Artefacts of Mechanistic Creation
Y'what? Just kidding, as usual...
BUT - what do you do when (as has happened to me twice in recent months) you get someone in a workshop who everybody guesses will have a high Musical (case 1) or high Artistic (case 2) and who is really, truly not at all happy to find they have scores for these around the 50 mark.
"This Birkman thing is just plain wrong..."
"I spend all my time playing my guitar/flutes/zithers/making cards/crafts/wrapping things beautifully" (delete as applicable)
Some of you know where this is going already. Yes, they both had Mechanical scores in the 90s. One of the most broadly applicable attributes of people with high Mechanical scores? Being "hands-on". Doing stuff personally. Enjoying the "how". (Avoiding delegation, but that is another post waiting to happen).
Half an hour after telling me this was all nonsense, High Mechanical / 50 Musical said "I've just realised; I only ever play music [and he is one of the most natural instrumentalists I have ever known - jon], I never listen to it"
Slightly quicker than that, High Mechanical / 50 Artistic said "Actually, now you mention it, I am not particularly interested in looking at what others have done - I just love doing it myself. At work, I get upset if someone suggests someone else should take on some of the "handcraft" parts of my job."
Like everything in this Blog, this is all so obvious once you have seen it. But the lesson is: when someone looks you in the eye and tells you this "Birkman thing" has failed to score them properly on this or that with regard to Areas of Interest - just look at their top two bars. The real motivator is sitting there, perhaps just a little incognito...
BUT - what do you do when (as has happened to me twice in recent months) you get someone in a workshop who everybody guesses will have a high Musical (case 1) or high Artistic (case 2) and who is really, truly not at all happy to find they have scores for these around the 50 mark.
"This Birkman thing is just plain wrong..."
"I spend all my time playing my guitar/flutes/zithers/making cards/crafts/wrapping things beautifully" (delete as applicable)
Some of you know where this is going already. Yes, they both had Mechanical scores in the 90s. One of the most broadly applicable attributes of people with high Mechanical scores? Being "hands-on". Doing stuff personally. Enjoying the "how". (Avoiding delegation, but that is another post waiting to happen).
Half an hour after telling me this was all nonsense, High Mechanical / 50 Musical said "I've just realised; I only ever play music [and he is one of the most natural instrumentalists I have ever known - jon], I never listen to it"
Slightly quicker than that, High Mechanical / 50 Artistic said "Actually, now you mention it, I am not particularly interested in looking at what others have done - I just love doing it myself. At work, I get upset if someone suggests someone else should take on some of the "handcraft" parts of my job."
Like everything in this Blog, this is all so obvious once you have seen it. But the lesson is: when someone looks you in the eye and tells you this "Birkman thing" has failed to score them properly on this or that with regard to Areas of Interest - just look at their top two bars. The real motivator is sitting there, perhaps just a little incognito...
Labels: Areas of Interest, Artistic, Mechanical, Musical
posted by jon at
19:33
2 Comments
Links to this post
2 Comments:
I recently had a similar experience with a 40 year professional music director. He scored under 30 on Musical and was ready to throw the whole assessment out the window. His top two Interests were Clerical and Numerical. His peers were quick to laugh and comment that Mr.-30 did not love music but loved counting measures and musical precision and making the choir show up on time. He lives in a small box of rules and exactness. I could not live in his world but it works for him. Of course, everyone but Mr.-30 thought the Birkman nailed him.
I agree - when an Interest seems to fall short, look up!
And I find those moments - when everyone can see it except the person him- or herself - the most frustrating. Except that for some people the penny will drop only when they aren't feeling under pressure about it (took me two years to recognise the truth of one of my scores!)