Context, Let's Talk About History

If Context is one of your gifts, there is a significant chance that you love history. You would have enjoyed my childhood elementary school years that were spent in Rockville, Maryland, just outside of Washington DC. For school, we went on field trips that one could only dream about. Each field trip took us to a destination such as the Smithsonian Institute, Ford’s Theater, Gettysburg, Monticello, monuments, and memorials.

Considering what has already occurred in the past can help you to bring value to activities in the present. There is a risk however, that you could spend far too much time in the past and never get caught up with present. When you encounter a person who is gifted with Futuristic, you have just found a person whose vision sees forward as opposed to backward.

Maximizer, Inspiring Others to Excellence

If your gift is Maximizer, you are sitting on what I call my signature theme. By using the word signature, I’m talking about a theme that I chose to build my business and my life around. Little did I know, that I would have to leverage my Maximizer to recover from a heart attack, to navigate open heart surgery and its recovery, recovery from cardiac arrest, recovery from a stroke, and now as a powerful tool in my battle with ALS.

Maximizer’s are interested in turning good to great. In my case, I’m even more interested in taking great to excellent. The late Dr. Don Clifton called this an Influencing theme. That sounds okay but to me, this theme is not being leveraged properly until it inspires others on a daily basis. Maybe, many different people on a daily basis.

The key to leveraging Maximizer to its fullest is to learn how to sort. Some things, processes, widgets, and deeds need to be improved upon. Some do not. Some people desire to take a quantum leap forward. Other people, are quite happy to stay where they are right now.

Activator, A Built In "Go Button"

The last couple of days, I have been reminded of situations where I took action at times when I did not know why I was taking action or risk but my gut told me to move forward anyway. I went through just over 40 years of my life not having any idea why I did much of what I did and it turns out that possessing high Activator is one of the reasons.

When I was introduced to CliftonStrengths, it wasn’t long before a lightbulb turned on and there it was, the answer to the question I didn’t know I had to answer. I have since learned that out of 34 traits that make up Dr. Don Clifton’s CliftonStrengths assessment that I possess a trait called Activator that only 11% of other people possess. Activator is a built-in “go button”.

If you possess Activator in your top potential strengths, you are sitting on something that is both rare and powerful.

Business Skills In High Demand: Strategic / Strategy

You Have Potential to Be Great At Something. Don’t Waste Another Moment Operating Without Personal Clarity, Self-Awareness and Confidence.

Bert Was On A Mission

He was a personal friend. He came to my office for a visit.  Sitting in one of the guest chairs positioned in front of my desk, Bert asked if I’d ever taken a CliftonStrengths™ Assessment?

Yes, Maybe, I think so, was my answer.  Well, did you or did you not take the assessment Bert asked? I think I have the results hidden somewhere in a drawer of my desk. Get them out please, I’ll wait, Bert said. At this point I knew that Bert was on a mission. I just didn’t know why.

I’m about to share my top strengths. Why my strengths? Because it wouldn’t be right for me to openly share any of my client’s private information. If I choose to share my own, that’s different.

FUTURISTIC®

Bert was serious about my assessment results. I did not know back in 2012 what the big deal was surrounding my assessment results, but I sure do now.  Bert began to explain what to me was simply black ink on white paper.  He showed me that I was Futuristic. Futuristic® is a CliftonStrengths™ term that means Visionary.

STRATEGIC®

Wow, the Futuristic® piece of information alone helped me to understand a lifetime of seeing possibilities down the road that others didn’t see. Then Bert explained my Strategic® gift.  He explained that this particular gift is one that a person either has or they don’t have. It cannot be taught. Bert explained how my Strategic enabled me to see the Big Picture as well as paths to get to a future destination that others can’t always see. I quickly began to understand why situations I’d encountered in the past worked out the way they did.

ACTIVATOR®

Bert got to my third Trait called Activator®. He explained how I had a built-in “GO BUTTON” that most people don’t have. To be specific, out of 34 possible Traits, Activator® comes in at number 29 in overall frequency. Only 11% of people out of more than 18 million people who have now taken the CliftonStrengths™ Assessment worldwide have Activator® in their top 5 traits.

