The Building A Body Of Work Approach Rather Than Just The Busyness Approach

There are many ways to do fine work. Some people follow the building a body of work approach rather than the being consumed by busyness approach.

Different people do this in different fields. They may do it when working as a writer, educator, musician, therapist, scientist, film maker, mentor or other kind of worker.

Such people sometimes take the following steps. They do what they believe in and what they do best. They do the basics, add the brilliance and build a body of work. 

Different people follow these steps in different ways because much depends of work they are doing. Let’s explore how such people may focus on these themes.

They Do What They Believe In

Such people clarify what believe in. They then aim to translate this philosophy into action in their own way. Here are some of the many examples.

Martin Seligman believed in sharing the philosophy of positive psychology. Alexander Calder believed in spreading joy through art. Anita Roddick believed in building an ethical business.

Dame Cicely Saunders believed in providing loving hospice care for people. John Wooden believed in helping young basketball players to develop as people as well as players.

Imagine that you want to follow elements of this approach in your own work. What do you believe in? What may be the philosophy you want to translate into action? This can lead to exploring the next step taken by people who build a body of work.

They Do What They Do Best

Great workers do what they do best. They also follow their best way of working. They build on their strengths and follow their successful style. Let’s look at one person who has taken this route to build a body of work.

Thomas Armstrong is a pioneering educator who has helped many young people to develop their talents. He also has a successful style of being able to pass on knowledge through his many books.

His books have helped many people to build on their natural talents. Whilst his books often focus on children, the insights he provides can be used by people in all walks of life.

Different People Have Different Intelligences

Thomas has built on Howard Gardner’s groundbreaking work about multiple intelligences. These were described in Howard’s book Frames Of Mind.

Thomas showed how the theories could be translated into reality in his book 7 Kinds of Smart. Since then he has added several more smarts that people may demonstrate.

The various smarts overlap, of course, so it is good to bear this mind when identifying a person’s preferred style. Let’s explore these approaches that a person may demonstrate in their life and work.

People Smart

This smart corresponds to what Howard Gardner called Interpersonal intelligence. Such a person may be good at working with people. They may enjoy building relationships, encouraging others and social interaction.

They have strong empathy skills. Sometimes they sense what is going to happen in a group before it actually happens. They can also be good at organising people and coordinating the strengths in a team.

The best way to help them learn may be through conversations, role-plays, simulation and other activities involving people.

Body Smart

This corresponds to Kinaesthetic Intelligence. Such people may be good at controlling their body movements, dancing, sports and managing materials successfully.

They express themselves through movement – sometimes finding it difficult to sit still – and have good hand-eye coordination. They have a strong muscle memory and recall lessons they have integrated into their bodies.

The best way to help them to learn is anything involved with movement or activities that evoke feelings.

Picture Smart

This corresponds to what Howard called Spatial intelligence. Such a person may be good at working with pictures, images, drawing, colours, art, imagining or other forms of visual organisation.

They often need to create or find visual images that enable them to retain information. The best way to help them learn is by using these media.

Logic Smart

This corresponds to what Howard Gardner called Logical-Mathematical intelligence. Such people may be good at reasoning, gathering information and numbers. They enjoy thinking conceptually, seeing patterns and making connections.

The best way to help them to learn may be inviting them to solve problems – particularly in their areas of greatest interest – collect data, do experiments and present the information.

Word Smart

This corresponds to Linguistic intelligence. Such people may be good at working with words, conversations, writing and languages. They enjoy speaking, storytelling, explaining, using humour and teaching.

The best way to help them learn may be inviting them to use these skills through writing, presenting, speaking new languages and other verbal media.

Music Smart

This corresponds to Musical-Rhythmic intelligence. Such people may be good at creating and appreciating music. They also often think in sounds, patterns and ‘rhythms’.

Some are sensitive to even the smallest sounds – which can be either helpful or distracting. The best way to help them to learn is through music and helping them to see rhythms – patterns – in other areas of learning.

Specialist Smart

This corresponds to Specialist Intelligence. Such people may be good at exploring deeply and doing good work in a specialism that they find fascinating.

Some may have lopsided personalities. They may be brilliant in some areas but oblivious to things in other areas. This can have both pluses and minuses.

The best way to help them to learn is to focus on the topics they find fascinating. It can also be sometimes useful to help them to build on their strengths and manage the consequences of any weaknesses.

Nature Smart

Such people are good at seeing rhythms in nature and have a feeling for living things. Here is a superb definition from Kathy Koch of what is called Naturalist intelligence.

Such children think in patterns and are usually able to compare and contrast easily. they usually enjoy collecting things according to shape, design, and texture. They love to be outside.

They may get dirty during every recess because they dig in dirt and pick up every rock and acorn Attention is probably heightened when lessons have to do with animals, rocks, mountains, lakes, planets, and other things of nature.

Self-Smart

This corresponds to Self-Awareness or Intrapersonal Intelligence. Such people have a good understanding of themselves. They clarify their inner feelings, strengths and weaknesses.

They tend to think deeply about topics and can sometimes be quiet. They may feel uncomfortable being ‘graded’ by others, because it involves outside judgements about their own views.

They learn best by focusing on topics related to their own lives and experiences. Such people often prefer to work alone. They like being given time and space to explore their own insights.

Life Smart

This is sometimes called Existential Smart. Throughout history individuals have asked questions such as:

“Who am I? What do I want to do in my life? Why do I want to do it? How can I make it happen? When do I want to begin?”

People with existential intelligence gather knowledge and wisdom to enable themselves and others to explore and find answers to these questions. They may also focus on the more spiritual aspects of existence and our purpose on the planet.

