Somewhere near the top of the pile of books I am slowly getting around to reading is Linchpin by Seth Godin. The premise of the book, from what I hear in interviews with Seth and the interwebs chatter is how to be indispensable. I’ve enjoyed several of Seth’s earlier books, and I’m intrigued by this topic. When employment seems more fleeting than it has ever been in our collective life memories, creating a favorable differentiation for yourself can be critical to career success.
Several notable personalities have done their own brief interviews for Seth about how important it is to be a linchpin or how to be indispensable. Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO of the Acumen Fund, gives this short explanation of how she recognizes indispensable people. This is a great short summary of individual and organizational leadership. Jacqueline talks about some of the same concepts that other intelligence professionals and I have been discussing, namely the ability of organizations to recognize new realities, experiment, iterate, tolerate risk and mistakes with the appropriate accountability and capablity to learn from smart mistakes.
