Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #239. - Not the usual fancy HR question

Today's question could have a bittersweet vibe to many, due to the habit of asking a similar one in many fancy and not so fancy job interviews.

That notorious one goes like "Where do you want to be in five years?" and, in most cases, people consider it scary, useless, phony, or even philosophically ridiculous. How should they know!?

And yet, today's question doesn't deserve a bad reputation, because it is actually... same same but different from the job interview one.

[Focus on the "being" part of the question

and you will get the most out of it, promised]

The one that most recruiters and HR people ask is all about today: what someone, right now, is wishing to get, to be, to have, to accomplish someday, in the future. Nothing more than an educated guess.

Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #162. - A curveball question about your gifts

I don't know about you, but I am a very big fan of so-called curveball recruiting questions.
Even if most of them can look like mere brainteasers created just for fun or for the sake of it, some of them can be quite deep and also reveal a lot about the person answering them.

One of my favorite ones is today's coaching question and it has been originally published by Glassdoor. It could look pretty trivial, and easy to reply to.

[If you have to think too long about this question...

it's probably time to give a new gift to someone]

If I would ask you what was the last gift you gave someone, what would you say, without thinking too much about it?
Incredibly unspectacular, right?

And yet.

Diversity? It's a state of mind, and this is one of the best definitions for it

How would you describe diversity?

The concept of diversity has become a buzzword in the last couple of years, and these days *everyone* is talking diversity.

Still, the way most people talk about it or explain it is just related to a very small range of cases or situations (more women on the management floor! more female programmers! more black actors at the Oscars! more LGBT advertising testimonials!, and so on).

Diversity is so much more than that, in my humble opinion. Diversity is, above all, a mindset and a state of mind.

[Diversity? It's a state of mind]

Therefore, one of the best definitions of diversity I ever read doesn't even use the word, and yet it nails the concept perfectly.

Forward-focused people and organizations realize that a happy, productive workplace exists only when everyone is aware of their gifts and how to best align their contribution with a larger shared purpose.

Venessa Miemis, Fast Company

3 Steps For Plotting Your Personal Future In An Uncertain World, May 5th, 2013

When this article was written, diversity had still to become the magic bullet has become today. Even so, the author was able to describe the difference that a diverse workplace (a diverse place, no matter in which context?) is able to make, if we get it right.

How would you define diversity?

Tags: Diversity, Buzzwords, Definitions of diversity, Cultural awareness

What to read next:

Why you should stop thinking that it's okay to culturalize people, once and for all - Part #1.

Visiting the blog for the first time? Aloha!

Where to start, if you are new

Do you want me to accept your LinkedIn invitation? Pay attention to these five things

Don't put all your eggs in one basket, they say.
Most of the time, they are right. (It happens a lot that they are right, just deal with it)

Still, when it is about networking and having an account on websites for professionals, I like to keep things simple and to embrace a minimalist approach.
This means that besides the Google+ account related to this blog, you can find me on LinkedIn, and on LinkedIn only. When people send me invitations for other networks, I pass, even if I feel flattered. Time is limited, and I prefer to focus on one network, where I have a strong and well-tailored profile.

Thanks to my profile and professional experience, I receive new invitations on a regular basis.
Some people follow a strict policy and they accept only invitations from people they know well in real life. I consider it a good option to also accept invitations from people that I don't know yet, if their profile is relevant to me. That said, I am always amazed at how sloppy and amateurish LinkedIn profiles and above all invitations can get.

[You don't have to look like a modern dandy, 

in order to make a great impression on LinkedIn,

but displaying a drunken selfie or some weird cat pic

would just not help. Just saying.

Image credit: ISO Republic]

Do you want me (= and probably other people as well) to accept your LinkedIn invitation? Then you should probably pay a little bit more attention to the following five things:

Are you already asking yourself this precious HR question? It's all about peace of mind and time-management

A couple of days ago, someone called me, asking for references about a former employee of mine. The call was short and sweet and lasted about 10 minutes. I was asked about how I met the person, how I would describe the collaboration with her, which are the strengths (but not the weaknesses) of the person, which kind of tasks the person completed and so on.

Easy peasy, all by the book.

And yet, as the phone call was approaching its end, I got asked a last HR question, and somehow this question rang a bell in my head:

[Phone calls can be so fascinating and intriguing 

as the famous Alice's rabbit hole, sometimes...

Even when they start in a very predictable way]

"If you would have the chance to work with this person once again, would you do it?".

"Yes, for sure".

What did impress me so much? Certainly, it was not the answer, because I would actually be happy to work with the person again.

It was the HR question itself.

A question that is so simple and clear and yet sometimes too complicate and tricky to answer.

Which superpowers do you have? Twenty questions that will help you the next time you will talk about yourself in public

If tomorrow you should stand up and find yourself in the middle of a room, filled with twenty people looking at you and waiting for you to talk about your superpowers as a human being, what would you say?

Is it easy for you to introduce yourself or you too, like most people, are somehow afraid of talking in public or not sure about what you should talk about in the first place?

[Like every other human being,

you are a special mix of everything that makes you...

you. How are you going to convey your superpowers?]

Here you have 20 questions that can help you to break the ice and to find your own superpowers, if you are still looking for them:

You & your unique experience

What did you love to do when you were young?

