What!??!

Okay, let me explain what I mean by that and you are welcome to disagree! Many who know me have heard me say that you should outsource those tasks that you hate to do and don’t do well (or even those tasks you do well but hate to do).

But what if something you’re really passionate about doesn’t turn into a strength until you give it the discipline, effort, and devotion to turn it into something you’re eventually great at? After all, many people like this quote:

“People of mediocre ability sometimes achieve outstanding success because they don’t know when to quit. Most people succeed because they are determined to.”

–George E. Allen

While I applaud the Strengthsfinder 2.0 assessment–the first one that was outlined in Now Discover Your Strengths was great, but this one is much better!–I read something in the accompanying book by Tom Rath that actually hit a nerve.

Do you remember the story of Rudy Ruettiger, the young, groundskeeper at Notre Dame’s stadium? His physique wasn’t quite the football flavor, and he certainly didn’t have a natural talent for football. He spent most of his days overcoming a weakness by practicing and practicing and practicing and eventually triumphed.

Rath implies that those days could’ve been better spent focusing on strengthening a strength rather than overcoming a weakness. His maxim is: “You cannot be anything you want to be–but you can be a lot more of who you already are” versus the familiar, “You can be anything you want to be if you just try hard enough.”

But what about the psychological benefits during the journey–especially if you’re passionate about the end result?

Here’s why what Rath said hit a nerve with me: The entrepreneurial bug hit me at 10 years old and I had a ball and made some cash doing all sorts of fun activities using my “kid charm” to get it done, and then took a hiatus in terms of true implementation until 2003.  I didn’t make a ton of money as a 10 year old, but I was having the time of my life!

Truth be told, when I got back into the entrepreneurial fold in 2003, I made more mistakes than money and didn’t really get into a groove until after I hired a coach in 2004 to show me where I was blocked (one big culprit was the “M” word…no, not ‘marriage,’ silly, ‘marketing’! ).

I was always awesome at academics, technology, teaching, and creating.

Marketing? Not so much. 

But marketing is such a pivotal part of being an entrepreneur. And I’m still not a master at marketing compared to some, but I do know it’s something I have to have my fingers in even if I would prefer to outsource that task.

There were other things my coach and I discovered together back then that was making my road to entrepreneurial success a real challenge–despite entrepreneurialism being a huge passion of mine–and those things are worthy of another blog post some other time.

But let me ask these two questions for now: Should you detach completely from something that is not a natural strength in the overall scheme of things even if you’re really passionate about it (my lack of entrepreneurial mojo in 2003 as an example) or go for it anyway because you’re so determined to succeed at your passion?

And if you decide to go for it (i.e., being an entrepreneur) and find out that the weakness you have is something many experts say you should be a part of anyway–marketing in this case–do you farm it out completely, or do you have a role in it?

What say you?

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