legal sanity

Rosa at the wonderful Talking Story blog directed me to this clip of author and speaker Marcus Buckingham discussing “the importance of using one’s personal strengths in the workplace.” There are a lot of thought-provoking observations packed into this little sound bite. Buckingham raises the question that’s fueled his work to date: Why do so few of us have a chance to use our strengths – those things we enjoy most and do best - on the job? He does not supply an answer, but does cite a recent poll showing that the respondents spend only 17% of their working day doing things they really like to do. Asserting that this number is way too low, Buckingham declares his continuing interest in discovering how to build a better world that compels each of us to “identify and deploy the best of ourselves” in our chosen occupation. I wonder how many lawyers would have benefited from a law school curriculum designed to help us discover our individual strengths and match them to a particular area of the law or to a related field, such as dispute resolution or teaching.