Let’s return to your own work. How can you build on your strengths and do what you do best? How can build on the way you work best and follow your successful style or working?

Imagine that you have settled on: a) the specific kind of work you want to do; b) the specific way you want to do it. You may then focus on working to achieve specific goals. This involves focusing on the next step taking by great workers.

They Do The Basics

Great workers keep doing the basics that are required to provide the platform for doing brilliant work. They often take the following steps.

They clarify the key strategies they can follow to give themselves the greatest chance of success.

They clarify their plan for translating these strategies into action on the way towards achieving success.

They keep doing the basics that provide a platform for doing brilliant work on the way towards achieving success.

Different people will perform different basics to reach their goals. The way they translate these into action depends on whether they work in sports, business, hospitality, medical care, therapy, technology or whatever.

A counsellor will help a person to feel at ease, explore what they want to achieve and then enable them to shape their future. An athlete will prepare properly – both physically and psychologically – and then do their best to achieve peak performance.

Wayne Gretzky, the great ice hockey player, described how he began to build the basics. Talking with Michael Murphy for the book In The Zone, he explained how he practiced during his childhood.

“I’d get up in the morning, skate from 7.00 to 8.30, go to school, come home at 3.30, stay on the ice until my mom insisted I come in for dinner, eat in my skates and then go back out until 9.00. 

“On Saturdays and Sundays, we’d have huge games, but night time became my time. It was sort of an unwritten rule around the neighbourhood that I would be out there by myself or with my dad. 

“I would just handle the puck in and out of those empty detergent bottles my dad set up as pylons. Then I’d set up targets in the net and try to hit them with forehands, backhands, whatever. Then I’d do it all again, except this time with a tennis ball, which is much harder to handle.

“I was so addicted that my dad had big kids come over to play against me. When the kids wanted to go home, I’d beg them to stay longer.”  

Imagine that you want to keep doing the basics in your chosen work. If you wish, try tackling the exercise on this theme. This invites you to describe the following things.

Describe the specific piece of work you want to do. Describe the real results you want to achieve. Describe the basics you need to keep doing to provide the platform for doing brilliant work.

Imagine that you are delivering high professional standards. If appropriate, you may then want to explore the next step taken by some people who aim to build a body of work.

They Add The Brilliance

Great workers keep doing the basics and, when appropriate, add the brilliance. Some go into another dimension and do something beautiful.

Different people do this in different ways. Some flow, focus, finish and find fulfilment. Some build on their strengths, follow strategies that work and do something special.

Some aim to be positive, professional and do pacesetting work. Some go into their equivalent of the zone. They do something magical and give people positive memories for life.

Different people also do this in different fields. Jesse Owens did it as an athlete. Derek Jacobi did it when performing in I, Claudius. Maggie Smith did it when playing Lady Grantham in Downton Abbey.

Maya Angelou did it when reading her poetry. Maria Montessori did it when doing pioneering work in education. Lionel Messi did it when playing football.

Imagine that you are doing what you believe in, doing the basics and sometimes adding the brilliance. If appropriate, you may then want to explore the next step taken by some people.

They Build A Body Of Work

Great workers sometimes aim to build a body of work. The way they do this depends on the kind of work they do.

A writer may produce several books. A singer may record many albums. An entrepreneur may build a series of successful companies. An inventor may create several pioneering products.

An educator may inspire many people. They may also mentor people and pass on their knowledge. They may do this be writing books, producing films or using other media.

Marie Curie made a pioneering contribution to science and medicine. David Attenborough inspired people to care for nature with series such as Life On Earth, The Blue Planet and Planet Earth.

Joan Baez created a wonderful body of work with her many albums. E. F. Schumacher showed how people could live in sustainable way using appropriate technology and with his books such as Small Is Beautiful.

Ellen MacArthur is somebody who also passes on a body of work. She gained fame as yachtswoman and is now enabling people to build a circular economy. The following piece is taken from her foundation’s website.

In 2005, Ellen MacArthur became the fastest solo sailor to sail around the world. Five years later, she set up the Foundation in her name to accelerate the transition to a circular economy.

After circling the globe – carrying everything she needed with her – she returned with new insights into the way the world works, as a place of interlocking cycles and finite resources, where the decisions we make today affect what’s left for tomorrow.

Spending 71 days alone at sea, confronted by the awesome power and dazzling beauty of nature, Ellen began to ponder the fragility of the systems we’ve built.

Her boat was her world and her survival was entirely dependent on the limited food, fuel, and other supplies she’d brought with her. She realised that our global economy is no different – it relies completely on the finite resources we extract, use and then dispose of.

She found that the linear system in which we live is fundamentally flawed. She asked herself what would a successful economy that uses things, rather than uses them up look like?

After talking with business leaders, engineers and other experts, she concluded that building a system that could work in the long term is within our reach.

But we would need to transform our extractive, throwaway economic model to one that was based on the principles of a circular economy – an economy designed to keep materials in use, eliminate waste and regenerate natural systems.

She did a massive amount of research before setting up the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. This now works with businesses, cities and other organisations that aim to apply the principles of a circular economy.

Ellen recognises that people are more likely to make changes when they see that these will be beneficial. The foundation therefore aims to deliver projects that provides financial or other positive benefits.

Let’s return to your own life and work. Imagine that you want to focus on a specific activity and follow elements of the body of work approach. This could involve taking some of the following steps.

You could do what you believe in and what you do best. You could set specific goals, do the basics and, if appropriate, add the brilliance. You could then take your own approach to building a body of work.

If you wish, try tackling the exercise on this theme. This invites you to complete the following sentences.