My 5 Professional Drivers
Recently I’ve been reading and thinking a lot about how Product Managers add value to their companies and teams. It can be really abstract thing to figure out, specially in a self assessment.
Instead of figuring out the value I add to any organization, I decided to create a list of drivers I always try to achieve when starting a new challenge.
Some drivers are not only related to a job, position or organisation (There is a different way to prepare myself when starting in a new job). Some I hope I can always carry on in my life, or maybe I can change some of them for better.
Here are the 5 drivers I am always pursuing as a professional:
Proactivity
Give the first step. Then you will know if you can move forward or not. Don’t wait no one to say to you what to do or how to act. This will kill your freedom and creativity.
If it’s a good idea, go ahead and do it.It’s much easier to apologize than it is to get permission
- Grace Hopper
This is connected with good intentions. If you have strong evidences, reasons or feelings about something together with good intentions, go for it. Just a few mistakes are not reversible. And those that are reversible makes you learn and find new ways to strive.
It is better to make many decisions per unit time with a slightly higher error rate, than few with a slightly lower error rate, because obviously one of your future right decisions can be to reverse an earlier wrong one, provided the earlier one was not catastrophic, which they rarely are.
- Elon Musk
Knowledge
This is the first achievement you get as an individual. Without discovering the basic WHY of what you are doing, there is no way to measure the value and effort of your activities. You need to connect dots before achieving great communication.
Another strong characteristic of knowledge is the responsibility you acquire. When I have information, I consider as my responsibility to communicate, share and teach it whenever I can. That’s one of the best ways to continuous learning and increment your knowledge too. Multiply it and the chances of reaching your goals get higher
If you cannot explain something in simple terms you don’t understand it yourself. It is the mark of a genius to be able to explain a complicated topic in a simple way.
- Richard Feynman
Creativity
Creativity relies on having knowledge. And everyone can be creative. The moment you use your knowledge to find creative solutions you can run away from the status quo. You can try something new, find new ways and be free.
Creativity allows you to run away from standardization and expectations. You can run free and discover new universes. But creativity relies on knowledge. So dig deep on what you have available and find new ways to use your knowledge in a way the fit your needs and allow you to reach your goals.
Creativity is not exclusivity of a few. It’s available to everyone (since an rocketship engineer, to someone trying to figure out to survive with 100 Euros budget and three childs). As Need is the mother of inventions, it gave birth through creativity.
People
No matter what I do, I do it for people. Can be a client, a partner, a peer, a manager, a friend. There is no reason to develop anything if you are not adding people on the equation. As humans living in a society we should prosper and grow together. Help those around you to arise and grow in any way you can. This can be translated in pushing them to take a stand, to grow, to feel safer or confident to try more and more.
Love
There is no reason to move forward without this intention.
Passion, Charity, Braveness, Impetus, Optimism. Doesn’t matter how you called it. Behind it, you should act with love for your dreams, goals, results, etc. Remember to consider people and that as human beings we should strive to transform the world into a better place using the resources we have available. Add this in your thoughts and everything will start get lighter and happier on a daily basis.
Do it with love.
Brené Brown defines Integrity in a super nice way, that I consider under the Love umbrella. Love not always is comfortable, but is never weakness.
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The article was inspired by the article from my Delivery Hero colleague Curtis Stanier “Creating your personal product philosophy”
