#601 How to use profilers for your career development

Hi, I'm Sarah. And I'm Helen. And this is the Squiggly Careers podcast, where every week we borrow some brilliance from a person, a book, a place, an object, or anything else that we can think of, and we try to turn that curiosity into useful action for you and your squiggly career. And if you are a squiggly career supporter, you probably want to sign up for our weekly newsletter. It comes out every Tuesday and it has all of our links to learn from. So our Tuesday episode, our Thursday squiggly shortcuts, and also tools and things we've written that could be useful for your career. And now we have made it more easy than ever to access that. All you need to do is go to squiggly.me, and it will take you to a page where it's very easy to sign up and get that learning in your inbox every week. And this week we are borrowing brilliance from profilers, in what I think is a very thinly disguised way of talking about our new profiler. I was about to say, you're like, we're borrowing brilliance from profilers. We actually like profilers. I love our profiler, which we will get to, but I'm quite a fan of a profiling tool. I feel like Sarah and I always have quite interesting conversations when we find a profiler and you hate to be stuck in any kind of box, don't you? So you always like, you heavily caveat profilers. Yeah, I think I, I mean, we have literally just launched one that I am very proud of. But I don't know, I think because I've seen them overused in a way where people label other people, but also the way, in a way that people label themselves, I think can get in the way, can get in the way of doing something that feels difficult because you're like, okay, well, be like me saying, well, I'm an introvert in whatever profile I've done, so I'm not going to go to this event tonight. And you're like, well, no, I want to use the profile as an excuse. Yeah, I think you do. And I think I, I hear people almost kind of going, well, I couldn't possibly do that because I'm that, or like, or thinking about other people in that way, you know, oh, they couldn't do that job, or that project wouldn't be right for them because they're a blue person. Yeah. Or, and I'm like, well, gimme. Or all senior people are red people, you know, so if you're not red, you're not going to, that, I'd actually do, I'm not going to say what company it was, I do remember, this is no critique of the profile, it's just, it was just my experience of it. But I was working for a company and we'd done the profile where you come out with red and yellow, green, and I didn't have red. And I was in, I was the only person in the room who did not have red. Interesting. And it was a senior leadership. I was also the only woman on there. And it became this very, like, it was, and what they did was they made you stand in the corner of the room. Okay, yeah. So it was visible. There's Helen by herself. There's the yellow one. The only yellow. There's the yellow one. Miling away. I was like, but it was a- Being optimistic about her own yellowness. But it didn't feel, you know, you never want someone to feel, I think the point of profile is to learn and think about how you can be your best and learn about other people and all that kind of stuff. And if it leaves you feeling, I remember being in that room and seeing all those people in the corner and me being in a different one and feeling like, you know, I felt a bit embarrassed and like, I should have faked it. That kind of thing. Well, I tried to be positive when I was preparing and I was like, well, we must think that they have some use, right? Because we have actually spent a lot of time and money in our company creating this profile, which we'll talk about last, actually. So at least we haven't put our own one first. And here's why I think they are helpful. I think they do give you some quick clues that increase your self-awareness. I think they can be particularly helpful, actually, if you're feeling stuck. And even when I was on our team, I heard that word last week. And, you know, we do hear that word quite a lot with careers like, I was just walking your dog. And during our lunch break. Who is currently in the podcast studio, I should say, in case you hear anything for reasons that we can talk about on another day. And what was interesting is your dog is very young and cute. So it attracted a lot of conversation, which I was like, oh, God, I'm having all these conversations now. And even one of the, I met this lady who was talking about works in design and she was like, oh, what podcast do you got? And I said, oh, Squiggly Careers. She's like, oh, I feel a bit stuck at the moment. And I was like, oh, it's just it's a really kind of common response, right, to kind of where people feel that they are. So I think it can just help. It can be helpful to give you that perspective. It can be the catalyst, I think, for starting to get unstuck. And I do wonder whether as long as you aren't anchored to only one, they can be helpful things to keep coming back to as you squiggle. So, you know, when you're trying to make choices, you're developing different directions, you're trying to figure out what's right for me right now. Having some data, essentially data for your development, right? Having some data for your development, I think, can be useful for understanding yourself and understanding other people, too. I am particularly interested in profilers that lead to action, because I think one of my big critiques of profilers generally, and the thing I keep thinking about with ours a lot is I think they're so often just one and done. And actually in that one moment, like we've done ones as a team that are not ours, where I've been like, yeah, that is helpful. I did find that helpful. I feel like I know our team better. I feel like I know myself better. But then you don't do anything differently, like nothing changes. So I'm a bit like, you know, like the so what-ness I always come back to in my head. This is me thinking, obviously, critically. I think sometimes people are not aware of, you know, just like the give people permission to go, well, how was this profiler created? What's the purpose of this profiler? It's, you know, it's not based on research or evidence. It might be just based on experiences, or it might be based on one person's perspective, you know, like encouraging people to have a play with the idea of profilers. One of things I really liked actually, when we, because we have used the colour profile in our team, the lady who facilitated that for us, I think that was helpful to have