Time to find your superpower

I just saw another great 99U presentation by Keith Yamashita from SYPartners. He is a passionate advocate for greatness in the world. As the Chairman of SYPartners, he leads a consulting firm dedicated to helping companies transform at the intersection of business, brand, and culture. SYP’s clients have included the CEOs and leadership teams at Apple, eBay, Gap, IBM, GE, Mercedes-Benz, Nike, The Coca-Cola Company and Yahoo!, among others. The firm has worked on turn-around efforts, leadership development programs, innovation initiatives, and culture-change efforts.

Quite a few things he said during his presentation stuck with me. One of the first things he said was that great creative success is very often not the work of one person, but the result of great teamwork. Artists are often thought of as recluses hiding away in their ivory tower... Actually, quite a lot of great artists work in pairs. Keith mentions Ray and Charles Eames as one of the best examples.

Keith then talks about how you should try to put your team together. And SYPartners is actually finishing up a Superpower Cards system to determine the superpower of each team member. He goes on to say that it would be a waste of time (and money) not to put the right person in the right place in the team: the place where he or she can use his or her unique superpower. Imagine going for a job interview and being asked to "play" the superpower card game. Sound strange? Take a look at the video and you'll probably go searching for these magic cards...

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