Ep. 115: David Wray - Accelerating your “Power of Potential” for Business and Personal skills

Contact David Wray:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-w-29627882/


David's Website: https://davidwray.com (*access
David's book and/or blog here)
Want to join David's LinkedIn Group?!
https://www.linkedin.com/company/37817090/


FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPTMitch:
(00:00)
 Welcome back to Count Me In, IMA’s podcast about all things
affecting the accounting and finance world. This is your host
Mitch Roshong and I'm here to welcome you to episode 115 of our
series. Today you will once again hear from finance executive and
a fortune 50 multinational and now new author David Wray. David
is the author of the recently published, The Power of Potential:
A Straightforward Method for Mastering Skills for Personal to
Professional. In 2019, the Harvard business review investigated
where learning and development goes wrong. In his book and during
this podcast episode, David calls for a new mindset and approach
towards acquiring new skills and achieving the level of mastery
desired. Keep listening to hear about his learning approach and
perspective on personal development.

Adam: (00:54)
The Harvard business review in October of 2019 investigated where
learning and development goes wrong. They found that
organizations spend about 360 billion US dollars on training and
ask the provocative question whether or not it was worth it. So
David, if we start with this Harvard business review article, can
you share your thoughts on whether organizational spend on
learning and development offers a good return on
investment?

David: (01:27)
Yeah I can Adam, it's a great question to set the context for our
discussion. So the typical organization spend on development is
definitely not worth it. If we start thinking about the
reoccurring themes that seem to come up, you know, survey after
survey. So as you mentioned, the Harvard business review, they
found that about three quarters of managers across about 50
companies give or take were quite dissatisfied with their
company's learning and development function. Gardener on the
other hand, found that about 7 out of 10 employees don't feel
that they have the skill necessary to master their roles and the
findings go on and on. So I started to undertake my own research
and thought, well let me find out what's happening and most of
the individuals I spoke to experienced real frustration and
disappointment with what it took to learn new skills for them. So
hence they tended to give up. I heard a lot of funny things and
some of them were interesting things I heard with things like, “I
feel like I'm faking it, hoping it just comes to me one day,
perhaps I'll have an epiphany” or “I'm pressured to work harder
pitches doesn't help, I can't seem to master the critical
thinking skills I need”, or “I've been asked to speak at an
upcoming medical conference and I'm truly petrified and end up
sounding like a toddler”. And when I started hearing and seeing
firsthand these stories of people really giving up while trying
to acquire a new skill, I began to wonder why, why do some people
struggle when others seem to manage it almost effortlessly? Why
is this happening? And it was really this curiosity that
motivated me to start researching, identifying, and then
eventually understand the differences that make a difference
between those individuals that see it through and those that give
up. And from the research that I did, the model I share in the
book really comes to life. It's basically a methodology that's
used unconsciously by masters in their field, and it offers real
value for time and effort invested to learn a new skill. And it's
a really a new way of approaching learning, especially for
accountants where so much of the learning happens on the
job.

Adam: (03:29)
Okay, now you've really piqued my curiosity. We at this podcast
with Count Me In, we're really trying to help accountants,
whether it's through learning or seeing what's happening in the
industry. Can you tell me a little bit more about your approach
and about how your approach is different from everything that's
already out there?

David: (03:47)
Yeah of course, I'm happy to give some insights into the model.
If you really start to think about situations where you've
undoubtedly seen a really talented individual in action and
you've been sitting there secretly wishing, “gosh I wish I could
do that and do it as easily and effortlessly as they do it”.
Well, you can. Now you might be wondering how. Well to do so, we
all simply need to just understand both the visible and the
invisible workings that an expert utilizes when they're doing
their thing. And basically the power of potential teaches readers
about these real, but invisible internal processing mechanisms
that we all go through when we receive information. And basically
think of the receipt as information as something like an external
event or an externality. And these externalities, they occur
every single day and they can range from very benign things,
something as simple as being, for example, cutoff in traffic, but
they can also range to the other extreme, which is life-changing.
And an example of that might be for example, hearing a terminal
medical diagnosis. So clearly a life-changing and difficult thing
to hear and individuals react very differently to the same
information or the same events. So why is that? That's what I
started to really wonder. And what I determined on, what I
discovered is that the differences in how we process information,
because when we process information we do so using our own view
of the world. We relay each filter information as we process it.
So for example, some individuals may choose to ignore information
or they may generalize by associating it to some past experience.
Let me give you an example of that. Imagine that you're an
individual who's giving constructive feedback to a peer or to
another team member. While there are one or two ways that
constructive feedback can be received. It can either be seen as
an opportunity by the individual receiving it, or it could be
seen as a threat. Now how that's received will depend very much
on the person's prior experiences and that's what I mean by the
view of the world. So each of these information filters that we
have is basically influenced by how we see ourselves. So things
like what we believe, what we value, any kind of powerful
memories, whether they're positive or negative, and also how we
speak to ourselves. So for example, is our inner chatter
self-critical, or is it self-respecting? And as if all of this
rapid processing wasn't enough, our current state of mind also
affects outcome. Let me give you another example of that, to help
bring it to life. If we're cut off in traffic on a day where
we've just heard some great news, the other drivers lack of
consideration, will probably roll away like water off of a duck's
back. But if we've just received news of a layoff that relatively
minor traffic slight could become a trigger to an
uncharacteristically angry outburst. And it's that, that I mean
when I talk about state of mind. So these rapid information
processing systems basically result in the behaviors we exhibit
and in turn, how others perceive us. And it's by understanding
these inner workings that basically the reader is empowered with
the knowledge and tools needed to harness them to their own
advantage. Which means that the learning solution that I provide
is really personalized. Let me give you another, a simple
example. Imagine that you dream of moving into a finance
leadership role, but you're really held back by your inability to
present effectively. You feel physically unwell at the idea of
be...