As we near the end of the year, I hope you are finding pockets of time to review what's happened in 2024, and to begin to think ahead to 2025. Even as you rush to wrap your tasks and projects for the year, make sure you take some "space between" to be alone with your thoughts and allow dots to connect.
The True Nature of Talent
I'm reading Scott Galloway's book The Algebra of Wealth, which—surprisingly—isn't about getting rich. Rather, it explores how to strategically invest your time and resources to build unique long-term leverage - wealth - with timebeing the crucial factor.
A key insight early in the book challenges our assumptions about where to invest time and energy for maximum impact. Scott explores how we often misinterpret what constitutes talent:
The key is to figure out what you can do that others can’t or are unwilling to do. Hard work is a talent. Curiosity is a talent. Patience and empathy are talents. For wrestlers and boxers, making weight is a talent. If you’re a jockey, being short is a talent. The point is to cast a wide net and consider not just your skills, but your advantages, your differences, what you can tolerate, what makes you unique.
As you consider the portfolio of activities that make up your days (and your leadership), how many of them center around your unique talents? How much focus, time, and energy do you spend each day doing things that express the best of who you are—your talents?
Talented, ambitious professionals need to know what makes them unique, but they must also leverage that uniqueness in how they approach their work. Otherwise, that talent might as well not exist.
Make Your Own Technology
I recently watched a documentary about the making of 10cc's classic song "I'm Not In Love." In today's world of advanced music production, it's easy to forget how much ingenuity and creativity it took to create groundbreaking music decades ago.
The short video below shows how the band invented their own sophisticated recording method for vocal tracks and harmonies. They spent weeks recording every possible note they might need, then played them back simultaneously on a multi-track tape recorder, using the mixing board to select specific notes. The result was remarkable.
Here's the question: what dream or ambition of yours feels constrained by current technology? Could you create your own solution? Maybe it's time to make your own tech.
Notes, Notes, Everywhere
One of the best purchases I've made in years is a little leather notecard holder that I carry in my back pocket. Together with my Fisher Space Pen, these tools go with me everywhere. I jot down hunches, ideas, observations, and bits of overheard conversation. After capturing these thoughts, I scan them into my phone to keep everything organized for later review. Some of the best ideas for my books and keynotes have emerged from these simple scribbled hunches on index cards.
Many people carry notebooks, but I prefer the flexibility of cards—they're easier to mix, match, and discard when needed.
Why not just use my phone? I've found that notes typed directly into a notes app tend to vanish into the digital void, rarely to be considered again. The deliberate process of writing by hand, reflecting, and then curating as I transfer them to my notes app creates space for deeper analysis of these ideas.
It's a low-tech, high-impact practice.
Featured Practice: Pruning
In my book The Accidental Creative, I wrote about managing your energy to ensure you can be brilliant when it matters most. The year's end offers a perfect opportunity to evaluate your commitments, projects, and meetings—determining what needs "pruning" to create space for fresh emotional and creative energy in the new year.
Which areas of your life or daily rhythms could benefit from pruning to make room for something more valuable?
Podcast: So Emotional
This week's podcast episode features former Nike CMO Greg Hoffman on the role of emotion in our creative process and leadership. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
Thanks for subscribing. If you found this helpful, please share it with others or consider purchasing one of my books.
Until next time, may you be brave, focused, and brilliant.
