Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?

by Seth Godin

Linchpins don’t need authority. It’s not part of the deal. Authority matters only in the factory, not in your world.

I’ve argued repeatedly that your product should match your marketing, not the other way around, and the same inversion is true here. Transferring your passion to your job is far easier than finding a job that happens to match your passion.

The linchpin is able to invent a future, fall in love with it, live in it—and then abandon it on a moment’s notice.

Every day is a new chance to choose. Choose to change your perspective. Choose to flip the switch in your mind. Turn on the light and stop fretting about with insecurity and doubt.

Your job is to make art the best you can, to change the status quo, and to become indispensable. If you burn out along the way, you’re not doing anyone a favor.

The ultimate gift you can give, the one that will repay you today and tomorrow and heal our world, is that gift. The gift of connection, of art, of love—of dignity.

In the case of personality, most psychologists agree that there are five traits that are essential in how people look at us: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extra-version, Agreeableness, and Emotional Stability.

There’s no script for leadership. There can’t be.

The linchpin changes that. Understanding that your job is to make something happen changes what you do all day. If you can only cajole, not force, if you can only lead, not push, then you make different choices.

The Dip is about this very thing. If you’re not the best in the world (the customer’s world) at your unique talent, then it’s not a unique talent, is it? Which means you have only two choices: 1. Develop the other attributes that make you a linchpin. 2. Get a lot better at your unique talent. It’s possible that no one ever pushed you to be brave enough to go this far out on a limb. Consider yourself pushed.

Focus on making changes that work down, not up. Interacting with customers and employees is often easier than influencing bosses and investors. Over time, as you create an environment where your insight and generosity pay off, the people above you will notice, and you’ll get more freedom and authority.

The act of deciding is the act of succeeding. The barrier to success is a choice. Up to you.

Artists, at least the great ones, see the world more clearly than the rest of us. They have prajna, a sense of what actually is, not simply the artist’s take on it. That honest sight allows them to see the future over the cloudy horizon. As our world changes faster and faster, it is these honest artists who will describe our future, and lead us there.