In my last article I shared with you the general principles of flow and how to get more of it.  A big part of enjoying more flow is understanding your strengths and how to play to them.   In this article, I am going to share with you the characteristics of one particular personality type – the Dynamo – and would invite you to determine whether or not this is you.   Each type has its strengths and its challenges.  The key to flow, stress resilience and productivity is learning how to be more conscious about what you bring into each activity.  Just because something is not a particular strength, doesn’t mean you can’t do it – it just takes more thought and effort.

So, what is a Dynamo?  They are people who are highly creative, competitive, visionary and goal-driven.  They tend to be more task-focused than people-focused and are great at getting things done.  They tend to be impatient though and dislike being constrained by rules.  If you think you are a Dynamo, you are probably a great starter but need to make sure that you finish things off or have a team that will do that for you.  Otherwise you will have a lot of projects that do not have sufficient ongoing attention to have continuing benefit. 

You are likely to have great intuition and should encourage that while at the same time making sure that your ideas have a strong potential to come to fruition – there is the possibility that your ideas may mean that you start off too many things so be clear about what you want to do and why and what your priorities are.   Then set yourself a timescale and robust implementation plan with the appropriate resources to make things happen.

If you are a Dynamo your fast pace of working is likely to translate into the way you communicate.  You may be to the point, or direct.   To you, this is just an efficient way of communicating.  But to others, it may seem a little too blunt – especially if they are sensitive or more have a more social (rather than task) orientation.   It may also mean that you go too fast for some people to keep up.  This is something to be aware of as it can really hamper your results – few people can go as fast as you do.

It is useful to understand the best way to communicate and delegate to each individual you rely on so that you can get the best from them and so that they stay motivated and are clear about what is expected of them and this will vary depending on their level of skill and motivation.

Because you will tend to see the big picture, it is likely that you will not be so good with detail.  It is hard to avoid detail altogether.  If you have someone reliable to delegate the detail to, so much the better.  Otherwise, it will be a matter of finding the time in the day when you are at your most focused and do the detail then.  Missing out the detail altogether can really affect your results.

In the next of this series of blogs I will be writing about being more productive with less stress by working with your strengths.  If you would like to have a profile so you can really understand yours better sooner, do contact me on  0845 130 0854.

© Tricia Woolfrey 2015