Like the best of a cat and a dog, it is curiosity and empathy that drives me and my business

Even 2 years into owning my business I still wasn’t 100% sure what it was that really underpinned my desire to start and run Shiageto Consulting; at first I thought it was my passion for solving problems , unleashing my creativity and finding better ways of doing things (as a kid I was obsessed with having the perfect strategy, even with something as simple as playing a board game, I’d constantly replay it just to see if I could find a better way to succeed).

Then I began to think it was actually more about my weird love of meeting as many new people as possible, staying connected with them all (in fact, more specifically, staying in touch with every person I’d ever met, no matter how impossible that might be) and helping each and everyone of them overcome their problems.

With these competing ideas in my head, I would flit between the two on a constant basis; one day I would be certain that my overarching focus was all about optimising things, the next I was certain it was all about people.

It wouldn’t have mattered but I’d read enough of all the management gumpf that talked about ‘finding your What Drives You’ (thanks Simon Sinek, Tony Robbins, and every other one of you fine collection of gurus) and more than that there was something inside of me that really wanted to nail what it was that drove me.

Even when working with a career coach to shape my new company, I found the answer alluded me and was constantly just out of reach. No matter what I did to pin it down, it just wouldn’t land.

Even though I was desperate to understand my ‘What Drives Me’, I parked it and threw myself into shaping a business that instinctively became all about strategy and emotional intelligence; I was super keen to help companies and individuals have a clear end state in mind (whatever they were up to), work out the best way to achieve it and then remove the human problems that stopped them from reaching that vision.

That always seemed simple enough of a concept in my mind (oh, how wrong I was) but to others it wasn’t always intuitive — now, that’s a different blog topic.

As part of building the business I began meeting with as many people as possible and getting stuck into understanding what their challenges were.

I just wanted to know as much as possible and, more often than not, I could clearly see where things were going wrong. As part of this, a plethora of questions would always be at the forefront of my mind whenever I met someone new or reconnected with someone:

• How did you come to be where you are today?
• What is it you really want to achieve?
• What do you like?
• What don’t you like?
• How well do you get on with others?
• What do you think your natural style is?
• What have you already tried doing?
• What is a must have?
• What is definitely off limits for you?
• What is holding you back?
• Why do you think the things you think?
• …

Then there were the questions I’d think to myself:

• Why did they answer the questions in the manner that they answered?
• Why did they list things in the order they listed them?
• Why did they make one choice over another?
• How honest are they with themselves?
• What don’t they know about themselves?
• …

The list goes on and on…

It’s not to say that I would just parrot out these questions as soon as I met someone. I was genuinely interested to know what was going on, forget whether I would get paid to help them with it or not. Without thinking, I would vary the questions I asked out of a natural desire to understand them and their world better; conversations would flow and before I knew it I could really see what their problems were and how I might be able to help.

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Fast forward to recent times: A few weeks ago I was having coffee with a new contact that I had been introduced to; before I knew it I had started with my questions and, in the space of 20 minutes, we were able to land on the specific challenge he was trying to overcome (not the one he initially thought it might be). On playing it back to him, he was thrilled I had helped him structure his thoughts so effectively and said to me:

“What a delightful blend of curiosity and empathy you have! Who would have thought that in such a short space of time you’d get to the heart of my problem. I can certainly see why you set up your business.”

And just like that this fine gentleman had summarised my ‘What Drives Me’. Damn it! If only I’d met him 2 years before, it would have saved me all that soul searching…but at least now I know… and what a pleasure it is too :)

Faris is the CEO and Founder of Shiageto Consulting, an innovative consultancy that helps firms and individuals sharpen their effectiveness. Connect with him here

Success = IQ x EQ x FQ