Episode 131 - Risk Taker vs. Consistency Quality Producer
Are you a risk taker or a consistent quality producer? Both are valuable but they are opposites. In a seminar I lead, I ask participants to put an x on a line between risk taker and consistent quality producer where they think they are. And then I ask them to put a y where they feel the organization would like them to be. Being close together is ideal. But if there is any gap, I ask them to label it the stress gap.
Risk takers get stressed in organizations or departments that reward doing predictable things in predictable ways for predictable results. Likewise, conservative people are stressed when the organization is anything but predictable, like when people are told, “Give it a try. Let’s see what happens.”
What if you’re caught in a tug-of-war like this? It’s smart to be true to your inner feelings because that is where you are strongest and can make the greatest contribution. It’s up to the risk taker types to get themselves into jobs that reward risk taking, such as leadership, sales and design work. Ditto for consistent quality producer types. They are responsible for maneuvering themselves into positions that reward consistency, such as management, accounting and teaching.
It’s smart to narrow the stress gap because the wider it grows, the more stress and anxiety you will feel from your job. And we all know that stressed out people can’t contribute their best. I say it’s always smart to perform work that’s consistent with your personality.