What You’re Really Meant To Do: A Road Map For Reaching Your Unique Potential

About the author

Rob Kaplan is a former 22-year Goldman Sachs executive, including time spent as Goldman’s Vice Chairman while leading Goldman’s Investment Banking and Investment Management divisions). He was subsequently a Harvard Business School Professor and President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. He is also a chairman and the founding partner of Indaba Capital. He is the author of three books, What To Ask The Person In The Mirror (2011), What You’re Really Meant To Do (2013) and What You Really Need To Lead (2015). Along the way, he has coached a large number of early- to mid-stage professionals on their careers. He is a regular public speaker and has contributed to numerous publications during his career. He is a co-chair of the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation, a global venture philanthropy firm, and chair of Project ALS. He has held a variety of corporate board roles, government appointed roles, and non-profit board roles. Rob graduated from the University of Kansas in 1979 and from the Harvard Business School in 1983, where he was a Baker Scholar. He has two sons and lives in Dallas.

Source: Google search, Wikipedia, and “About the Author” section of the book

Our one-sentence summary

Reaching your true potential requires a deep understanding of yourself – your skills, passions, dreams, values, character, and leadership traits – that enables you to find your unique professional path.

Kaplan’s book features a number of accompanying case examples and exercises.

Publisher’s summary

How do you create your own definition of success—and reach your unique potential?

Building a fulfilling life and career can be a daunting challenge. It takes courage and hard work. Too often, we charge down a path leading to “success” as defined by those around us—and ultimately, are left feeling dissatisfied.

Each of us is unique and brings distinctive skills and qualities to any situation. So why is it that most of us fail to spend sufficient time learning to understand ourselves and creating our own definition of success? The truth is, it can seem so natural and so much easier to just do what everyone else is doing—for now—leaving it for later to develop our best selves and figure out our own unique path. Is there a road map that will enable you to defy conventional wisdom, resist peer pressure, and carve out a path that fits your unique skills and passions?

Robert Steven Kaplan, leadership expert and author, regularly advises executives and students on how to tackle these questions. In this indispensable book, Kaplan shares a specific and actionable approach to defining your own success and reaching your potential. Drawing on his years of experience, Kaplan proposes an integrated plan for identifying and achieving your goals. He outlines specific steps and exercises to help you understand yourself more deeply, take control of your career, and build your capabilities in a way that fits your passions and aspirations.

Are you doing what you’re really meant to do? If you’re ready to face this question, this book can help you change your life.

Source: Book jacket

Detailed Summary

Introduction: Reaching Your Unique Potential

• Key tenet: “The key to achieving your aspirations lies not in ‘being a success’ but rather in working to reach your unique potential.”
  • Don’t let others define your path for you, even if they’re well-intentioned
  • Look inside yourself – what are your unique skills and qualities?
  • Tune out the external forces (such as the ‘cookie-cutter’ career choices)
  • It’s not easy – it “takes courage and hard work”
  • It is a “multistage, lifelong effort”
  • There is no single right way
  • It involves a mindset shift and new habits

Chapter 1: What You’re Really Meant To Do

• It’s critical that you take ownership for your own career direction
• Most of the advice we get from others isn’t “based on any deep understanding of who we are as individuals, but rather on the advice givers’ own experiences, desires, and understanding of social norms.”
• Don’t confuse being “accomplished” with tapping your true potential and fulfilling your passions and desires
• Five Suggested Rules of the Road
  • Believe that justice will prevail
    • Everyone is treated unfairly at some point in their lives
    • Don’t let it lead you to just give up or only go after what you know you can achieve – this mindset is a trap
    • You “must be willing to figure out what you believe and have the courage to act on your beliefs”
    • If you are “true to yourself and your convictions, eventually you will be treated fairly”
  • Beware of conventional wisdom
    • It tends to be backward looking and it doesn’t “take into account your distinctive attributes and experience”
    • You’re the one who “must actually live with the consequences of choices you make on the basis of conventional wisdom and peer pressure”
    • What’s hot today may not be hot tomorrow, and it may not be a good fit with your skills and interests anyway
  • Act like an owner of your life and your choices
    • Don’t be “a passive bystander in your own life”
    • Take responsibility for learning about your “strengths, weaknesses, and passions…and communicating your desires to can help you achieve them”
    • Make explicit choices, not passive ones
  • Be realistic and adapt to circumstances
    • You may have near-term constraints but you also need to plan for a brighter future in which you’ll have more degrees of freedom
    • Don’t swim against the tide – accept the broader world realities
  • Be open to learning
    • It’s harder than it sounds, as it involves engaging in “meaningful introspection” and actively seeking feedback
    • You never have to have all the answers, no matter how senior you are
  • Suggested follow-up steps (taken from the book)
    • Write down your definition of success
    • Write down the steps you believe are needed to achieve your dreams
    • Keep these answers in a notebook and come back to them periodically

