Page 9 - kf fyi for your improvement license eng 3-4-15

– Seek further feedback. Little happens without feedback. Get a developmental partner, get formal
360 feedback, and poll people you work with about what you should start doing, keep doing, keep
doing with slight modifications, and stop doing.

– Use jobs or assignments for development. The number one developer of competence by far is
stretching, challenging jobs—not feedback, not courses, not role models, but jobs where you
develop and exercise significant and varied competencies. If you really want to grow, these are
the best places to do it. You’ll have to stretch in uncomfortable areas. A challenging job or
assignment requires you to work on your downsides more vigorously because you either perform
or fail. Real development happens when it’s not practice but it’s the real thing and the stakes are
high. Use your new job or assignment to learn from experience—this ability has been shown to
be linked to potential.

– Lay out a plan and a schedule. Your plan should include at least three items you will work on
immediately.

2. Work around the need to neutralize the weakness. Self-knowledge is essential to this approach. You
have to know you have the need and acknowledge its importance. You can use any of these four
workaround strategies to cover for your lack of skill. The goal of a workaround is to reduce the noise
caused by the need. While there may or may not be any learning attached to the workaround, this
accomplishes what must be done without directly addressing the personal need.

– People workarounds…
Find an internal or external person to stand in for you when the weakness is in play. This could be
a peer, a friend, someone from your staff, or a consultant. For example, if you are a marginal
presenter, get someone who is a good presenter to present your material. Hire people for your
team who are good in the areas you are not. Delegate the tasks that bring the weakness into
play.

– Task workarounds…
Trade tasks or share tasks with a peer. For example, you help a peer with their strategic planning,
and they help you with your presentations to senior management. Structure the weakness out.
Redesign your job (with your boss) so that you are not responsible for the task(s) that brings your
weakness into play. Change your job so that you no longer have to give lots of speeches to
strangers. Assign that task to another unit.

– Change workarounds…
If you decide that you don’t want to work on your needs, do an honest assessment of your
strengths and find an organization, a job, another unit, or another career that fits those strengths.
If you are in sales promotion and are not a comfortable presenter or cold caller, then find a sales
job where leads are provided or customers come to you, or consider marketing analysis where
those two requirements are greatly decreased.

– Self workarounds…
Acknowledge your weaknesses and be honest with yourself and others. Research shows that
admitting weaknesses (within limits) actually increases people’s evaluations of you. So if you start
by saying, “As most of you know, speaking is not one of my strengths,” people will not be as
critical. Make a conscious decision to live with a weakness. If you decide not to address the need,
concentrate harder on the things you do well.
© Korn Ferry 2014-2015. All rights reserved. WWW.KORNFERRY.COM

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