases to fish out this lack of real leadership skill. The result we are not able to realize individual's full potential and god given gifts and natural talents. As individual contributors we are able to realize our areas of concern and our areas of influence but when we go to the next level at the team lead or at the manager level or at the CX level and even at the Board level, we are missing the trees from the woods because we mistake real skills with phantom skills. Is my understanding correct, Kumaran sir.
Founder & CEO, Tiny Magiq; EiR at CMI Algolabs;xSVP/CIO & Head of Innovation, Cognizant
1 年Good one Kumaran. I was going to say Dunning Kruger Effect but you said already. ?Phantom Skills says it much better though. Nice coinage like Anbu says.?