facilitated. She really encouraged us to go through the profiles and be like, what feels right? What feels wrong? You know, it's not, this is not us just sort of telling you, so I'm like, that's kind of really helpful. And then I do feel that when you have a really helpful profile, it goes beyond you. It goes from the kind of the I to the we. It's like, as a team, how can we be better? Because we've got this data, understand each other better, work together better. So I think I have come round to them a little bit. I think I had a real moment. Five minutes of how I have come round to profilers. Whereas I'm like convinced in 30 seconds. I think I quite like to play and see what it says. I think the two benefits that I really see from them are a shared language for a team, like whatever the profiler is, suddenly you've got this, if we all do it together, we could talk about it. And I think it makes the conversations that I think are really valuable, important and easy. And the other thing I like is borrowing the language and putting it into conversations. Or even like your LinkedIn profile. So let's say you do a really common one, like a Myers-Briggs one, which is not one we're going to talk about today. One of the least evidence-based ones, just in case you're wondering. We'll leave that there. Thank you. Important to know. But one that's often, you know, it's used quite broadly, let's say that. But you can take that and it will give you some insights into people who match a particular profile. But what I think you can do is you can steal some of that language and it might say, you know, people who have this profile are great at collaboration and bringing people together. And I might think, oh, actually, I've been struggling to say what I'm good at in an interview or actually for my LinkedIn profile, I really want to say like three things that make me stand out at work. And I could borrow that language because I often think, like with ours, we've put a lot of effort into the language. And the report. And so you can literally just steal that for your own, like conversations you're having with people that matter to your development. Yeah. Joe, I hadn't thought of that. I thought when you first said it, you were going to say, oh, we people should be saying I'm an INFJ or whatever. And I was like, oh, no, thank you. I am not a big fan of where people have their profiles on like email signatures. Yeah. Which you do see. Yeah. And some, you know, some companies go all out, right. They're like, yes, we will all do this. And I'm just like, oh, wow, that is quite a bit. I think that's quite a big decision to be saying to everybody to do that. I think your version is much more useful for people because people do find it hard. They can choose a language. But that language, to your point there, people find it really hard for loads of different reasons. Could be confidence. Yeah. To sort of talk about what they're good at. It could just be like clarity of thought. Like, how do I say this succinctly? And somebody has done that hard work for you with most of those profilers because they all generate a report and you don't have to cut and paste all of it, but you can pick and choose the bits. You're like, yes, you've said that really well. I'm going to steal that. One of the things I did do as part of the preparation for this, which I did find really helpful, which you could always just use as an AI prompt, is I was thinking, oh, range is quite useful here, right? Like you probably don't just want to do one profiler. Also, most of them don't take that long. Yeah. Five, 10 minutes. So you could do one a day for a week, which I think would actually be a really good experiment. But I asked, I mean, I use Claude. So I just asked Claude, can you create a table for me of profilers that you think could help me in my squiggly career? I have a preference for ones that have research and evidence behind them. And I'm looking for ones where I can at least have a go for free. Because some profiles have versions that are like all free or like ours is all free. Some have like a mini version that's free, which is also fine too. And so I just got a table up. And then I actually discovered something I'd not heard of and clicked through some again that I'd not done for a while. And that I think would be a really good 10 minutes a day if that one week experiment. Like do five profiles in five days, get to the Friday. You could upload all of your results from each of them. Get AI to then go, what are the trends and themes? You should obviously have a look for yourself too. But you know, across all five, if it said, if consistently every profile said, collaborator, collaborative, working with other people. I mean, you've still got a decision to make, like how do I feel about that? But it's very, very consistent. And so that gives you like a stronger clue versus one saying it. Can I give one Sarah like reflection before we share our favourites as in a sort of critical thinking reflection of it? I would say with profilers, their perception, as in this is how I think I respond to the situation. This is how I think I behave. Yeah, exactly that. And I think it is very important for you to also get other people's perspective. And you can do that in any number of ways. You can ask for feedback. You can ask, I could say, this is what this profiler said. What do you see? I was thinking, could you mirror it? You know, could you create your own? Well, I think some do. Some do have like functionality in them where you can. Often the more expensive ones, I'm just thinking. So you potentially could pick a couple of questions and say, on a scale of one to ten, how would you rate me on this? Yeah. Like, you know, the three things that you came out as brilliant at or something. So I just, it's more just my little caveat for them that I don't think it tells, I think it tells your story. I don't think it tells the full story. Yeah. So what we've done is picked three profilers that we do think are useful for your squiggly career. I've picked one, Helen's picked one, which we're going to talk about. And then we will talk about the squiggly skills one and how you might want to use that. Are you ready? Yes, ready. So I picked Linda Grattan's Living the 100-Year Life Diagnostic. So this is the new one that she's done. So you've got the 100-Year Life, which was the first book that she wrote over 10 years ago now. And then she's got the newer book, which is Living the 100-Year Life. And I think this assessment is particularly useful because it encourages you to zoom out from work and careers. So it goes