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When I was learning to play bass, my first teacher told me, Find your groove and stay in it. As a musician, that meant discovering the rhythm that allowed me to lock in with the drummer so the rest of the band could shine. Years later, as a consultant and culture architect, I realized the same principle applies to productivity: Each of us has a groovea natural style of workingthat, once discovered, allows us to perform at our best. The challenge is that most professionals attempt to replicate productivity systems that dont align with their brains natural rhythm. They read about a CEO waking up at 4 a.m. or a time-blocking hack and feel frustrated when it doesnt work for them. Thats like asking a jazz saxophonist to practice like a classical pianist. Both are musicians, but their artand their brainsrequire different approaches. Neuroscience supports this. Research on brain plasticity reveals that each of us develops distinct cognitive strengths and energy patterns based on our experiences and genetic wiring. In other words, your productivity style is as unique as your fingerprint. Leaders who thrive are those who learn to recognize, honor, and harness their styleand then build teams that groove together like a jazz ensemble. The Four Productivity Styles Over the course of decades working with leaders, teaching project portfolio management, and performing music, Ive identified four broad productivity styles. Think of them as sections of an orchestra: Each contributes differently, and the magic happens when they play in harmony. The Disciplined Virtuoso (Focus & Discipline)These are your practice room professionals. Like Prince, who mastered 27 instruments through relentless repetition, they thrive on structure, consistency, and clear goals. The Creative Shape-Shifter (Reinvention & Innovation)Think David Bowie or the Beatles. These individuals thrive when they can reinvent themselves, innovate, and question the status quo. The Resilient Improviser (Experimentation & Recovery)Modeled after jazz legends like John Coltrane, this style thrives in uncertain times. They treat challenges as improvisational prompts, seeing them as opportunities to adapt and grow. The Collaborative Conductor (Collaboration & Vulnerability)Like Beyoncé, who builds a powerhouse creative team, these leaders excel at orchestrating others. Their groove is creating safe, trust-filled environments where collective brilliance emerges. Each style can lead to extraordinary resultsbut only if you work with it rather than against it. Why Knowing Your Style Matters Failing to identify your productivity style is like ignoring the bass in a songit leaves everything else hollow. Heres why it matters: Energy Alignment: When you work in harmony with your natural groove, tasks that once felt like mountains become more like your favorite tune. Reduced Burnout: A Kronos study found 95% of HR leaders believe burnout is sabotaging retention. Misaligned productivity approaches are a silent culprit. Team Synergy: Just as an orchestra needs strings, winds, brass, and percussion, organizations need a mix of productivity styles. Strategic Clarity: The most successful companies, from Apple to Walgreens, found their hedgehog concept by aligning passion, capability, and economic engine. Individuals must do the same with their productivity. How to Find Your Productivity Style Think of this as a discovery processnot unlike learning to play music by ear. Heres a framework I use (inspired by my Productivity Smarts podcast and methodology): Identify Peak Energy Hours Track your energy for a week. Virtuosos often peak early; shape-shifters may find evenings more generative. Map Motivational Triggers Do you thrive on checklists or freedom? Pay attention to when you feel in flow. Replay Your Work History Look at past projects. Were you most engaged when innovating, executing, adapting, or collaborating? Run a Jam Session Try tasks outside your default style for a week. Notice whether they energize or drain you. Seek Feedback Ask colleagues what they see as your strengths. Others often notice patterns you miss. Turning Style Into Strength Discovering your productivity style is only the first step. The real magic comes when you apply it with intention: Design Your Environment Like a StudioVirtuosos thrive with tidy desks and project management tools. Shape-shifters may need whiteboards and inspiration boards to help them visualize their ideas. Improvisers benefit from safe sandbox spaces. Conductors need open collaboration zones. Build Your Productivity ParthenonIn my book, Productivity Smarts, I describe the Parthenon as a metaphor for enduring productivity. Each pillarFocus, Innovation, Experimentation, Collaborationmust be represented. Your style shows which pillar is strongest and which requires partners. Sync With the BandProductivity is not a solo act. Leaders should intentionally compose teams with a mix of styles. Thats how you avoid the all-drummers problemlots of noise, no melody. Use Neuroscience to Hack Your GrooveNeuroscience tells us emotion, novelty, and stories enhance memory and performance. If youre a Virtuoso, add novelty breaks. Shape-shifters should ground ideas in stories. Improvisers should embed recovery rituals. Conductors should practice emotional intelligence to deepen trust. Make Decisions Like a Jazz SoloistIn my book A Symphony of Choices, I wrote that effective decision-making is about striking a balance between structure and freedom. Let your style guide not only how you work but what you choose to work on. When Styles Collide I once consulted with a federal agency IT department that was paralyzed. Projects were late, innovation was flat, and morale was low. After assessments, we realized the leadership team was composed almost entirely of virtuosos. They were masters of execution but resistant to improvisation. We introduced shape-shifters and improvisers into the project management leadership pipeline, pairing them with virtuosos in co-lead roles. The result? Innovation flourished, risks were managed, and execution remained strong. Within two years, their project delivery rate improved by 35%, and employee engagement scores jumped. The lesson: When you know your style, you not only work better, you know who to partner with to fill your gaps. Action Plan: Finding Your Groove Heres a simple five-step plan you can use tomorrow: Take Inventory: Track when you feel most energized. Label Your Style: Decide whether youre primarily a virtuoso, shape-shifter, improviser, or conductor. Align Your Calendar: Schedule high-value tasks during your peak windows. Curate Your Ensemble: Partner with colleagues whose styles complement yours. Review Weekly: Ask, Did I honor my style? Did I balance it with others? Why This Matters Now We live in what Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez calls the Project Economy: a world where most of our work is structured as projects with clear outcomes and stakes. In this environment, productivity isnt about doing more; its about doing what matters most in harmony with how your brain works. Leaders who ignore this reality will continue to fight burnout, disengagement, and wasted resources. Leaders who embrace it will unlock resilience, creativity, and sustainable high performance. Closing Note: Play Your Part When I play in a jazz ensemble, no one asks the bassist to sound like the trumpet or the drums. My job is to provide the groove that makes the whole band sound better. Productivity is the same. Your style doesnt need to match anyone elses. It needs to be yoursand when you play it well, others will find their groove alongside you. Your brain already has a productivity style. Its time to discover, honor, and utilize it. Because in the great symphony of work, the world doesnt need more noise. It requires your unique music.
Category:
E-Commerce
Most personal branding advice assumes youre one thing. But what if youre not? What if youre a strategist and an artist, a CEO and a musician, a parent and a community builder? For leaders who live at these intersections, the advice to pick a lane can feel suffocating. I know this tension firsthand. My own path has spanned finance, strategy, leadership development, writing, and creating art. Initially, I worried that showcasing this diversity would appear disjointed. Over time, I realized that my multidimensionality isnt a liability; its part of my brand. The question isnt How do I simplify myself? Its How do I integrate my many identities into a coherent, compelling story? Why This Matters Research shows multidimensionality is more commonand more valuablethan ever. A recent McKinsey study found that half of American professionals now identify with more than one career identity, often blending side hustles with traditional roles. Meanwhile, the Harvard Business Review reports that leaders earn more trust when they reveal dimensions beyond technical skillsuch as creativity, vulnerability, and even hobbies. And as Reid Hoffman and Ben Casnocha argue in The Startup of You, the most resilient brands are those that adapt, iterate, and broadcast a multidimensional story. The challenge? If you dont actively design your personal brand, the world will do it for you, and it will often default to the narrowest version of you. Examples of Multidimensional Branding Done Right Too often, leaders feel pressure to pick one defining trait: strategist, innovator, operator. But the most resonant brands are those that embrace complexity. Here are some well-known examples of multidimensional personal brands that have gotten it right. Bozoma Saint John: The former CMO at Netflix and Uber has a brand that stands for more than marketing expertise. She weaves her identity as a Ghanaian-American, a fashion icon, and a champion for diversity into her professional story. That integration has made her one of the most recognizable CMOs in the world, known as much for her bold presence and narrative as for her marketing results. Lin-Manuel Miranda: A creator who fuses theater, history, and hip hophis brand isnt playwright but storyteller across genres. Reshma Saujani: The founder of Girls Who Code is also a lawyer, advocate, and author. Her personal brand is built on a throughline of bravery in the face of imperfection that ties her varied pursuits together. These leaders didnt collapse themselves into one lane. Instead, they built brands around the connective tissue of their pursuits. A Framework: The Three Cs of Multidimensional Branding So how do you put this into practice? When I work with leaders, I use a framework inspired by The Startup of You to help them embrace, not erase, their complexity. Clarify Your Throughline. Whats the connective idea across your roles? Maybe its expanding access, bridging art and science, or helping people reimagine whats possible. This becomes the anchor of your brand. Curate Your Narrative. Not every role needs equal airtime. Instead of a laundry list, craft a story arc. Example: I started in finance, which gave me analytical rigor. I layered in strategy and biotech, which taught me the importance of scale and innovation. Today, I bring that foundation into leadership development, blending structure with creativity. Communicate Across Contexts. Your brand isnt staticit flexes depending on the audience. On LinkedIn, you can highlight your leadership coaching skills. On your podcast, your identity as a connector and storyteller comes to the forefront. Consistency lies in tone and values, not identical messaging. Together, these steps ensure your brand reflects your wholeness, not just one polished fragment. Practical Tips for Leaders Building a Multidimensional Brand Frameworks are powerful, but they only come alive when translated into daily practice. Many leaders nod along to the idea of integration over simplification, but then get stuck when it comes to LinkedIn headlines, bios, or introductions at networking events. The gap between knowing and doing can make multidimensional branding feel abstract and intangible. Thats why it helps to start small with practical, repeatable actions that align your external signals with your internal story. These arent about over-engineering your brand. Theyre about cultivating habits that make your complexity relatable and memorable. Here are four ways to put multidimensional branding into action: Audit your brand signals. Google yourself, review your LinkedIn headline, and ask: Does this reflect all the sides of me that matter most now? Experiment in public. Post about a project outside your main lane. When I first began sharing my artwork alongside my leadership insights, I was surprised by how strongly it resonated with them. That integration signaled more authenticity than adhering to a single professional script ever could. Borrow language from others. Listen closely to how colleagues describe you. The phrases that recur often point to your authentic differentiators. Tell stories, not resumes. People remember narratives of how you moved between worlds, not a bullet list of achievements. The old model of branding said: be consistent by being narrow. The new model says: be consistent by being authentic. You dont need to shrink yourself to be relatable; you need to integrate yourself to be memorable. So, ask yourself: Whats the throughline that ties together my many identities? How can I share my story in a way that feels both multidimensional and coherent? Because in an era where disruption is constant and roles are fluid, the leaders who thrive wont be the ones who fit a mold. Theyll be the ones who embody the power of andand in doing so, expand what leadership itself can look like.