Chapter 2: Assessing Your Strengths and Weaknesses

• Understanding your strengths and weaknesses is essential to achieving your potential and to realizing your dreams…but it takes real work and motivation
• Don’t expect your company, HR, your manager, or anyone else to do the work for you
• You can’t do this alone – we all have blind spots – so you need to engage others
• Specificity matters – don’t operate at the level of broad generalities
• When you’re preparing for a review or coaching session (taken from the book)
  • Write down before the session your own assessment of your skill-based strengths and weaknesses. You can start with a list of skills and rate yourself on a 1-10 scale or bucket them into 3 columns: + / – / not sure. Go a step further by evaluating what skills are most important to the job itself
  • Ask questions during the session. Use them to gain clarity and to surface specific examples that make the feedback tangible
  • Be aware that a year-end review is rarely the best forum for getting coaching, as the manager is busy writing and giving reviews, deciding compensation, etc.
  • Recognize the possibility that your boss may not be your best coach and may not be a good coach at all
• Revisit this exercise regularly, as your role and external circumstances change
• Ask yourself whether the best course of action is to (a) address your weaknesses or (b) build on your strengths while looking to others who are strong in areas where you are weak
• Assessing and working on your strengths and weaknesses requires coaching
  • Coaching is not the same as mentoring
    • Coaching is about direct observation, it’s best in the moment, it needs to be candid, and it requires follow-up / regular interaction
    • Mentoring is about advice given in response to the way you tell the story
  • Coaching can come from peers, subordinates, etc. – not just your manager
  • If needed, coaching can be provided based on discussions with people who have had direct observations of you, but view this approach as a back-up
• If you realize your skills are not matched well with the job requirements, find someone with whom you can talk that through, and determine whether to work on your weaknesses or find another role better aligned to your strengths
• Volunteer work can be a good test bed for skill-building and for being a coach yourself
• You don’t have to be good at everything
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book)
  • Conduct the skills assessment exercise (summarized above) and discuss your assessment with someone who observes you regularly in a work setting
  • Identify 2-3 seniors, peers, or subordinates who could provide coaching to you. Schedule time with them, push yourself to solicit their feedback, and reflect on what you have learned from them
  • Write down the top three skills you need to be outstanding in your current job
  • Be available to coach others, and reflect on what you learn about yourself and your capabilities from these interactions

Chapter 3: Finding Your Passions

• There is a “strong correlation between believing in the mission (of the company), enjoying the job, and performing at a high level”
• Connecting passions to work is a recurring need and challenge
  • Needs to be your passions, not others’
  • It’s about connecting head and heart
• Early in career, you’re likely still being influenced by others and may not be sure what you’re passionate about, so think about the school topics and other things you love (not necessarily the things you’re good at), aim to get yourself in the general direction of what you think you’d like to do, and then calibrate further as you continue your career
• Mid-career, you need to set aside financial obligations, expectations of others, role in the community, etc. – it can be difficult because mid-career individuals often perceive the cost of change to be so high that they try not to think too deeply about how they feel about what they’re doing
• Be aware of real trade-offs and false trade-offs
  • To a degree, money and passion are false trade-offs, as you have to be sufficiently passionate about what you do to be successful
  • Be conscious of the difference between extrinsic motivators (money, power, etc.) and intrinsic motivators (learning, passion, etc.)
• Be aware of the dangers of conventional wisdom and peer pressure
• If constraints are a reality, at least be explicit that you are making a choice in favor of these constraints, such as family or financial obligations
• Don’t fear the unknown – embrace it
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book)
  • Think about when you were your best self. What were you doing? What tasks were you performing? What was the objective? What did you enjoy about it? Etc.? Be detailed
  • Consider these mental models
    • If you had one year left to live, how would you spend it?
    • If you had enough money to do whatever you wanted, what job or career would you pursue?
    • If you knew you were going to be highly successful in your career, what job would you pursue today?
    • What would you like to tell your children and grandchildren about what you accomplished in your career? How will you explain to them what career you chose?
    • If you were a third-party giving advice to yourself, what would you suggest regarding a career choice?
  • Write down the tasks you enjoy and other job aspects that you believe create enjoyment for you, including both extrinsic and intrinsic motivators
  • Consider what stands in the way or your spending time on the activities you enjoy