way beyond your job. It is much more about, am I living my life in a way that works for me? That was my kind of note. I felt like it helped me to think about, with the different aspects or threads, as Linda would describe them, that kind of make up all of our lives, am I weaving those together, to kind of use her metaphor, in a way that works for me? And it doesn't take very long and it's free. And the categories, what she does is then at the end, I think there's eight threads. And for each thread, you're going to get the output is, are they foundational, which means they're strong? Are they renewing? So they're developing, could probably get a bit stronger. But that's sort of like, okay. Or are they fragile, under strain? And her point is very much, no one has. You know, no one is brilliant at friendship and mastery and nurture. Because you can't be that good, right? But I think it will make you sort of both intentional, or help you to be intentional about kind of how you live your life. Spot if something isn't where you want it to be. So if friendship is massively important to you, and that comes up as fragile, or even as renewing, and you're like, friends is one of my values. I think it would make you pause, like kind of like pause for thought. And so my foundational thread was mastery, which actually isn't that much of a surprise, because mastery is a lot about who you are, being connected to your work and your identity. Obviously, I love my work, and it's a big part of who I am. And I had everything else as renewing. So nothing was too fragile. And then what's really nice at the end of it, it's really simple. You actually don't get emailed a report, which is quite unusual. It just comes up on the page, doesn't it? Yeah, it comes up on the page. And you can just screenshot it, or I press print so that I got it saved. But at the end of each section, so initially I was like, oh, lots of mine are a bit samey. So how helpful is that to have adventure and friendship and stuff? So it doesn't divide them out that much. But if you then read the questions, that was then what prompted me to be like, okay, that's made me think a bit more. So for adventure, the two questions were identify one area where you're playing it safe and take a low risk step forward. And I was like, so that made me think, like, where am I playing it safe? And I thought about all of my life. I was like, where am I playing it safe? Like, what would I do? I did find that intriguing, and that stuck with me. The kind of playing it safeness stuck with me. And then the other question was, revisit an old curiosity and see if it still gives you energy and enjoyment. Oh, that's a nice question for you. Yeah. Do you know what? And again, I was like, to me, this is where the value has really come out. I was thinking about, I used to go to quite a lot of events that I used to label as networking, but were not for networking. They were just pure curiosity. So I didn't talk to anyone. I just went because I was like, that's interesting. And I pretty much always went by myself. And I always really enjoyed them. And what I did was I sort of had places. So it'd be like, oh, okay. So you used to go to the V&A? I used to go to Fridays at the V&A. I used to go to the Barbican. Certain ones. Whereas now I think I sort of filter my curiosity a bit more through probably the lens of work. I am going to an event tonight, but there is definitely a work filter on that event. But those ones were pure. And honestly, sometimes I would go to something and be like, I don't really understand. I don't really understand this thing around architecture and everyone else would be there. Maybe it's like architecture students. And I would just be like, this is interesting. But they're very accessible. They're very open. And I think I've lost doing those partly because some of them wouldn't work as well in my life. And I struggled with the online-ness. So some of them have gone online. I actually really struggle at home to focus on an event that's online. Because I sort of get a bit, I would actually find it really hard. It's quite unlike me to not be like, oh, but what's on my email? Or what about my team's messages or those? So I think I have got to be in a sort of captive place for that to work. And again, these are two conversations and two thoughts I'm only having because I've done that. So my foundational thread kind of wasn't a surprise, but it was those questions on all of those other areas that were useful. Brings to life the book really quickly. So if you're thinking books don't work for me, which they don't for everybody, or do I want to read the book? I almost think if you did that first, it might make you think, oh, okay, now the book's going to really help me to like dive into those areas. It might determine how you read the book. I don't know if that's what Linda wanted. I'm just going to read books that you've written. I think it's fine. Yeah, yeah. But I think it would make me think, oh, okay, which of those threads, like my renewing ones, like the adventure one, I like that word. I've come back to it a few times over the last few years. So I think I'd almost, I mean, I have actually already read it, but I would start again there. I'd start in a kind of adventure. And I do like the fact it's free and it doesn't take too long. Did you do it? I did do it. Yeah, I did it. I did it and I ended up talking about it because of the LinkedIn Live to support the episode that you had done with Linda, which I think if you do as well, if you do do that profile, I think it's a good episode to listen to because I think yours, I really remember from that conversation you had like the chat around friendship. I've met now Shirley. You've met Shirley, I love that. Because I went... Did you say, did you say, we talked about you? A hundred percent. That's like when I was sitting next to her and she was like, I'm Shirley. And I was like, you're Shirley? She's like the, you know, like the Shirley. And it was really interesting. It was really interesting to like hear her then talk about our friendship. And obviously Linda saying Shirley had basically really prioritised that friendship and how grateful she was for it. And I think what's really refreshing is not to then feel like, I didn't hear Linda like beat herself up being like, oh, I should have been a Lowe's Better Friend. I think it's just the reality of, well, there were some other threads and that's where she put her time and effort. But she's really grateful. She's really grateful for that friend. And it's clearly been a really massive part of her life. So it's