MAXIMIZER®

Bert continued on to tell me about my Maximizer®. It was love at first sight when I began to understand that it was in my DNA to not just push good to great but to push for excellence. Once again, I quickly began to understand why I had operated they way I had up to the point when Bert sat in my office, but with no clarity of purpose.

 RELATOR®

Next, Bert talked to me about my Relator®. This Trait as he explained is a very powerful relationship building trait. Most of my relationships are deep, authentic, and trusting. I’ve never been a social butterfly. Now I understood why.

COMMAND®

Bert couldn’t resist telling me about my next Trait. It’s called Command®.  Out of 34 Traits, Command® comes in at number 34 in frequency. Very few people possess this leadership trait.

DEVELOPING STRENGTHS

We went on through my top 12 Traits as I recall. The further we went, the more I understood why Bert had chosen this particular assessment to drive his coaching practice.  This wasn’t the last time Bert and I would meet to discuss my Traits. Bert wanted to see me develop my Traits into full-blown Strengths.

According to the late Don Clifton, the author of the CliftonStrengths™ Assessment, a true Strength is the ability to consistently provide a near-perfect performance in a specific task. When I wrapped my head around this definition, I have to admit that my Maximizer got excited.

Most people who take a CliftonStrengths™ Assessment only learn what their potential strengths could be. They never do what it takes to turn a raw Trait into a full-blown, polished, Strength.

For the next 12 months, I mentored under Bert because it quickly became clear to me that the CliftonStrengths™ Assessment had a strategic place in my own coaching practice. Adopting this tool in my coaching practice was one of the smartest decisions I’ve ever made.

GAME-CHANGING, LIFE-CHANGING, PARADIGM-SHIFTING, TRANSFORMATIONAL, CONFIDENCE-BUILDING

My Career Coaching clients have been achieving life-changing results as a result of the work I do with the CliftonStrenghts™ Assessment and the EQ-I 2.0 Emotional Intelligence Assessment.

If you’d like to learn how my clients are benefiting from the year I invested to mentor under Bert, and the 5+ years I’ve invested into developing my coaching services beyond Bert’s involvement,  I invite you to visit my Career Coaching / Strengths Coaching page on the Jeff Snyder Coaching website.

My clients tell me that the work I’ve been doing with them is “Game-Changing, Life-Changing, Paradigm-Shifting, Transformational, and Confidence-Building”. I’ve never done work that is more important in my life!

Jeff Snyder’s, Self-Awareness, Self-Confidence, Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

Why Military to Private Sector Career Transition Is So Difficult

Comments from Career Transitioning Professionals

“After 27 years serving in the Army, I have never found anything harder than transitioning from the Army to civilian life.”

“I understand what you are going through, I retired from the Navy in 1997 and the transition was so difficult.”

“The private sector is not anything like the military and takes a little to get used to, but again it just takes time and patience.”

“I’ve sent my resume out over 100 times and nobody is paying any attention to me.”

Why Career Transition Is Challenging

These are the comments that I either see on social media or comments that have come to me directly from people who are struggling to make career transitions. Here are a few steps that will address challenges that exist in career transitions.

CAN vs SHOULD

·        In the military, you may have had some choices with regard to where your skills, training, education, and career were headed, but you likely did not have total freedom of choice.

In the private sector, you can do whatever you want to do. Most people never slow down in their lives to figure out the difference between what they “CAN” do and what they “SHOULD” do. When you enter the private sector, this is your opportunity to finally focus in on what you “SHOULD” do with your life based on your unique giftedness.  People who make this investment find Clarity, Confidence, and Direction.

Translation

·        The work you performed in the military was likely called something different than it is in the private sector. You need to translate your language.

A 25-year non-commissioned army officer came to me looking for help with his career transition. In the deserts of the Middle East, he drove and guided convoys of supply trucks across the desert. These trucks carried supplies, vehicles, weapons, etc. While a corporation involved in trucking in the private sector may not be transporting tanks, they are transporting goods that need to be delivered safely and on time. I taught this military officer how to translate his resume’s language. Doing so led to him receiving calls for interviews for supply chain and logistics positions.

Leadership Paradigm Shift

·        In your military career, you likely led by command and control techniques. You might have possessed more stars and stripes than others. Therefore, when you laid down an order, there were people under your command who had no choice but to respond and take action.