Chapter 4: Understanding Yourself

• This step is about “coming to grips with your life story and understanding how it impacts who you are”
  • Your story has “a powerful impact on your emotions, perceptions, idiosyncrasies, assumptions, vulnerabilities, and mindset”
  • Your story “goes a long way toward explaining your behaviors”
• Suggested steps
  • Write down your basic story, in whatever form works best for you. Start with the description and then consider more the “why’s” and the “implications”
  • Understand your competing narratives – the success narrative and the failure narrative – and be aware of which one is in your head at any given time
  • Consider how your narratives impact your behavior
• Another angle is to explore a past injustice
  • How did you frame it at the time it happened?
  • How have you framed it since then?
  • If you have experienced a particular trauma, you need to take time to process it, you should discuss it with others (particularly those who might have witnessed it), and you should learn from it
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book)
  • Consider:
    • If you’re taking actions that make you unhappy, unfulfilled, or regretful – why? Is there something in your life experience, story, or narrative that could help you understand your actions?
    • If you cannot take an action that your best judgment tells you to take, can you zero in on why you are unable to act? Is there something about your story that could help you understand?
  • Select one more friends with whom to discuss your respective life stories
  • Using the drafts of your success and failure narratives, consider what circumstances cause one of these narratives to be present in your mind. Try to recall an important decision that was influenced by one of these narratives. Why did that happen?
  • Author a story of your future. Write down the story of your life you’d like to tell ten or twenty years from now. Make sure to include details of your specific jobs, your life, and other important activities. What do you learn?

Chapter 5: Making the Most of Your Opportunities

• Making the most of your opportunities involves 4 actions:
  • Envisioning your dream job
  • Discussing that dream job with senior people at your firm and others who could help make it a reality for you
  • Determining what’s most important in your current job and excelling at those tasks, so that you perform at your best and create opportunities for yourself
  • Accepting that there will be setbacks along the way, and learning how to deal with them constructively
• Start by “writing down the details of your dream job.” Don’t overly worry about how you’re going to get there…just document what would make this job ideal for you
• Discuss your dream job with key people at work
  • Don’t expect them to intuit what you are seeking…you need to tell them
  • Don’t be hesitant to do so, even if it feels uncomfortable or political
• Write down the 3 tasks you must perform really well to excel in your current job. This action is about better positioning yourself to earn your dream job
  • Make sure that you regularly revisit those 3 tasks, based on situational changes
    • Do so as a “clean sheet” exercise, as if you were new in the role
    • Interview peers or customers if it’s helpful
  • Evaluate how your skills line up against these critical tasks
  • Assess whether you’re properly allocating your time against these tasks
• Learn how to deal with setbacks: “Your career is a marathon, not a sprint. If you think you’re going to get through it without being humiliated, feeling embarrassed, being treated unfairly, or having something bad happen to you, you’re being unrealistic. The trick is not to avoid these setbacks. Instead, it lies in learning to deal with them.”
  • Keep your cool
  • Take time to reflect
  • Get outside help if needed
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book)
  • Discuss your job and career aspirations with your immediate boss or another senior person at your firm
  • Commit to doing regular analysis of the top three tasks that are critical to success in your current job
    • Track your time and make sure it matches with performing those tasks
    • Make sure you are focusing your skill development on being able to better perform those tasks
    • Surround yourself with people who are able to complement your abilities
  • Write down the impediments to being at your best in your current job. Make a list of distractions or other factors that seem to be diverting you from being superb