like with all of those things, it's not like you have to be amazing at all of them. But you also might be like, well, the people you surround yourself with, you know, if you're not very good at nurture, if you surround yourself with someone else who is good at that, it probably does help you to nurture a little bit more. Can you remember what yours were? No, I can't actually, which makes me think like how much has it stuck with me. Yeah, that's true. I really like the conversation and I quite like the simplicity of them. I think some of them, the one I'm going to talk about next, I think is more sophisticated as a tool. Yes. But that doesn't necessarily, just because the text better doesn't necessarily mean the learning is right. But I think sometimes simple is better because it just leads to those questions, right? And also I think the reason you probably want to play with different profilers is different ones will also connect with different people and at different times. Yeah. Like if you're in quite a thoughtful space or if you're at that one, I think it's, you know how you said, it's got kind of like a whole life view. Yeah. I think if you're feeling, if you're at a point in your career where you are slightly more conscious of how everything's fitting together, that I think we are, I think we're trying to run a business, you know, make sure we kind of have a positive impact with our work and that continues to grow. We've got stuff going on outside of family. We're about to start a PhD. We want a life and friendship. You know, it's quite a lot. And I think if anybody is sort of struggling with the different threads and how they weave together, then I actually think her work is a really helpful moment to pause. And maybe that's a good, you know, if you're figuring out what profiler or profilers to spend time with, I wonder if before, you know, like you could jump into a profiler because who doesn't love it because you're doing something and you're filling something out. Maybe just the first question to pause on, you know, to like pause before the profile on is, well, what question am I trying to explore? So actually I had a career conversation with someone on our team last week where she got quite a lot of clarity on her values, but she definitely wants more clarity on her strengths. She wasn't that sure about them, couldn't kind of talk about them with confidence. I can see her strengths, but she clearly couldn't see them for herself back to the two way thing. And so what she could do is go, like, I want some profiles that are going to help me to explore my strengths. Explore what I'm going to talk about. Yeah. But that's a very different starting point to the question is, how do I live my life in a way that works for me? It's quite different to what am I good at? Yeah. Or like the really good values one that was in the AI skills sprint that we did, which was much more about like, well, what motivates and drives me if I want to explore my values? Like that's such a good tool for that. So I think rather than maybe being too scattergun with your profiles, because there are quite a few that do similar things. The one that, again, if you're in sort of life category, the female lead one that Edwina Dunn. I've not done that. That's good. Yeah, that's a good one as well. Obviously we'll put a link to all these ones. But Edwina Dunn and her team have done one. And again, that's quite an enjoyable experience to go through. When we were creating our profile, I remember going through and being like, oh, again, that's much more life. And also it's a very different, like you said, the technology is quite different on that one. I think we should do a LinkedIn post around when this podcast comes out. So listeners head to Squiggly Careers on LinkedIn. And I think we should do like a, what's your question? What's our most recommended profiler? Something like that. So, because I think it is a good, you know, what question have you got in your work and life and what profiler will help you answer it? When we get to our one, we should figure out. What would that help you with? What would that question be? I'll figure that out while you tell me. Which one do you use? I'm going to get my phone because it's on my phone. So I use, and I can also be quite objective about this, because I think there's some things that aren't brilliant about it, but there are some things that I really like. So the profiler is 16personalities.com. And to your point, it has a really comprehensive free bit. Yeah. And then there is a bit, you know, it has the whole, and if you want to learn more. If you want to pay. Pay nine pounds, which actually isn't that bad. If you want to. That's more accessible than some of them, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's not. It's quite an access, but I don't, I have actually never paid. Sorry, 16personalities.com. But I- I probably would though for nine pounds. Yeah. That feels like money quite well spent. I thought so. I was like, oh, actually, yeah. Like the price is stuck with me because I thought it was very simply communicated and it's right at the bottom. And so let me say why I like it. And also I should caveat this with, it is largely based on Myers-Briggs. So to Sarah's critical point earlier, it is largely based on that. The reason I like it, so Myers-Briggs will give you like an INTJ and ENTP or whatever, it gives you this code. And other than Sarah's point about the grounding of that research that has informed that, I think I don't like being a code. I don't often have these statements like, I don't like something, but I don't like people going around. I don't mind the, I'm quite red, I'm quite yellow, I'm quite blue. I don't, I don't mind that as much, though I totally get your point about putting people in boxes, but I find it quite robotic to be like, oh, you're an ENTJ. Because also the one that was popular to your point of like the red thing. Yeah. The old ENTJs. Because when we first started at work, everybody did do Myers-Briggs. Yeah. There are some very good critiques of it, by the way, you could read, which are interesting, which would probably make you think, I'm never going to do it. But you know, as long as you know that, you can then choose to, right? But I really remember like the profile that you wanted was ENTJ. And I really remember doing mine and being like, oh, oh dear. Yeah, like, oh, I'm not that person, therefore I'm not going to be successful because people are like that. And so it doesn't do that. It does tell you it, but actually what it does is it gives your profile a name and it has these 16 