Ep 126: Elevating Individual and Team Productivity With Patrick Lencioni’s Working Genius Tool

The Global Leadership Podcast

What if, as a leader, you had access to a tool that could easily identify productivity strengths and weaknesses for your team? After years as a pioneer in the field of organizational health, speaker, consultant, and best-selling author Patrick Lencioni has developed “Working Genius,” which can help leaders quickly and clearly identify how individual team members are wired to work naturally. In addition, Working Genius can also be used to easily map an entire team’s strengths and weaknesses. In this episode, Patrick and Global Leadership Podcast team member Jason Jaggard explore how Patrick approaches public speaking, how Working Genius came about, and how leaders can use it to increase productivity and happiness of their individuals and teams.

KEY MOMENTS IN THIS EPISODE

04:44 CREATING CONNECTION THROUGH ON-STAGE VULNERABILITY. As a speaker, Patrick intentionally breaks down barriers between himself and his audience by owning his vulnerabilities and bringing the audience into the experience with him.

14:32 SIX DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES ARE REQUIRED TO DO ANY KIND OF WORK (AND INDIVIDUALS ARE ONLY GREAT AT TWO OF THEM):

1. Wonder

2. Invention

3. Discernment

4. Galvanizing

5. Enablement

6. Tenacity

17:24 UNDERSTAND YOUR UNIQUE “WORKING GENIUS” IN A TEAM CONTEXT. Understanding how your particular “genius” interacts and compensates for others on your team can significantly increase collective productivity and job satisfaction. It can also reveal where teams may lack a particular working genius.

25:52 DIFFERENT MEETINGS REQUIRE DIFFERENT GENIUSES. Be aware of whether you need a meeting to be a brainstorming meeting (as opposed to say, an, “operations” meeting) so that you can make sure the right individuals/geniuses are available to contribute.

29:37 BEING AWARE OF OTHERS’ GENIUS UNLOCKS OPPORTUNITIES FOR PRAISE. You can love and honor people effectively when you know what their genius is.

37:20 Host reflection and takeaways.

RELEVANT RESOURCES / LINKS

Table Group

Working Genius

The 6 Types of Working Genius: A Better Way to Understand Your Gifts, Your Frustrations, and Your Team (on Amazon)

Global Leadership Network

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION

Go further with this episode by discussing the following questions with your team, or engaging in some personal reflection:

Patrick talks about how working inside your “Working Genius” increases personal performance and job satisfaction, and that if teams allow people to work within their genius, the same holds true for team performance.

Have you ever been on a team where you or someone else was working outside of their genius (or natural aptitude)? What was the effect on team performance?

Moving Forward: What could you do differently as a result of this podcast?