Ning Xiangdong: Four Defining “Ones” in Life and Career

Four questions about the “ones” in life and career: one pursuit, one domain, one distinctive skill, and one person in charge. (A distinctive skill means an unusual ability or skill few others possess.) --- One pursuit First, find something you can do for a lifetime. At university, a person should accomplish at least two things. The first is to learn a skill. Whatever your major, completing it should give you a means of earning a living. The second is to find one pursuit for your life. Life is short; ultimately, you can devote it to one thing. If you truly love it, you will pursue it regardless of obstacles and persist no matter what. If someone can quickly persuade you to give it up, you have not found that “one pursuit.” Many mistake hobbies for a lasting vocation. A person may have many hobbies, which often shift. Hobbies are sometimes called interests. But interest alone cannot make an activity a lifelong career. What can genuinely guide a career choice is an enduring aspiration. Here is the interesting distinction: an interest can become such an aspiration, but aspiration is much more than interest. Interest is somewhat more focused and narrower than a hobby. What is an interest? People say they are interested in this or that, but often these are merely hobbies. An interest can develop into a lifelong pursuit, a vocation, and a career. There is a paradox: your university major can become your vocation. Genuine interest may begin when you discover you do not find an activity tiresome. If you do not tire of it, curiosity gradually develops. Curiosity draws you deeper, and what seemed uninteresting becomes increasingly interesting. Interest turns into aspiration, which becomes organically integrated with your career. Some find their careers painful; others find them joyful. The latter fundamentally derive considerable enjoyment from doing their work. The first threshold, then, is finding “one pursuit,” a choice made around 20. Later is fine too. Some start a career at 40; others even later, and those who start later deserve even greater respect. ---------- One domain Ages 25 to 35 are a time for cultivating depth. Having found a field that interests you and inspires a lasting aspiration, work steadily within it and establish a domain of your own. How should we assess someone at 35? A crucial measure is whether they have established their own place in a field. At 35, do not look at how much money they have or how high an official position they hold. Ask whether they have built solid foundations in a field, developed their own career, and established a domain. Some start early but falter at the finish. Others begin slowly but make every step count, building considerable strength for later. -------- One distinctive skill There is no fixed order between “one distinctive skill” and “one domain,” but both are threshold choices in life. Around 35, find a field that lets you use your talents to the fullest and develop a unique competitive advantage. That is your distinctive skill. Thirty-five is a suitable stage: much earlier, you lack experience and understanding of yourself and the world. At 35, with both energy and experience, you have a good chance of finding such a field. Have you considered where, whether in specialist expertise or general management, you possess a skill others lack? The test is whether there is something in your organization that only you can do. If so, that is your distinctive skill, and you have firmly established your position. If you leave today and plenty of people can take over tomorrow, you will never have an opportunity to move further up. How do you find that skill? Build on your characteristics, endowments, and distinctive resources. Everyone has their own endowments—something unique to them that others do not possess. People are “born unequal.” Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew emphasized this, so his governing philosophy was: you arrive unequal, and therefore need not leave equal. What we can do is help you become a little better off; that is government’s responsibility. Where do differences in endowments come from? To put the question scientifically: why do people differ? That their endowments differ is certain. Many habitually compare themselves with others, supposedly to discover strengths and weaknesses. Strategic management has the SWOT framework, analyzing how to use strengths to capture opportunities and weaknesses to guard against risks. The author disagrees with such simplistic comparisons. Strengths and weaknesses often belong to the same whole: they are characteristics. Your endowments and behavior reflect characteristics that have both strengths and weaknesses. Change them, and you would no longer be yourself. What matters most is not identifying strengths to exploit and weaknesses to fix, but fully using the strong sides of your characteristics and avoiding their weak sides: play to strengths and avoid weaknesses. -------- One person in charge After 35, particularly after 40, an unavoidable question arises: should you become the person in charge? Everyone has dreams, and ultimately realizing them requires taking charge. The simplest form is taking charge of yourself through effective self-management. This is the hardest kind of management. Many people fail badly at it throughout life without recognizing the fact. Self-knowledge has a blind spot, like darkness directly beneath a lamp. Many are not content with leading themselves; they want to lead followers within an organization to achieve a dream. Deciding whether to make that breakthrough at the right time requires another set of qualities. At 40, you may find yourself in an awkward career position. Before 40, there are fewer competitors and more positions. Those above treat you as young; you are a mainstay and a soldier charging into battle. After 40, positions shrink and competitors become stronger. The senior leader who supported you is due to retire, while those below want you to become a stronger source of support. That is how Chinese organizational systems work. You must then consider whether to take the top role. Dreams often cannot be realized alone; they require a group. You begin developing that group while establishing your domain and distinctive skill, and must find a path forward for them. Taking charge requires many qualities: endurance, an understanding of stability, and enough toughness at critical moments. These are life’s four thresholds, which the author calls the four “ones.” I hope you find your own. #得到寧向東的管理學課 (Ning Xiangdong’s management course on Dedao) ---- Robin: “Many things require regularly returning to the starting point and asking: Have I found work I love? What am I willing to give for it? Do I possess unique expertise others lack? Have I found somewhere to use it? Can I manage myself? An organization? Am I willing to share proactively and grow a team to influence or change something?”