different names. And so that's one thing I like about it. It turns that research into something I feel like is more human, more conversational. The other thing I like about it is you get really extensive results. Really, I find them really useful for thinking about my impact and how this affects how I'm working. You don't have to accept all of it, but I think there's a lot in. So for example- Tell me, tell me about what you're brilliant at. Well, I come out as an ENFJ. Okay. I've slightly, I've slightly- What were you? I think I was in- You were an ENTJ. I think I was. I remember the Helen ENTJ days. I've gone more on to, I think the F is feeling, but I'm only just, I'm 54% feeling. I mean, I've only just gone- Sarah's looking at me and going, I mean, you are not that- This is what happens when you get a puppy. Puppy, she's got a few more feelings. I've got a few more feelings. Kids are getting older. I need to look after a bit more. So my, the personality name for mine is a protagonist, which is not a word I would ever say. And it's not a word- You know how to play, don't you? I do. So I don't, the word doesn't really work for me. But when I read, when I read it, it says you possess a unique blend of charisma, empathy, and idealism. But it says you have a natural ability to inspire and lead. So it gives you a bit of a profiler. It then gives you your personality traits. So you can see when you're on a scale between extroverted, introverted, intuitive, observant. So it gives you all this scale. With numbers or- Yeah, with numbers. I will show you. If you're watching on a video, you'll be able to like zoom in and see this now. But you kind of get like a little scale with where you sit, which is interesting. Visually nice. Doesn't change my life. But little things that I think are useful in here. It says your career path. You thrive in roles that help you to inspire, guide, and develop people. I was like, pretty true. Then it gives you your strengths. This is a point I was saying earlier about, actually you can choose the ones that resonate within here. Building connections, problem solving, adaptability, effective communications. You communicate clearly. And then it talks about weaknesses. It says sensitive to criticism, overlooking practical limits. You underestimate logistical realities. Oh, you're not sensitive to criticism though? No. Reluctant to delegate. Yes. It says driven by, this is an interesting one, driven by deep care. You can exhaust yourself in trying to improve other people's lives at work. No. Do you want me to comment on that? You get your personal growth, which I think is quite interesting. And then there's just quite a lot. It talks about your relationships. So, you know, we were talking about, I think the difference between this one and say, living the hundred year life, you get a huge amount of data. I'm still scrolling. It sends you a report. So that's another thing I like about it. Also, you can see it over time. So I do think one thing I don't like is when profilers just fix you as a person forever, where I think your context, you know, you joked about, you've got a puppy, a bit more feeling. I do think your context, where you're working, who you're working with, what's happening in your life, can change how you show up. And what this does is it tracks it. So I can look, has my profile changed since I last took this? And the fourth reason I like it is I think this works really nicely in teams. So I did this years ago with a team. I mean, I think maybe like 15 years ago, I've got loads of profiles on here. And we as a team mapped our profiles. And I had quite a large team at the time. And it really helped me to see where I'd got gaps. Because I don't know, maybe I'd hired people who were quite a similar profile, or maybe I'd inherited a team of quite similar people. I can't quite remember what had led to it now. But what I could really clearly see, because it takes the 16 personalities, it then puts them into sort of four subgroups, four groups of four. And I had everybody in one subgroup. So basically I had 25% of the profiles recognised in my team and a glaring gap with a lack of diversity in other people's strengths and approaches. And I found that was a really interesting team moment to sort of see and recognise that. So yeah, that is my pitch for why I like 16 personalities as a profiler. Well, if you're looking for other, there are lots on strengths, actually, I would say. If you're thinking also a bit more about just self-awareness, just personality, there are quite a few profiles all based on like the big five personality traits. And that one does have the most academic research base, I think, not being an expert, but from what I could see when I was going through it, it's the one that kind of keeps coming back to... Have you got the URL? Yes, for one of the ones that is. It's like a version that's free. OK. So there's loads of versions that have all been built around this kind of big five personality traits that we kind of all have. So if you're just starting from, like, who am I? Which I think is a good question. That can be one of the questions. Who am I? Well, I think if your profile question is who am I, like a personality one I think is useful. What are my strengths is quite different to, like, who am I? Who am I will probably also start to get you into values. I think one of the other watchouts when I was just listening to you then and hearing you read those words out, you know, sort of the whole, how much you sort of, like a horoscope, you know, you read it and you're like, oh, of course I'm that. You know, like you sort of overly agree with it, because you just go, yeah, I'll take a bit of that. You almost like match it up, even if it's not true. So I think even when I was listening to you describe those things, I was like, well, that just, that doesn't feel like Helen for me. Well, that feels maybe a bit like Helen. I think that's the skill though, right? So I think it is taking your answers, it's telling you based on those answers, these are the strengths and weaknesses associated with it. And I think the skill then is then your own self-reflection. Like I can go, I'm like, protagonist is not, I would never use that word. It just doesn't feel like me at all. But then there are some things in there that I do identify with. And then that might be a, okay, I should get some feedback on that, because is that like perceived or realised in my work? And I don't think any of them are a solution to self-awareness. No. I think they are a shortcut to getting started. Like it's like, and it's like, it's all of