Hi Reader,

A few months ago, I sat with a senior engineering leader — sharp, self-aware, running a large org inside a big tech company — and walked him through his GC Index profile.

He looked at his results for about a minute and went straight to the lowest number. Four scores high, one sitting at a 3. And he did what almost everyone does the first time. He pointed at the 3 and asked me how to fix it.

I didn't answer that. It's the wrong question.

The GC Index doesn't measure how good you are at things. It measures your energy — where your contribution naturally goes, and what it costs you to sustain.

There are five kinds:

Game Changer — energy for invention, for new ideas and directions.

Strategist — energy for making sense of things, turning patterns into clarity and focus.

Implementer — energy for turning plans into action and getting things finished.

Polisher — energy for standards and quality, making good things better.

Play Maker — energy for people, for getting the best out of everyone toward something shared.

Most of us run strong on two or three and lighter on the rest. A low score just shows where you have less natural energy.

Now the interesting part.

He'd been trying to build an engineering community inside his organization for months. He'd thought about it, shaped it, refined the idea — and launched none of it.

He was sure this was an execution problem. His low Implementer, right on cue.

But that wasn't it. The real problem was his Polisher — one of his strongest energies. It kept reaching for excellent. He hadn't defined who the community was for or what it was meant to solve, so the Polisher had no target to measure against. So he kept going in circles and never launched.

What finally moved things was his Play Maker energy. He has a wide network of managers. So — go talk to them, find out where they're actually stuck, let the need come from real people. Once he knows that, the Polisher has something concrete to aim at, and the whole thing gets moving.

By the end, he'd stopped thinking about the 3 entirely.

Here's what I keep seeing. We assume our weakest area is what's holding us back. Oftentimes, it's an overused strength that creates the roadblock. And because it's a strength — something we're good at, something we get praised for — it's the last place we think to look.

If you want to understand what's actually stopping you from reaching your goal, here's the link to book your own GC Index assessment:

And if you want to know more, hit reply with your questions. I read them all.

See you next week.

Daria

P.S. Most of interesting conversations start on my podcast, Built by People Leaders, where HR and people leaders tell me what AI adoption actually looks like on the ground. Worth a listen if this is live for you right now.

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