If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. (African Proverb)

Come fly with me*

A year ago I started a 5 minute slot in our Publishing Editor meetings, called "Work smarter, not harder", because I thought if I could just work harder, I could get it all done, that I had to do it all by myself, because what was most important was to have everything done in your inbox.

You see there is a misconception about "getting it done", that you have to be the one to get it done, immediately, on your own, that we aren't "working hard enough" and that if you can just work hard enough you can get where you are going. 

This doesn't take into account our strengths, our individualities, and the fact that we don't all see things the same way, that we are as different from each other as if we were from a different country (which, incidentally, I am!). Because we live in the same country and work in the same company, we just assume we see things the same way, and work the same way. 

But we don't, and actually we have to learn to recognise our strengths, because the way I see it, it's as if we are all on a plane, and we have to work together to get our passengers to their destination: 

(I should point out here that a few years ago, I was fortunate enough to be sent on a training course, where they gave us an example of our different strengths, called social styles.**

This course not only changed my perception of my colleagues at work, it changed my perception of myself at work as well as my life overall, and has started a transformation of which I realise now I am only just the start of the journey. Please note this is just a metaphor, to illustrate how very different we all are and how we are all important and how we all have our roles to play)

- Driver: We need the pilot, to get us there, to steer us in the right direction

- Amiable: We need the air steward to make sure everyone on board is comfortable, and safe and fed and clothed and attended to. 

- Analytical: We need the engineers to make sure the plane is flight-ready. They provide us with the checklist to work on, to figure out what needs to be fixed.  
- Expressive: We need the high-energy, larger than life people who are cheerful, and remind us not to be so serious. They keep morale high. They put me in mind of the celebrities, the rock stars, who entertain the troops. If we were all running a charity race, the Expressives would be the ones running the race in the fancy dress costume.

We all have our different roles to play, and we can see how we are all needed. 

But the pilot couldn't fly the plane and serve the passengers alone, any more than the air steward do the oxygen mask demonstration and point out the exits whilst flying the plane. Both are needed. 

We wouldn't expect the engineer to be good at supervising a little child flying alone. That's not to say that they can't all learn a little about each other's roles, or to move into those roles in time. Just to say that we will always need engineers, pilots, air stewards and the entertainers to keep the plane flying. 

Interestingly, if we are interested in all four social styles, we can broaden our horizons, and we can learn 3 other new ways of looking at the world. It's as if we become multilingual, and can speak a little bit of each language. 

And perhaps the air steward observes the pilot and decides that one day he or she would like to fly the plane, or to take flying lessons and just fly their own plane. 

If we don't open our eyes, how can we see the opportunities that are out there? 

Purlgirl xx

*From the song (1957) written by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn, probably most famously sung by Frank Sinatra. 

**Social Styles Handbook: Adapt Your Style to Win Trust (Wilson Learning Library) (Nova Vista Publishing, 2011)