those, you just take what you want from them and use it, have a conversation, get some feedback, get someone else to take the profile and see how it compares. Yeah. And I do think like we have within our team used insights, which is the colour one. And individually, I didn't find it that helpful, but that's probably because I've done these things lots of times before. But to your point, I find it really helpful to see where we all were as a team. And probably what I found most useful was I really remember we did a day and you couldn't come because you were having an operation. But actually what was most helpful was hearing people talk about it for themselves. So, you know, it's, it was almost what it's, the conversations it sparked. So whether someone was like a green or yellow or whatever, but it was more than what people then chose to share or whether people were just like, this is exactly me. And I always want jobs where I'm like supporting other people or whatever. You know, it was the, what you then hear from people. I felt like I knew people much better after that day. Like I also, it's really, you know, like you have memorable, we always talk about, you have memorable moments when you're running a company. That day, despite you not being there, because actually part of the reason it was memorable was also because you weren't there. So like we, I missed having you there. But I do remember feeling like a sense of connection with the team that I hadn't felt before. And that came from that, you know, and because it was sort of, you know, almost like as long as it's useful enough and then as long as there's some good things that kind of come from it. And I remember like that, I felt like the team also understood me better. Yeah. Because that day it was very clear that my profile was very unusual and quite weird. And I think honestly, I could see some of the team being like, well, but also even having like a bit of a, oh, okay, this is like, she's, that's why she's sort of maybe sometimes quite unusual or does things a bit differently. Because that profile quite interestingly looks at what you're like at work and what you're like at home. And whether you're like the same or whether things change and like how dynamic your profile is, like your profile has like zero change, right? You're... Helen, I'm just yellow everywhere. You're always Helen. You are yellow. Like I am yellow. It is my identity. Whereas my profile shifts really dramatically. Yeah. It's quite unusual. And then again, you know, like it's almost the conversations over coffee that are fascinating. Yeah, maybe like that's a filter, isn't it as well? Like, is it something that A, maybe helps you learn something about yourself you didn't know, or what's the point? Can it lead to a conversation, which is, I think is useful, could be in a team or with a mentor or a manager or something. And is it something that you could come back to? Yeah. I think there's additional value when it's something you can come back to over time. Well, back to those questions, if I was thinking, how can I connect more with the people I work with or how do I understand more about who I'm working with? Something like the coloured insights, you're like, no, it created connection and I understood more. It was very well facilitated for us, like we sort of didn't do it ourselves. So we invested in that. And it did, I'm like, oh, it did deliver on those things. Do I think it's then led to that action beyond it, to your point? I'm like, not really, but that's also down to us. But we do talk about it. I think we do like, oh, that's because that person kind of likes to communicate in that way and yeah. But probably like, again, it's how you keep it a bit more alive. Shall we talk about our Squiggly Skills Profiler? Yes, and why we've done it. So we have created the Squiggly Careers Skills Profiler and the reason that we wanted to do this, I think also, I think we've got to like this sort of, this sort of tipping point with Squiggly Careers where we, you know, people read our work and listen and they make decisions with their development. I think it's a real responsibility for us and now there's a very big Squiggly Careers community. And what we want to do is make it really, really easy for people to take action with their development. We're always, Sarah and I are always balancing awareness and action. So we want people to learn more about themselves and then we want people to take action as nothing ever changes with their development. And so the reason we've created this Squiggly Careers Skills Profiler is both individually and as a team that will come to, you're able to answer a set of questions. Like it takes you, I don't know, five minutes, ten minutes if you really want to think them through. Though we guide you to just go with your first thoughts. So it's five minutes and what it will help you to do is to first of all, see your Squiggly Careers super skill, which, you know, something you should definitely be proud of. It's not, it's not easy to, you know, have confidence as a super skill. That's brilliant if that's you. Well, thank you. I love it, I love it. If that's you, brilliant. And so you want to be really proud of your super skills, but then it will also tell you your gap for growth. And whilst, whilst all skills are equally important for your career, they're not always equally important at the same time. And so we do want people to focus on the thing that might make the biggest difference to development right now. And it gives you that insight and it helps you take action. So what question do you think our profiler will help people to answer? Every question. Every single question you ever have with your career. Maybe, but I actually think if you, if your question is, how can I have more control over my career development? Or how do I take control? Like a control-based, I want control, I don't know how to do it. I think our profiler will help you because it prioritises the skill that you need to focus on for your squiggly career and it gives you the actions you need to take. Yeah, I also wonder whether, you might not be feeling out of control, but you know, if you're thinking, you know, like we know loads of people feel stuck and you're just like, well, how do I continually learn? How do I continually improve my squiggly career? Because we know from the people who've tested it so far, about a thousand people in sort of the first week and we're, we'll make it better all the time based on all of your feedback. So please tell us like how you get on. People really liked the, and they still continue to