In the private sector, 21st Century Leadership involves building deep, meaningful, authentic, trusting relationships. Trust must be earned. It is not mandated. In order to attract and to retain talent, 21st Century Leaders must learn to coach, inspire, grow, mentor, and develop employees. Private sector employees can leave and find another job at any time. A different leadership approach is required in the private sector.

A New Resume Strategy

·        You may have been taught to write a government resume that stretches to 5-10+ pages. In the private sector, you have a matter of seconds for a gatekeeper to find a reason to slow down to read your resume. You need to execute a different strategy to achieve a different result.

A clean, clear, logical resume that is built with the resume owner’s new audience in mind, wins. Most resumes are built with the resume’s owner in mind. This approach requires a paradigm shift to implement a different strategy if one wishes to achieve a different result. If your current resume hasn’t generated desired results in 20 tries, you’ll likely get the same resume results when you try 50 times and even 100 times. You need a different strategy.

This is a very short list built to demonstrate just a few of the paradigm shift challenges that exist when one leaves a military career to enter the private sector.

Jeff Snyder’s, Career Transition Coaching, Career Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

Outside In or Inside Out…Which Career Development Approach is Better?

Outside In or Inside Out?

Most people I’ve met over nearly three decades of recruiting seem to choose a profession and a career path to follow before they determine exactly who they are, how they’re built and how they are uniquely gifted. I’ll call this Self-Awareness. Self-Awareness leads to Clarity.

When a career path decision is made correctly, a person is positioned to deliver the best possible version of themselves to everyone around them.

When this decision is not made correctly, people are promoted to levels where the technical skills that got them to a certain level of engineering or architectural accomplishment are no longer enough to achieve the same level of success as they continue to rise in an organization.

As promotions occur, and as promotions are achieved, required skills change. These new roles require people skills, exceptional communication skills, soft skills, influencing, empathy, humility, negotiating, persuasion, collaboration, partnering skills, and more.

Outside In

For those who chose or stumbled into what is now Cybersecurity, early on, it was like stepping into the “Wild West”. Judging from the multitude of Cybersecurity job descriptions I see on a daily basis, the “Wild West” analogy fits quite well.

Employers rarely know what they're doing when hiring Cybersecurity talent. Cybersecurity professionals deliver communication to their audience that does not align with the way their audience communicates.

By jumping into the water and catching a fast-rising wave, many brilliant Cybersecurity technologists were promoted to Manager, Director, Vice President, and CISO titles. While this might appear to be a great accomplishment on the surface, it might not be such a great accomplishment after all.

The high-IQ driven, cognitive intelligence, analytical, linear thinking skills that cause a person to be great at addressing hardcore cyber technology issues are not the skills generally required for success at the Manager, Director, Vice President or CISO levels.

Inside Out

A better approach to choosing a career path begins with gaining a clear picture of who you are and what your unique giftedness translates into. Are you gifted to lead, guide, manage, mentor, and influence others? If you are, you may have what it takes to be someone’s outstanding boss. For most people, these skills don't come naturally but they can be developed.

On the other hand, if your unique giftedness is made of strategic thinking skills that reside in your head where nobody else can see them or experience them, you’re most likely gifted to be a great technologist or technology architect.

Finding out how you are uniquely wired is the key to knowing whether you should go straight, turn left or turn right at a various point in your career path.

Peter Principle

“The Peter Principle is a concept in management theory formulated by educator Laurence J. Peter and was published in 1969. It states that the selection of a candidate for a position is based on the candidate's performance in their current role, rather than on abilities relevant to the intended role. Thus, employees only stop being promoted once they can no longer perform effectively, and "managers rise to the level of their incompetence".

The Peter Principle runs wild in the “Wild West” of Cybersecurity. You owe it to yourself to discover what you are naturally built to be great at. You’ll appreciate what you can accomplish when you align your natural giftedness with your chosen work and so will those around you.

Change Your Life Today

Cybersecurity professionals come to me on a daily basis with questions. It seems that in many cases, they don’t know when to go straight, when to turn left or when to turn right.

Nothing is more satisfying to me than to help a person who sincerely wants to know, to determine how they are uniquely gifted so I can map their unique giftedness towards the right career path.

