Please Advise: Should I Just Do What I'm Good At...Even If I Hate It?
Becoming You with Suzy Welch
In the premiere episode of 'Please Advise,' Suzy Welch tackles real-life questions from four listeners, exploring topics ranging from career
Key takeaways
- Doing what you're good at doesn't guarantee fulfillment if it conflicts with your core values or interests.
- The 'Becoming You' framework prioritizes the intersection of values, aptitudes, and interests for meaningful work.
Main topics
- Career alignment with personal values
- The tension between talent and passion
Notable quotes
"Do not do what you hate under any circumstances."
Conclusion
Suzy Welch emphasizes that true fulfillment comes not from leveraging ta
Transcript preview
Speaker 6 (0:00) I was on the subway the other day in New York City, and this is no lie. There was a woman across the way. I was sitting down. It was very crowded. I looked at her. I couldn't miss her. And she was mouthing the word help at me, like literally help. And look, okay, I could tell she recognized me maybe from the cover of my book or whatever. And she was wearing a suit and she did not look in particular immediate distress. So I was like... what the heck is going on? And then very luckily at the next stop, I mean, I was making eye contact with her. At the next stop, people got off and the seat right next to me came open and I waved her to come sit right next to me. And she did. And indeed, she did want help with a work dilemma. She was like, Susie, here's my work dilemma. And we managed to solve it in the next three stops. And I was so happy. We like waved goodbye. We were friends. And that is one reason why today we are launching. a new kind of episode on the pod, and we're calling it Please Advise, as in Susie, help. Like, please give me some advice. Because, you know, it's not just that woman on the subway. That was a weird day. But I mean, it's just listeners DM and email me every day. I wake up to this, and they have a burning question and wonder if I can help. And I'm so here for that. I love it. And I love what we're doing here because it involves me talking to listeners live. And in fact, on our maiden voyage with Please Advise, we are talking to four... listeners, each with a very different problem from work to parenting to love to friendship. All right. So hello, everybody. I'm Susie Welch. I'm your host. Welcome to Becoming You, on the podcast where each week we usually walk alongside you on your journey to discovering your unique purpose in this crazy, Speaker 4 (1:35) messy, beautiful thing that we call life. But Speaker 6 (1:37) today, as I just said, we are answering people who are metaphorically mouthing the word help across the subway car at me, and I am waving them over so that we can fix things in like three stops. or less. I am a professor at NYU Stern. I'm the director of the NYU Stern Initiative on Purpose and Flourishing. I'm an author. I'm an entrepreneur. I'm a mom and a grandmother, but most of all, I am so glad that you're here. Welcome. Speaker 6 (2:03) So let's get going, starting with Lynn, who wrote me to ask, in the bluntest possible terms, what do I do if I hate what I'm good at? Ouch. Here is our call. Speaker 5 (2:16) Hi, Suzy. Under the Becoming You framework, how would a person find their area of transcendence if they dislike work and activities that engage their top aptitudes? Speaker 4 (2:25) Or in simplest terms, Speaker 5 (2:27) basically, what do I do if I hate Speaker 6 (2:29) what I'm good at? This is such an incredibly great question. And it's one of like the, thank you for asking it. It's one of the most profound questions of the whole Becoming You process. So look, the very simple answer is do not do what you hate under any circumstances. And actually Becoming You is set up so that you won't do that. It's a three-legged stool. And what it basically says is find what's at the intersection of what... matches your values, what you're really good at, those are your aptitudes, and then what interests you. And so, you know, what you're saying is like, well, okay, here's a one-legged stool. Okay, I'm really good at some stuff. And I actually heard a famous person who has her own TV show, Who Shall Remain, nameless at this moment, literally tell somebody to just do work that matched her talents. And I was like shouting, I saw it on TikTok, actually, I was shouting, no, no, no, no, no, because if in fact, people just did what they were good at, I would be working in finance, okay? Or like doing something that was completely unrelated to the things I value and love. No shade on people who work in finance. So is this actually a question about you, that you are good at something that you don't like doing? Speaker 5 (3:42) Yes, it is about me. I am very good at numerical reasoning. Okay. And I'm also very good at the aptitudes that I would all put under the umbrella of finding problems in other people's work. Okay. Speaker 6 (4:00) All Speaker 5 (4:00) right. So inductive and sequential reasoning and visual scanning. Okay. Speaker 6 (4:06) So these are all the kind of analytical things that kind of pop up when we do aptitude testing. So it's like diagnostic problem solving, numerical reasoning, which is just a way of saying you're very good at math. And so have you ever had jobs in those areas? It sounds like you have and you didn't enjoy them. Speaker 5 (4:23) Yes, I have. Speaker 6 (4:24) And are you doing one right now? Speaker 5 (4:26) No. Okay. Speaker 6 (4:27) I Speaker 5 (4:28) actually am not working