In 1970 Dick Bolles published What Colour is Your Parachute?

50 years on and one key piece of his advice comes up in my client conversations almost daily.

What is it that’s so relevant half a century later?👇

My friend was trying to train her dog and was reading lots of advice on the internet about ‘treat training’. It’s where you use snacks to reward your dog when he’s done something good. The trouble was, her dog didn’t really dig the snacks.

She read she should switch to ‘high value’ snacks.

So she tried sausage, cheese, weird stinky pate. Nothing.

The dog wasn’t motivated by food.

One day, she was playing ball with him on the park and realised that this dog would do ANYTHING for the ball. The ball lit a fire under him, he could play all day and never get bored of it. Even after a long walk, that dog would chase the ball like a demon.

So she started using the ball as the reward. And it worked.

The things that light us up are all different.

In the workplace and beyond, it’s usually our strengths which draw us to the tasks and roles which create interest and motivation. They are our energisers.

The Strengthscope tool we use at Henley Careers tells us that the chances of two people reporting the exact same top 7 strengths is one in 346,000. So we can’t assume that even two people doing the same role have the same strengths.

Often, when we feel miserable at work, it’s because we’re doing too much of what de-energises us and there’s not enough focus on our energisers.

Working out what your energisers are is the first step to getting more of what you need in your job.

Ask yourself questions such as, when am I absorbed by what I'm doing so that I don’t notice time passing? If I had to do just one thing from my current role all day, every day, what would that be?

If you do this, you'll understand yourself better and able to articulate your wants and needs to current and future employers.

If you want to read more of my posts, follow me and tap on the bell 🔔 on my profile and you’ll be notified as soon as I post.