This is the latest from my blog about EA-org-style management, together with Brenton of 80k. You can subscribe on Substack if you like.

Sometimes people review their strengths and weaknesses, and then automatically assume that they should try to improve their weaknesses.

I think that you should at least consider focusing on strengths instead.

Why focus on strengths?

Increasing returns. You can often create a lot of value by becoming excellent at a few important things, and then finding roles that use those strengths. So going from good to great can be worth investing in. This is particularly true if you’re operating in domains with fairly heavy-tailed returns, like research.

Success spirals: It can be more fun and exciting (h/t Daniel Kestenholz) – it’s a more positive endeavour than trying to address your weaknesses: you can lean into your passions, and build a sense that you’re doing a good job overall.

Some weaknesses can be fixed with an exoskeleton (rather than just by building muscle). Even when it seems like a weakness is really holding you back, that doesn’t necessarily mean you should work on improving it. Maybe instead you should try to fill those gaps by shifting responsibilities around. For instance, if you struggle with setting an inspiring vision, maybe you need a co-founder who complements you (obviously not speaking from personal experience here). Or if you are great at writing and a colleague is stronger at product work, can you shift work around appropriately?

(Also, sometimes your weaknesses support your strengths: for instance, I have a theory that some thinkers I respect come up with good ideas in part because they’re not trying to reply to my emails on time (and therefore not very reliable). They take a lot of time going on walks, sketching ideas out on whiteboards, and totally failing to be organized. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.)

Why focus on weaknesses?

Plugging weaknesses could be the right call if:

• It’s hard to disentangle pieces of work that rely on your strengths from tasks that expose your weaknesses. For instance, management often requires both good social skills and decent organization.
• You haven’t tried that hard to develop your weaknesses: sometimes weaknesses are just things you haven’t trained much, and they can become strengths with a small amount of investment. Conversely, be skeptical of trying to improve at something if you’ve tried to improve it in the past and failed to make much progress.
• You’re a generalist: in this case, your strength may be your ability to be flexible and handle almost any task that’s needed. (This is commonly the case for chiefs of staff, entrepreneurs, etc.) If you’re good at 95% of what life throws at you but screw up the remaining 5%, it might be worth addressing that 5% even if it’s fairly-intractable, so that you can jump into any situation and handle it decently.