right now because I kept getting funneled into things that I was good at. but I didn't enjoy them. So I have quit to go through your process and decide a new direction. Speaker 6 (4:42) Okay. Well, I want to cut to the chase and tell you you're going to find something because the process is set up for you to find something. Let's just talk about values first. Do you know what your top three values are? Speaker 5 (4:52) And we're eudaimonia, voice, and place. Speaker 6 (4:54) Okay. So are you in the place you want to be? Speaker 5 (4:57) Yes. Speaker 6 (4:58) Okay. And eudaimonia is the value that reflects self-care, personal flourishing. And so it sounds like your own personal well-being is a value to you. And then you have another value that is shared by many, which is authentic self-expression. Do you find that you're an artistic person by any chance, a person who likes crafts or expressing yourself through any kind of art? Speaker 5 (5:21) Yes, I do enjoy that quite a lot. I'm not sure I'm particularly good at it. Speaker 6 (5:26) Yeah. Okay, but you do enjoy it. I enjoy it too. I really enjoy ceramics. And man, am I bad at it. And that's why it's a hobby. And in fact, this is a good moment for me to say that when we have it, you know, most people have the opposite problem, which is that they love something a lot and they're bad at it. And what you have is that you're bad at something that you don't love. So most people like, I really, really want to be a singer or I want to be on Broadway. And they just actually don't have a good voice. They're pitchy or whatever. You've got an interesting problem that you've got real aptitude. aptitudes that are in demand. The aptitudes you have are kind of workplace aptitudes that are in demand. But what you're struggling with is that that work doesn't in any way, I think, match your values of probably around voice because you're not actually authentically expressing yourself in ways that feel creative and fulfilling to you, and perhaps not also matching that value of kind of personal wellness. It feels like the work is just work to you, right? Speaker 5 (6:25) That's correct. And it tends to go against my interest, which I think is almost strong enough to need to be a value of realism. I don't really like sitting at a computer all day. Speaker 6 (6:37) Do you like to be outside or in nature? I do. Okay. So this is typically comes out in the value of beholderism, which is about caring about how our environment feels. So you like being outside and you like being in nature. Do you like animals? I do. Have you ever thought about... pursuing a career in some kind of like management or operational role in an organization that's around animals or nature, like a national park or museum or something like that? Speaker 5 (7:05) Not specifically. I have done management in environmental projects, but it was all indoors. Speaker 6 (7:13) I think that the issue with you is not around values, which you know, and it's not around your aptitudes, because frankly, the aptitudes you've got can work in a lot of different workplaces. I think it's around the nature of the work you're doing. You don't want to be inside. I mean, it's really important if you want to be in a big company or small company, inside or outside, at a computer or, you know, with your hands in the dirt. And I think you've got a workplace habitat thing going on. Have you ever let yourself, like, just close your eyes and think about where you'd like to work just physically? Speaker 5 (7:48) Yeah, I have. I have a hard time envisioning what I'm doing when I'm doing that, but I would just like to be outside in the woods or in a park. Speaker 6 (7:58) Yeah. You know, Lynn, I'm wondering if you don't want to work. Is it possible? Speaker 5 (8:04) Of course. Of course I would rather not. Okay. I Speaker 6 (8:09) think we might have gotten to a little bit of a nub of an issue here. I mean, you have eudaimonia. Here's why I'm putting that together. You have eudaimonia. as your number one value. And already that suggests to me that work centrism is probably not going to be as high to you. It didn't probably show up in your top five or so, right? And then the work that you do kind of you don't enjoy, and then you don't like being in an office. And then when you start describing what you like, it's kind of out in nature or it's in kind of a more bucolic, eudaimonic environments, right? It's possible that what you're struggling with is, yeah, sure, the question you're asking, but do you have access to your values, Bridge? Can you see where work centrism shows up for you? Ten. Ten. Okay, so that's down at the peripheral values. And let me ask you another question. Can you find achievement? Speaker 5 (9:00) Yes, I think that one was six. Speaker 6 (9:04) Six. Oh, Speaker 4 (9:05) that's interesting. Okay, Speaker 6 (9:06) so listen, what we're seeing here is a profile. Six is pretty high for achievement. And so you like the feeling of, and there's no shade on this, you like the feeling of achievement, of having accomplishments. That's why you keep getting drawn back into work. But Lynn, the actual activity of work is not pleasurable to you. And, you know, in many ways, I want to say welcome to humanity. This is not an uncommon profile. I mean, this is part of the struggle for some people. And so what ends up happening is you're doing work and it's taking you away from what you actually love and want to be doing. And so you feel very frustrated. So I'm going to make a suggestion that you actually start in