We all have blind spots and ego distortions… To others, our blind spots and ego distortions are often... blindingly obvious!

By Duncan Anderson. To see all blogs click here.

Reading time: 5 mins

Summary: 

• IMO we all have blind spots and ego distortions. Finding out about them is IMO one key strategy to not living a bad life. 

• IMO you should do formalised feedback at work every 6 months. I often believe the simpler and more flexible the better (if you are doing a job that has not been done before you can’t really know how to do it and as such have a high confidence development plan). 

• How I find feedback feels: 

  • Relative strengths - feedback is energising

  • Relative weaknesses - feedback is draining

  • Blind spots and ego distortions - feedback is shocking! 

Before you ask someone to remove the twig from their eye try removing the log from yours 

• To you, your blind spots and ego distortions are not visible. 

• To others they are often blindingly obvious. 

• Unfortunately these two normally make unhappy bedfellows. 

  • You blissfully going along unaware of doing this counterproductive thing / missing something

  • Others thinking ‘are you serious, why is Duncan doing this!’

• Please don’t assume that others see what you see. In fact, my default is to assume that others don’t see what you see!

The only way to not have new blind spots and ego distortions is to not grow in any way 

• When someone gives you feedback, they are giving a gift. It might be a gift you weren’t expecting, but it is still a gift to help you grow. A gift = an upgrade opportunity (see this blog). 

• IMO if you grow in anyway you’ll:

  • Build new relative strength(s)

  • Build new relative weakness(s)

  • Build new blind spot(s) and ego distortion(s)

• IMO these come as a parcel. IMO it’s almost impossible to get one without the others. 

• “Every strength is a weakness and every weakness is a strength.” 

• What I find normally happens: New Unit of Ability = 1. New strength + 2. New weakness + 3. New blind spot and ego distortions

• IMO the trick is to grow new ability AND find out and ameliorate weaknesses, blind spots and ego distortions.

• I find when cultivating a new ability the new strength is often known (ie 1st order outcome is clear) but that the accompanying new weakness, blind spot and ego distortion is unknown (2nd order outcome is unclear). Boo! 

Knowledge is power… to build cool things and get yourself into trouble! 

• The higher knowledge you have the higher your ability to build abstractions that make logical internal sense but ultimately do not reflect reality - ie that create blind spots and ego distortions.

• If you don’t scale your methods for finding blind spots and ego distortions as you scale your knowledge / abilities IMO you end up being ‘strong weak’... but it’s actually ‘understood strong unknown weak’. This is a bad cocktail! 

• I’ve written about this from another lens in ‘getting high on your own supply / eating your own bullsh1t’. 

How to find blind spots and ego distortions:

• Method 1: do 6 monthly feedback with 3-5x people who work closely with you and have the following sections: 

  • Relative strengths

  • Relative weaknesses

  • Blind spots and ego distortions - just being prepared for this is half of the solution IMO. Knowing you have and will likely always have new blind spots and ego distortions and that you want others to help you find them is IMO half the battle! 

• Method 2: diverse reading (blog coming)

  • You can point out past blind spots and ego distortions you had. 

    • “I’m more proud of the things we didn’t do than the things we did do.” Steve Jobs. 

    • “I’m more proud of the blind spots and ego distortions that I’ve found I used to have than the new abilities I have cultivated.” Duncan Anderson! 

  • You can point out how this new strength / knowledge you have could cause problems! Everything works somewhere, nothing works everywhere. 

  • Effectively seek out alternative viewpoints / schools of thought. IMO if you can’t outline an internally consistent alternative approach to your approach, you have blind spot / ego distortion. 

    • One key way to add value to a different viewpoint is to point out a blind spot / ego distortion (ie missing piece) that when added changes the synthesis.

    • F. Scott Fitzgerald - “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”

• Method 3: building personas and then trying to see how they view the world. 

  • Some fav ones I have: 

    • How would 10 years ago Duncan have approached this and what problems would that have created? 

    • What would 80 year old nursing home Duncan think about this decision? I can miss the big picture but asking this helps me see the bigger picture! 

    • What would mum think? 

    • Where is the overton window on this? Are you off in the fringe and as such will others think this really strange. 

  • If we are talking about teachers:

    • Out of area

    • Traditional

    • High working traditional

    • Innovator 

  • Students:

    • Not motivated

    • Tries but does not succeed

    • Tries and succeeds 

If you look for and have others help you find blind spots and ego distortions you can turn growing your knowledge / abilities from ‘good bad’ to ‘good minimal bad’. If that isn’t catchy then nothing is! 

• Growing without personally consciously looking for blind spots and ego distortions and without having others help point them out to you.

• Growing with personally consciously looking for blind spots and ego distortions and with having others help point them out to you.