Chapter 6: Good vs. Great

• This step is about “examining your character and your leadership behaviors”
• These are difficult to develop “because they’re not easy to coach, they may not yield rewards for many years, and they rarely lend themselves to metrics and measurement”
• Leadership means different things to different people. Kaplan puts forth his own definition: “Leadership is the ability to figure out what you believe and then summon the courage to appropriately act on those beliefs. These actions must be geared to adding value to an enterprise and making a positive impact on others”
  • You need to act like an owner of your organization
  • You need to use your talents for a greater purpose
• Great organizations “depend on people having the guts to speak up – even though the boss may disagree with them, and they may sometimes feel a bit stupid for having opened their mouths”
• Don’t think to yourself, “It’s not my job.” You may believe you’re “focus[ing] your energy on doing what’s best for yourself, but in reality, it limits your effectiveness and your impact on the organization”
• Ways you can take an ownership mindset (taken from the book)
  • Helping others without regard to what’s in it for you
  • Learning to give credit to others
  • Judging your actions through the prism of whether it’s good for the organization versus only good for yourself
  • Doing your job with “the next job up” in mind versus the “next job down”
• Be authentic and take risks – which admittedly takes courage – but don’t “play not to lose” and don’t get complacent – “play the game with some degree of abandon”
• Consider your values and ethical boundaries. It’s especially important to consider your ethical limits so that you aren’t having to figure them out in the moment
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book)
  • Think of a person you hold in high esteem as a role model. Write down the elements of his or her behavior that you respect highly. Which of these elements are skill-related and which related to their character and leadership traits? Give yourself a grade for the degree to which you display these types of behaviors
  • Write down the biggest changes you would like to see made in your project team, business unit, or company. If you were in charge, what specific actions would you take to make these changes? Have you voiced any of these suggestions to your boss in a constructive manner?”
  • Think about what keeps you from speaking up at work. Write down these impediments and discuss them with friends and loved ones
  • Write down your values. Write down your ethical boundaries that you promise yourself you will not cross. Discuss these values and boundaries with friends and loved ones

Chapter 7: The Importance of Relationships

• Mutually beneficial relationships help you avoid isolation, reduce your blind spots, maintain perspective, and see yourself more objectively
• Social media connections are not real relationships, and you need to have at least 1-2 people with whom you can have substantive, honest, open conversation
• Real relationships require three things: “mutual understanding, trust, and respect”
• Creating these kinds of relationships requires “time, face-to-face interaction and hard work…and a mix of inquiry, self-disclosure, and candor”
  • Self-disclosure – telling the other person things that will help them better understand you
  • Inquiring – asking questions to help you understand the other person better
  • Seeking advice – being “willing to ask for constructive advice on matters of importance and [being] to seek their advice” as well
• For critical discussions with someone, the mode (face-to-face, phone, etc.) and tone both matter tremendously
• It’s important to be aware of your support needs, e.g., love, reassurance, etc.
• Don’t rely on just one person for all of your relationship / support needs – form a support group, personal board, etc. – be systematic about who you include and find ways to fill in gaps that you perceive (e.g., a lack of relationships at work)
• Remember that it’s not about quantity – 5-6 real relationships would make you lucky
• Don’t try to figure out difficult situations on your own – people want to be asked to help
• Suggested follow-ups (taken from the book):
  • Pair with another person and do an exercise of engaging in self-disclosure, inquiry, and advice-seeking
    • Write down something fundamental the other person doesn’t know about yourself, something that would help them understand you better
    • Share with each other what you wrote down
    • Write down a question that would help you understand the other person better
    • Ask and answer each others’ questions
    • Write down an area of concern or self-doubt you have
    • Disclose that self-doubt to the other person and ask them how they might address it. The other person should do that same with you
  • Think about a time when someone came to you for advice and ask yourself
    • How did you feel? What did it feel like to be asked for advice?
    • What was the mode of communication the person used, and how did their choice impact the quality of your interaction?
    • What did you do that was helpful?
    • What did you learn about yourself from this interaction?
  • Make a list of issues that concern you. Which of them have you discussed with someone else? Push yourself to identify potential relationships within which you could discuss one or more of these issues

Chapter 8: The Road Map

• Summing it up
  • Are you able to accurately assess your skills?
  • What are your passions?
  • Do you understand who you are?
  • Do you have a dream job in mind?
  • Do you apply your skills and passions to be outstanding in that job?
  • Do you exhibit character and leadership traits?
  • Do you have a support group that you can rely on?
• There is no one path: “Each of us is unique and brings a range of qualities to any situation. We progress at our own path and in our own ways. We each are more likely to excel at certain activities than others. We can’t be put into a box and expected to perform”
• Most people take the easy way out and don’t truly try to understand themselves
  • They “debate intellectual questions”
  • They “mimic others rather than…figure out how they can develop themselves to be their best”
• Consider the 8 chapters a stepwise approach:
  • What you’re really meant to do (Chapter 1)
  • Know thyself (Chapters 2-4)
  • Make the most of opportunities (Chapter 5)
  • Go the extra mile (Chapters 6-8)
• Final recommendations
  • Keep a journal
  • Read the newspaper every day
  • Save your money
  • Build time into your schedule for vacations and time off
  • Don’t let your relationships slide
  • See a professional if that helps