What are the five most valuable things you have learned, over time?

Your passions

What passions do you have? 

What does excite you? 

What do lean startups and minimalism have in common?

How would you describe a lean startup, with your own words?

If you are looking for a very good article for beginners about lean startups and entrepreneurship, look no further. The Lean, Agile Way to Build Your First Product by Andrew Blackman is what you are looking for. The article is easy to read and to understand, detailed without being too detailed and definitely readable, clear and well written.

A short, apparently innocent and very pragmatic passage captured immediately my attention and stuck with me even after me being done with the whole reading:

Being lean is not about saving money; it’s about avoiding wasted effort. In this highly competitive, fast-changing environment, you can’t afford to waste time and energy, especially if you’re working by yourself or with a small team. The goal is to make effective use of all your time and resources.

[Lean startups and people that embrace minimalism

have so much in common: it is all about quality over quantity,

seeing changes and also failures as a part of an exciting experiment

and being aware of standards and expectations]

Why did exactly this passage stick with me, you could ask. (hey, good question!)

Everybody wants not only somebody to love, but also to be...

He's a so-called old soul, and he knows what he wants. 

"I am going to have my own company, one day, and to be the boss. A good one".

I smile, very proud of him, and yet I can't help but tell him: 

"You know, as far as I can remember, I almost never met someone that said that they wanted to be a bad one, not officially, at least not on purpose. Most people want to be a good boss. It is just not that simple, because not everybody has the needed soft skills and not everybody is willing to work hard for acquiring them, or they are not aware that they are not as good as they think to be and that they need those skills in the first place".

[Nobody wants to be a bad boss...

Well, maybe nobody but the weird characters of

Seth Gordon's Horrible Bosses (USA 2011)...

from a time when Kevin Spacey was still considered cool] 

He agrees with me, and we change the subject.

Still, I keep thinking about it.

"Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses?", or the one about 16 (yes, 16!) cool t-shirt slogans that can make people smile or think about life

Most of us like to think that very deep thoughts and life-changing ideas have to be long, complex and difficult to get. Otherwise, everyone would get them, right?

Well, sometimes.
And sometimes, it is really so simple.

A story is the expression of how and why life changes. 
A story begins with balance, then something throws life out of balance, then a story goes on to describe how balance is restored.  

Robert McKee

Sometimes, something tiny can make all the difference: a sentence or a question may be enough for creating a new mental landscape, for showing a new perspective to someone willing to get it and able to see it, for playing with a challenging and yet refreshing suggestion.
In other words, for providing someone with a very valuable piece of information or a moment of pure and precious serendipity.

Oddball brainteasers have been a big hype in the recruiting style of big internet companies for a while, and then they started to fade out. My favorite one?

"Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses?"

Whole Foods Market meat cutter job candidate (Lexington-Fayette, KY)

The question sounds crazy, I know. (even more because now you are visualizing 100 duck-sized horses, and if you tell me that you don't, I won't believe you anyway).

And yet, how you will reply and react to it tells a lot about you.

Sneak peek of my interview about being a localization manager, or why diversity is a new buzzword for something as old as humankind

How does the life of a localization manager look like?
While asking this question, most people expect me to talk about source languages and target languages and pivot languages and translation KPIs and ISO 9000 quality management systems standards and TMs and glossaries and workflow optimization and... the endless stream of industry-specific lingo could go on and on.

All those things are for sure very important, and yet, at least to me, being a (good) localization manager is above all about self-awareness, stellar and consistent communication, self-control, diversity management and valuable relationships.

A relationship, every kind of relationship (romantic partnership, professional partnership, family relationship, friendship, being colleagues, neighborhood relationship, you name it), can be pleasant, happy, rewarding, quiet, funny, encouraging.
Or challenging, difficult, painful, disappointing, frustrating.

In the practice of tolerance, one's enemy is the best teacher.

Tenzin Gyatso, born Lhamo Thondup

better known as the 14th Dalai Lama

A relationship can actually be also merely boring, ordinary, not interesting at all. Or it can be all these things and more, depending on the days, your mood, the circumstances, your attitude.

Still, what matters is how you deal with the relationships, both in your private life and at work.

[Pics: Me, October 2017 -  With my naturally curly hair...
after five years, they are back.

© Radoslaw Kosiada]

Last week I got interviewed for Plinga's blog series "Heroes at Plinga".
It has been a fun one, and I had a chance to talk about diversity, work-life balance, servant leadership and more.

Cultural differences in the workplace? A questionnaire needs your thoughts and ideas!

If I have to think about some of my favorite movies about the workplace, I could say I have seen just one movie over and over again, even if that's not actually true.
I have seen a lot of movies, but finding similarities among them is not that complicated, since most of them...

• were made in the Eighties;
• are romantic comedies or at least comedies;
• have amazing female characters;
• show horrible clothes, haircuts, and styles.

Just a couple of titles? Well, Working Girl and Nine to Five for sure.

[Melanie Griffith and Harrison Ford
in Working Girl (1988) by Mike Nichols]

But today I don't want just to talk about movies. Today I'd like to invite you to fill out a questionnaire. What kind of questionnaire?