like the begin by then try actions. So it's almost like the so what-ness of what people are finding is like, okay, so what could I actually do now? Thanks to you and your begin by then try videos. That was a lot of videos I've recorded. We wanted to be really personalized. So depending on the actions that you take, you get a different set of, you get a different set of actions, depending on your answers. And then you get a different video that took with me talking it through. That was a very busy day in the office. Yeah, a lot of videos of people. And you can either watch the videos, which you should, because Helen put a lot of effort into them, or you can read it. We have, we have written them too. And so I think, yeah, if that feels kind of helpful for you, I think the profiler will give you, yeah, a pretty, a pretty quick view, but then when you start to get into the report, I think that's when it becomes more personal and more personalized. And if you do the team view, I find the team view particularly helpful, probably because we've done quite a lot of work on self-awareness. So that was actually never my starting point because our team view was fascinating. So we did loads of test team views while we were actually testing the tech. So then we had to like wipe all of those and then actually say to team, please, can you, can you actually just, can you actually do it properly? Because our team, to your point on one of the previous teams that you've led, isn't particularly balanced. So almost everybody's like super skill is values. So maybe you think, well, you're going to get a skew because of the sorts of, sort of company that you are, how you work, like what you stand for. So maybe you attract values-based people, people who've kind of thought about their values. But then also our gap for growth was very consistent across the team. I have to say, neither of these were mine, but I was like the one outlier. As ever, was possibilities. And actually, like that really, it has actually really made me reflect because I think there's both, how do you use the kind of super skill to our advantage as a team? I don't want to ignore that. So for things like values, actually, how can we make more of it? I was thinking, oh, how could we add it into things like our clarity creator conversations? Like you want to, it's a good thing. You don't want to skip straight to like the gap. You want to go, let's think about the advantages of being a values-based team. And then I was thinking about the possibilities. I was thinking, well, I don't want, it will increase people's career risk and decrease their resilience if their possibilities are low. And we advocate for squiggly careers. And so, I'm like, oh, okay, that actually really matters to me. And so I was thinking about things like, right, okay, maybe that looks like some fast upskilling of what we think are our best tried and tested possibility tools and techniques. Like we have scanning, spotting, scoping. Again, I mentioned that to one of our team last week and they didn't know what those were. And I think sometimes I take it for granted because we share those with companies all the time. I'm like, well, surely our team are doing those things. But actually, she'd not even heard of the framing. And of course, people, it turns out not everyone has memorized the squiggly career book. Not everyone has memorized every idea we've ever come up with. But obviously, we're incredibly close to them. Or it could be things like my other idea was encouraging everybody to have one curious career conversation every month outside of our team, which our team would be too small to all talk to each other all the time anyway. But then maybe we're sharing it on teams to go, oh, who's yours been with? Like, what did you learn? Oh, that's so interesting. And they might not be the right ideas, but it definitely, because I saw that team profile, my head really quickly went to actions that we would want to take in terms of how we work together. And it does give you the actions to be clear. You don't have to be like, Sarah's gone beyond. Sarah's gone beyond. That's surely my job. Yeah, it's gone beyond. It's like, I've done all these. And the report that you get will give you the actions for your team. I was just listening to you there thinking that for people that have already invested in our work, as in the book books, I think this is quite a good shortcut. It's quite a good reminder because if I think, gosh, if I think about, if you were to count the amount of tools that we put, we've written three books. I think Lobster alone's got, what, over a hundred? Yeah. There's quite a few different ideas for action. And I love that because there's loads to try out. But actually what I think this could do is help prioritize a little bit because we pick the ones that are, like, begin by then try, the ones that are the easiest to get started with and the ones that are a little bit more stretching. And if you've got loads of our books and you're like, oh, where do I start? I'm trying to work our way through them. I think it's probably quite a good filter for action. Well, we will always keep it free. Certainly this version won't go anywhere. The other thing that you can do, and we do have it in the reports, but just like top tips for people to really make the most of this. Again, if I was designing this and I'm like, right, I am going to make the most. I'm going to really sweat squiggly careers. What have they done that's free? Because we know in lots of companies, in lots of teams, you can't always get investment, external investment. You can't, you don't always have the cash to like do extra things. You could do the profiler first. Then you could do the squiggly skills sprint times AI. So you could do that like, and that would build kind of really nicely. And then you could go, right, we're going to listen to the podcast, read the book. But in the report, you get links to learn from. So there is read, watch and listen to, which again, none of that, I mean, maybe it's obvious, but none of that report is AI generated. It is all written by me or you. Or like, well, all the videos are clearly you. And like we wrote every single one of those statements, we've made the decision about what we're going to recommend. And so we've really also tried to create, I guess like a flow of learning that doesn't just feel like you do a profiler and then that's it, which we've tried to sort of, I suppose, connect the squiggly dots between like other things that we've done. So I think you could create your own little squiggly curriculum now that wouldn't