Book Report - "The 6 Types of Working Genius: A better way to understand your gifts, your frustrations, and your team" by Patrick Lencioni

A second book by the same author in as many months is not the way I typically do book reports, but Lencioni has been resonating with me and I came to a realization that stretches beyond just these two books.

Although there is an assessment available, I didn’t feel the need to pay for it to identify my own strengths and weaknesses or geniuses and frustrations. Similarly to “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team,” Lencioni offers a fable to illustrate the model and then explains the details of the model after concluding the fable. Simply reading through the fable and his explanation is adequate to get a good understanding of the working geniuses and some introspection should allow most people to identify their own.

Source: https://www.workinggenius.com/about

• Working Geniuses

• Enablement - One of my greatest pleasures with work is helping people through their problems and finding the best solution.

• Tenacity - I thrive at the point in the project where the needs have been determined and the tasks have been planned. Let me get to the boots on the ground phase as quickly as possible.

• Working Competencies

• Wonder - I can analyze situations and determine what the problems are if I have to, but I wouldn’t want to do that all the time. I would much rather assist in fixing the existing problems, not determining more work to do.

• Invention - I’m not great at thinking outside the box individually, but I can do it with a team when necessary. Give me a whiteboarding session and I’ll chime in with ideas and theories, but I don’t want to be the only or main person coming up with novel approaches to our problems.

• Working Frustrations

• Galvanizing - Please do not ask me to get people motivated and involved. Once they have decided they’re on board, I’ll enable all day long. Just don’t force me to drum up the initial support.

• Discernment - I don’t trust a gut check or intuition. I want data. Unless you have a specific and particular reason why you are in favor or opposed to a certain idea, I’m assuming it’s just a wild guess.

Interestingly enough, one of my first jobs was serving as a tutor when I was in college and I loved it (hence the enablement genius). Furthermore, jobs in which I had any sort of galvanizing responsibility were excruciating to me. I didn’t associate these with any sort of organized system, but merely the way I am. Having a measurable and descriptive analysis allows me to speak about these preferences and abilities in a way that is productive at an individual and team level.

Beyond figuring out my working geniuses, competencies, and frustrations, I also came to a realization about our capacity to do something that drains us over time. Lencioni gives the analogy of a coffee cup. Working in one of your areas of genius is akin to pouring coffee in a thermal insulated container with a lid: the coffee will stay hot for a long time and you can similarly do that kind of work for a while. Competencies are like coffee in a ceramic mug: it will cool more quickly but not immediately, the way that working in a competency is sustainable for a period. Finally, frustrations are like coffee in a plastic cup with a hole in the bottom: not only will it cool almost immediately, but it is also actively draining out. Working in one of your areas of frustration is unsustainable and draining for even the most dedicated employees.

It occurred to me that this analogy is very close to the Gary Chapman’s cup idea from “The Five Love Languages.” Chapman suggests that we pour affection from our own cups, and these cups are gradually filled when we receive affection in the form of our own love languages. You can persist for a time pouring out affection without receiving any in return, but this is not sustainable for a long period. When our cup is empty or almost empty, it is very difficult for us to show affection at all. You can’t pour from an empty cup.

I think this idea of a vessel of fluid is applicable for a lot of things in life. We can put up with a lot of unpleasant situations for a while, but not forever. And the more unpleasant the situation is, the faster that capacity is drained. Some people will still continue to pour from this cup to their own detriment, but it isn’t a great situation for anyone involved.

Instead, the ideal circumstance is to find a situation that fills your cup most of the time and drains it only on rare occasions. In such a scenario, your personal fulfillment is greater, you operate at a more effective level, and you are generally happy. This happiness often spreads to those around you as well.

I’m not saying it’s easy to find such a perfect equilibrium. In fact, it is genuinely hard work even when you have a job that fits your working geniuses and you speak the love language of those close to you, but the work is satisfying and the rewards are entirely worth the effort spent.

Resources:

Lencioni, Patrick. The 6 Types of Working Genius. Narrated by Ray Porter, Matt Holt Books, 2022. Audiobook.