Becoming the best version of yourself is a bit of a trope but I like it for two reasons: It acknowledges that you are different from everybody else. This isn’t about becoming the best project manager but the best Christoph. It also reinforces a growth mindset - I can actually become the best version of myself and am not stuck with who I already am.
How to build valuable skills
Lean into your strengths
To a significant extent, you are a product of your genes. That’s obvious for your physical build but just as much applies to your mental state. Instead of acknowledging this and giving up, identify where you are already great, and just double-down on that.
Find your strengths: Try personality tests (big five seems most predictive), do internships or find other cheap ways to experiment, get anonymous feedback from lots of people. Ideally you can combine a few strengths to become unique.
Match them to the market: What can you get paid for the most is a good heuristic for what’s most needed. Your guess on what stays relevant with AI changing is as good as mine so I’d suggest to focus on the short-term for now.
Put in the work: I cooked for many hours in my life, yet I never got beyond ‘feed myself’ level. In order to improve, you need feedback, a coach, and active learning time. We created a guide on deliberate practice here.
Manage your weaknesses
Compared to my peers, I have a worse memory. Instead of trying to somehow train my memory, I just built a note taking system around it and hum melodies instead of singing along to songs. Get your weaknesses to a level that they won’t get you fired.
Acknowledge it: Same story as for the strengths: find your weaknesses through tests and feedback. Verify it in your own experience.
Get creative: Use an AI to figure out how other people solve this. How far does training get you? What other systems are possible? Do you know people who are dealing with this as well? I know people who got PAs to do their admin.
Work around it: Best case: Find jobs where this skill is simply not needed. Next best case: Build systems around it. If you feel safe, make your colleagues aware of this and see how they can support you or how you can work around this together.
Improve your productivity
No matter what you do, your productivity will have an overall effect on what you do. One way to become more productive might be just raising life satisfaction (following Euozia) though the causal link isn’t clear. Experiment with:
Raise your motivation: Set goals you care about, work next to people, start with small wins, or start with big blocks, work on interesting things, take breaks, use commitment devices or accountability groups, celebrate wins.
Block out distractions: Disable all notifications, block out focus time, block apps or news feeds, have one system where you can log all thoughts and tasks, negotiate response-time expectations with colleagues.
Stay reasonable: I love the story of Derek Siver’s bike ride. The gist: you can overexert yourself and be 2% faster than if you just take it easy. Throughout history most people got 4 hours of deep work done per day.
Three things to start growing
Ask a friend to interview people who know you on your strengths and weaknesses.
Identify your biggest strength. Journal on how you could become even better.
Commit yourself to deliberate practice sessions. Your future self will thank you!