actually cost you anything, hopefully. That makes me happy. That makes me happy. I hope that like squiggly skills can go far. What was your, as you said, what I said that mine was confidence. So my strength was values, which actually did not surprise me. Again, that's the point that we know this, like I really feel the way that the scoring is broken down is that you have some sort of, for each skill there's some questions around awareness, like your level of awareness of the skill, and then some questions around action. And I am very aware of my values and I regularly take action with them. So I kind of knew that would probably come out. What was your gap? Networking, actually. Oh, me too. Ah, and I think probably if I think of like, what is that gap? Probably just a bit of sameness. I think I'm probably not, when I think about some of the questions I was answering, I think probably could do more to bring in a bit of difference into my networking and just probably could just prioritise it a little bit more. I spend time with lots of people I like. And sort of going over and above and looking for different voices is probably something I could do more. Yeah. And it's hard, right? Whatever your gap is, if it was easy, you probably would have done it already. But I do think it's interesting because I am an extrovert, so people probably, I'm extrovert, I'm quite visible, so people probably assume that networking is a super skill, but networking is a skill and just being an extrovert and somebody who shares on LinkedIn does not mean that, does not mean that you're really, really owning that skill in the context of your career. So I find that quite useful. And maybe, as we said, I actually do think your squiggly skills will change. You know, like there are some profiles I think do stay quite constant and that's a good thing, like your values stay quite consistent typically. I wonder whether with this, you know, if you took it in six months, even in a year, whether it would be the same or not, because I do think you can't do all of this all at the same time. Well, I actually think with career change as well, I think part of the reason my values are so high is because I can, I can talk about them every day with people because I have high trust and it's part of our company culture, but you put me in a different organisation and that skill might feel constrained in a way that it doesn't today. And we had some people, so we've started to see on LinkedIn, people like sharing their super skill, which is great and you get the lovely squiggly gif. And a few people were saying, oh, possibilities is my gap for growth, but I've just started a new job. And I'm like, of course it is. You know, like if you've just started, if you're brand new into a job, your focus area is probably not going to be on expanding your possibilities right here, right now. If in a year's time, 18 months time, it's still the bottom one. You might start to go, okay, but I do want to keep opportunities or options open or those kinds of things. But I sort of trust, I think our community are, they can make that, you know, like the context connection of going, okay, you've quite quickly gone to, well, it's not that I'm bad at networking because you're clearly not, but you're like, oh, but I've fallen into a bit of a- As a skill, I could stretch it. Yeah, as a skill, you could stretch it. Same for me, like when I looked at networking, I was like, oh, it's not that my networking is a disaster. It's just that I think I am sometimes just not intentional enough about prioritizing it. And I will definitely do other things, you know, because it's not, because actually I'm not naturally as good at it as you are. If I've got a choice, if it's like this or networking, in whatever way I'm framing networking, this always wins or always. So it actually reminded me back to the, I am better at networking when I do it with someone else because it's like a forcing function for me, which is quite a helpful thing. You know, like, oh, we are going to meet some different people, but I'm going with, I need to be one person for me, but I'm going with one other person. And I got quite good for a bit, like doing that, being like, well, I want to go to this, but I'm too scared. So who could come with me? And then, cause they're coming, I'm like, oh, okay, well, I'll go to that now. Or being part of a community, being like, oh, is there someone I know? I could also invite along with me. I suppose there's some of the nuances as well that come out in conversation, right? So we are not, that our profile doesn't tell you that, but your reflection and a conversation is where that happens. We also haven't said squigglyskills.com. I was like, we haven't told people where they can get their profiler. Yes, hopefully Google works, right? Hopefully, yeah. We will obviously put all the links in the pod sheet, but squigglyskills.com is the link for you to get started with your profiler. And then if you did want to do it as a team, which we would definitely recommend, there's some really easy instructions about how you can do that. And if you do have any fast feedback, I think we see it as, or I see it, let's see if Helen sees it the same way. I see it as a strong version one. Do you see it as a strong version one? Yeah, I'd love to start building it. I've already, like we've already talked about a couple of ideas of like, but I think our team are like, let it live for a little bit. Yes, for at least, well, more than one week. Yeah, more than one week before we change it. But yeah, I think your feedback is hugely valuable. And so if you take it and you love it, then like email us, Helen and Sarah at squigglycareers.com and share. Sarah mentioned your like squiggly super skill, you get a gift. Please share that and tag us in your posts. If you take it and you're like, oh, I've got some reflections or some questions. Also let us know those, just email us, because we are definitely creating a little bank of how do we continue to build and develop this so that it's even more useful for people. And I'd also love to hear from you if you have got any kind of profiler or diagnostic where you're like, this is brilliant because it's helped me with this question. Definitely email those across to us because we can include it, particularly if it's free in resources for people because we are always looking to sort of share things that are kind of helpful in lots of different ways. But that's everything for this week. I hope you enjoy kind of trying out and having a play with those profilers. I'm back with you again soon. Bye for now. Bye everyone.