Your Superpower is Your Competitive Advantage
The excerpts below are taken from Sandra’s presentation to the Atlanta Women’s Network on February 23, 2021.
On Knowing Your Superpower
Knowing your superpower is so important, it can be life and career-altering. Why, do you ask? Because we are the leaders of our lives.
Every day from the front, from the side, from behind in friendship groups, families, communities at work, and our lives and our work are integrated. They’re not distinctly separate states of being.
Your superpower allows you to show up consistently in that leadership.
So what is it? It’s your differentiator. Your secret sauce. It’s what sets you apart because you are your own unique self.
Knowing your superpower and standing in it will inject a huge amount of confidence into your life. Whether you’re a solopreneur or in a corporate job, transitioning into a new job, looking for a job or a stay-at-home mom, knowing your superpower and standing in it will convey your value to those around you.
On Why an Integrated Life Grows Your Confidence
What I’m asking you to consider is that your life and your work is integrated.
When you are when you’re standing in your superpower and you understand your value, that is going to increase your presence exponentially.
When your life and your work are integrated, look from the standpoint of being a leader in your life and your work, and that you are the leader in your life and your work. And you are leading from the front, from the side, from behind every aspect of what you do.
You’re the leader of your life and in your work and your life.
Understanding and knowing your value are extremely powerful and your confidence increases exponentially.
The Power of a Big Vision and Mentorship
My vision is to guide inspire and build a global community of solopreneurs who are strategic, accountable, intentional about creating a more fulfilling, rewarding, and sustainable entrepreneurial life.
The reason a more sustainable entrepreneurial life is so important to me is it hearkens back to my brand Life Reinvented because I am always talking about life and work and the integration of the two.
It’s very important to have that rewarding and sustainable work-life integration.
That’s what I live. And integrity, courage, commitment to empathy, and love is how I show up. I went through an inquiry as it related to mentorship.
Why have I always been mentored?
What is it about me that has allowed people to show up and mentor me? And when I went back and did that inquiry, I realized that the thing that really stood out is this ability to take a vision and to see way beyond where that the current thinking is and to see what’s possible beyond that.
That ability goes back to when I first got out of college and I went to work for a place called the Center for Real Estate Development at MIT. The director of the center at the time was Larry Backhouse.
He was my first mentor. At that time we were building a new business and there were all kinds of really neat, innovative things going on.
And there were ideas. One of the things that I realized is that I was able to take an idea and, think way past where the idea originated. And that was something that he saw in me. As a result of that, mentored me and helped me find my first job when I moved out to California. And it really was the beginning of something extremely special when it came to understanding what I was capable of and, who I am.
Mentorship Guided Me at The Gap
Looking back again, when I worked at the Gap, one of my mentors was Don Fisher, the Founder and Chairman. And he was my mentor, especially when we were in the UK and it was a new business and we were in a new market and we were trying to figure product-market fit and. He had the idea of what he wanted based upon what happens in the US and we’d have conversations about it, and I could see something else.
And he showed up as my mentor then because he saw that I was able to see past what was visible to others. And so it’s that exponentially forward-thinking piece that I’ve had all throughout my life and my career that really gives a good understanding of of who I am and the business building piece is a big part of it as well. It’s something that I’ve done, literally, since I got out of college, I’ve helped build businesses, whether it’s here or overseas.
What’s Your Superpower?
Find the skills that align with your core values.
Do an inquiry of everything that makes you, YOU! All of those times that you showed up and you were in your zone and everything was clicking and everything was working.
- What was happening at that time?
- What were you doing?
- What were you bringing?
- What were you, how were you showing up?
When you figure out your superpower, this is going to be your competitive advantage. This is your differentiator. This is the thing that’s going to set you apart from other job candidates. It’s is the thing that’s going to set your business apart.
When someone is coming to you, looking to hire you versus someone else and figure out your need unique strengths, because that’s going to help you enjoy, life more.
Why Your Superpower is Your Competitive Advantage
A lot of people self-identify with what they’ve been doing for years and suddenly when they are not doing it anymore — especially for women — there’s an identity crisis. We’re, thinking, gosh that’s how we defined ourselves.
So that’s why I’m asking people, especially women, to go through this inquiry and figure out how you’re showing up in your life and in your work, because the two are the same, really.
Reflect on how you’re showing up and in that value, because that surpasses what it was you did. That was your job. It is who you are, it’s critical to understand who you are because that’s your differentiator.
That’s the thing that will stand out to other people about you, but it will also help so much in knowing and understanding your value.