Choosing the right career path has potential to result in greater job satisfaction, higher earning potential, improved productivity, improved relationships, and lower stress.

Who wouldn’t want a better job fit, more income, a greater sense of accomplishment, more quality working relationships and all with less stress?

Use this link to schedule a strategy call with me so I can get you started on the road to Clarity and Discovery.

Jeff Snyder’s, Jeff Snyder Career Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

Before you make your New Year’s resolutions, be sure that you are crystal clear about your “WHY”

What is your “WHY”?

Your “WHY” is your unique purpose that is connected to your unique giftedness that is driven by your personal values. If you don’t know what your unique giftedness specifically looks like, now is a great time to find out. The difference between finding out or not finding out is the difference between excelling at the work you do versus delivering an average performance.

Some people are built to lead. Others are built to follow. Some are built to function in-between leading and following in a managerial capacity.

You can find out exactly and precisely how you are uniquely wired and it takes just 30 minutes to discover.

Your “WHY” will give you the sticktuitiveness to follow through on decisions. You don’t need to make empty New Year’s resolutions that generally fizzle out in just a few months. Discover what you were built to be great at and then align your daily activities with your unique giftedness and you won’t need the resolution to keep you going.

You’ll be able to keep going because you’re doing what you were built to do in the first place. I call it the difference between settling for what you “CAN” do and holding out for what you “SHOULD” do. This is what happens when you take action to discover your unique giftedness.

“Just spent my first hour on the phone with Jeff Snyder Coaching - motivational, inspirational, eye-opening, validating, humbling, and completely NOT what I was anticipating for a first call!  It was SO MUCH more!  I came away with insights and pragmatic, practical tools I can put into action in my work/relationships starting as early as today! 

IF you are willing to go there, Jeff will provide you with the “code” and he’ll help you crack open the door to possibilities and the journey that lies ahead of you.  BUT, ultimately, it’s up to you to take that first step and then follow through with a commitment to taking action on the insights, resources, materials, and strategy that Jeff will place at your fingertips.

​​​​​​​Jeff, Thanks for the investments you are making in people lives.”

— Mark, Executive Director

Jeff Snyder Coaching’s, Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

Connecting With People at an Emotional Level Produces Results

What You Should Do When You’re Interviewing For The Wrong Job

7 Total Interviews

The company just called Sue back for her 7th interview.  Yes, you read that correctly.  Seven total interviews. Nobody at the company is qualified to understand Sue’s uniqueness. She’s now being asked to take on an individual contributor job.

She’s a deeply skilled, talented, polished and bright candidate. It’s as if the hiring manager is doing everything possible to tactically fill his round hole with a square peg and Sue is the current candidate on the stage.

Who Is Sue?

First, she’s Strategic®.  She has an ability to not only see the big picture but she also has the giftedness to know how to move from point A to point B with great precision. Sue doesn’t need to be in a position that pushes her down in the weeds. She needs to be in a position where she can guide others through the big picture.

She possesses a strength called Individualization®. She’s gifted with an ability to understand the uniqueness of each person she encounters.  She instinctively knows how different people can work together to produce the best possible output. She is gifted to manage people.

Sue is an Arranger®.  Arrangers are gifted to arrange people in the most optimized manner in order to get things done. Combined with her Strategic abilities, Sue has her eye on the entire plan and she instinctively knows how to put the right people in front of the right tasks to maximize their productivity.

Throw in Sue’s Achiever® and she’s virtually guaranteed to guide teams to results. She is built to take people and project results to the finish line.

Placing Sue in a down in the weeds, in an individual contributor role, where she has no ability to guide other people to produce results is a recipe for total frustration, lack of engagement, and guaranteed turnover on Sue’s part. 

Self-Awareness Is Powerful

Sue knows that she needs to be hired into a role where she gets to leverage her people skills, her organizational skills, and her executing skills in a highly strategic role.  

When Sue takes on a role like this, she’ll likely deliver the best productivity of her entire career and she’ll fall in love with the work she’s doing. She’ll be engaged, empowered, and her results will be powerful!

She picked up her heightened and accurate Self-Awareness through Strengths Coaching with Jeff Snyder.

What Should Sue Do In This Case?

Turn around and run!

Jeff Snyder’s, Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810