The Key to Managing Oneself

 

Peter Drucker was a well known Austrian-American management consultant. His ideas are highly regarded in the project management field. He wrote many books and articles, but one in particular that comes to mind is "Managing Oneself". Still a very popular article, it neatly and meticulously spells out a few practical tips on how to build a life of excellence. First, one must ask a few questions:

1) What are my strengths?
2) How do I work?
3) What are my values?
4) Where do I belong?
5) What can I contribute?

At first glance these questions might sound trivial. But with a closer look one can see how these questions help drive ambition, and motivate one to maintain a positive trajectory to elevate oneself to the peak of any profession. In essence it helps one become a chief executive officer of their own career. As the old saying goes, if you don't manage your career, someone else might manage it for you, and that may not always be pleasant. The above 5 questions help each one of us develop a significant understanding of ourselves, how we can work best with others, and make a significant contribution to increase our value within the workforce.

What are my strengths?
Use feedback analysis to effectively identify your strengths. When making pertinent decisions, write down your outcome. Compare actual results to expected results to get a more informed idea of your productivity, by observing the variance between these two perspectives. It's more productive to remedy your weaknesses and bad habits. This will increase your performance.

How do I work?
What is your optimal form of processing information? Through listening to others, or through reading? Do you work best alone or with other people? Do you function best in a predictive or adaptive environment? People achieve positive and productive results by doing what they are good at, and exploiting those skills.

What are my values?
Do your ethics influence how you live your life? Do your organization's ethics influence your performance positively or negatively? Do you do the things that keep you up at night? Can you look at yourself in the mirror and say, this is the type of person I want to be? You must work with an organization whose values are compatible with yours, in order to be successful.

Where do I belong?
What are your strengths, preferred way of working and overall values? You will become a star performer by working in an environment that exploits your values. You should be able to decide where you do not belong as well as where you do belong.

What can I contribute?
How can you best improve or enhance an organizations output and performance. How can you add value to an organization? How can you maximize your contribution to an organization using your current skills and strengths. And, what has to be done to make a significant difference to an organization?

In short, it's this understanding of one's strengths and self-knowledge that enables us to accomplish rewarding and valuable levels of excellence within the project management field, by analyzing ourselves, and asking some of the questions listed above.