Category:
E-Commerce
Five years ago, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong did a bold thing. He banned political conversations at work. He made this decision because he knows what the job of a business leader is: to deliver for customers, employees, and shareholders. More recently, another executive did the opposite. Jerry Greenfield of Ben & Jerrys fame left the company as part of a row with its parent company over social activism. For Greenfield, political stances are not just part of the company; they ultimately outweigh everything else. This stark difference is very instructive at this time. Amid Americas rising polarization, what stance should businesses take? Many people who think of themselves as social justice activists criticized Armstrong and praised Greenfield. But in reality, for society, Armstrong showed the kind of leadership America desperately needs. The degradation of public discourse is corrosive to society and individual well-being. It might be the greatest social challenge we face today. Government leaders are, all too often, exacerbating this. But businesses canand mustbring Americans together. Years of research have proven this. Studies of intergroup contact theory find that when people work across differences and focus on common goals, they build much greater understanding. Workplaces are often the main places in which this happens, and they benefit from greater cooperation and collaboration. By recognizing how interpersonal trust, the foundation of teamwork, is primarily formed in our workplaces through acknowledgement, respect, and relating, as well as by modeling trustful behaviors, team leaders can manage political discourse,” a 2023 study on political polarization found. They can also “acknowledge the good, and refocus on the mission, culture, and goals that united us in the first place, before polarization became so pronounced. How is this done? Should companies take stands on controversial issues or avoid them? When a stand is taken, will that create an echo chamber of aligned social warriors that alienates the nonaligned? Unite around meaning Businesses must create environments in which people do their best work. Employee engagement drives productivityand its all about how people feel about work. Yes, in this data-driven world, feelings still matter more. Leaders should build cultures that make people feel excitement and connection over shared aims. Decades ago, President John F. Kennedy confronted a perceived threat from Russia, and raging controversies in America about what to do. He responded by motivating people to share a dream of U.S. astronauts making it to the moon. That dream was so compelling that it was faithfully delivered seven years after JFKs assassination. The lesson: focus on big goals and build camaraderie around what it takes to achieve them. Business leaders must set up moonshot aspirations. Lay out what it takes for the organization to get there. Make that the driving force of daily operations. Build focus amid overstimulation Anthropologist Grant McCracken talks about todays culture being concussive. People have so much coming at them at all times that theyre distracted and often triggered. They feel overwhelmed just by being alive. The pervasive complaint of overwhelm is a symptom of this condition. An absolutely essential job of a leader today is to deliberately and methodically pull people out of that morass of overstimulation. Make work the place in which people derive a sense of meaning from achievements that become core to their identity. Create an environment in which they take pride in work well done and beautifully executed. This happens when leaders make clear what the purpose of the enterprise is. That purpose must override everything else. So a leader should ask: Are we in the business of creating the funkiest, most creative ice cream on earth, at scale? If that’s the purpose, then everything else comes second. You dont divide the company, customers, workforce, corporate partners, suppliers, or anyone else over issues outside that purpose. Over the years, I have noticed that the happiest people I know are a bit obsessed with their work; they find meaning and joy in what they do. The CEOs job is to foster this environment. One where a sense of purpose and meaning comes from being part of an organization larger than themselves, and where it is clear to everyone what the relevant beliefs, mindsets, and mental models are. At its core, the job of culture is to find that which unites people. With political extremism and violence endangering Americas future, the nation needs workplaces to step up. There, leaders can create clear, positive cultures, capture peoples attention, and help them rediscover what its like to come together.
Category:
E-Commerce
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