The act of self management requires a change in cultural capacity. The art of building capacity has three aspects worth considering.
The first aspect is historical and involves collective capacity, build on the belief that you can’t know where you are going without being consciously and critically aware of where you have been. Grounding in historical understanding and critical awareness provides a solid anchor and tether point as you move forward.
The second aspect is social. Unless social capacity for holding open and non-positional conversations is intentionally developed old behaviours and patterns will continue to get in the way of new opportunities. These include our tendency to move to either judgment, agreement or personal story. These habitual behaviours contribute to superficial understanding and run contrary to the goal of collaboration, which, is to build habits that seek first to understand.
The third aspect is individual and reflects the belief that human capacity is maximized when engagement is driven by individual interest and talents. Studies in positive psychology indicate that happiness and productivity increase when people work to their areas of strength particularly when in pursuit of goals beyond self interest.