All change is not growth, and all movement is not forward.

Ellen Glasgow

I was talking with a new Change Makers participant earlier this week. He’s just started the programme. I asked him “How do you want to grow in this programme?”

“Well, my weakness is that I talk too much. I need to learn to shut up, let others speak, and listen.”

Fair enough.

But he answered a different question.

He answered the question “What do you want to get better at?”

I asked, “How do you want to grow?”

They’re two different questions (ha - that much is clear!)

I asked him the question again, in a different way.

“What limits do you want to overcome?”

That got him thinking. After some thought, he replied, “I’d like to let go of the need to take control all the time, and feel more comfortable in my skin by being someone who adds value by allowing others to take the lead.”

Can you see the difference in the quality of his two answers?

His first answer was about improving a perceived weakness.

His second was about transcending limits.

I’ll explain further:

“What do you want to get better at?” suggests that you’re not as good at something as you’d like. It speaks to a ‘gap’ between current reality and perfection. Or, as in his case, a perceived weakness of some sort. That question typically invites a response about improving skills or behaviour.

“How do you want to grow?” and its sister question “What limits do you want to overcome?” have a different intent. They speak to the potential to expand your perspective of what’s possible. To see an issue in a new, more nuanced way. They don’t speak to a gap. Instead, they speak to a broader field of possibility to operate in. 

If we use Nick Petrie’s cup metaphor, “What do you want to get better at?” is about filling the cup with new skills and tools. “How do you want to grow?”, and “What limits do you want to overcome?” and about growing the capacity of the whole cup.

The research is clear: leaders, leadership teams, and organisational cultures with ‘bigger cups’ are far more effective at operating in complexity. They’re more adaptable, more resilient, and make wiser choices.

Yet most leadership programmes exist to try to answer the question “What do you want to get better at?” When what we need, more than ever, are solutions that answer the other set of questions.

In a fast-moving, ever-evolving world, “What do you want to get better at?” isn’t enough of a question. We also need to ask, and answer, “How do you want to grow?” and “What limits do you want to overcome?”. And we need ways to help that growth to occur, and those limits to be transcended.

If you want to get above endless loops and wasted efforts, and instead truly rise to the challenge, start by asking those other two questions.

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