Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?

by Seth Godin

We need original thinkers, provocateurs, and people who care. We need marketers who can lead, salespeople able to risk making a human connection, passionate change makers willing to be shunned if it is necessary for them to make a point. Every organization needs a linchpin, the one person who can bring it together and make a difference.

Artists are people with a genius for finding a new answer, a new connection, or a new way of getting things done.

you want a job where it’s okay to follow the rules, don’t be surprised if you get a job where following the rules is all you get to do.

This is a more powerful question, and a difficult one. It’s entirely possible that once you choose to become indispensable, you will no longer be loved. Not by the same people who love you now, perhaps, nor for the same reasons. But (and I know it’s a big but) either those people will come around, or they never loved you in the first place, did they?

No, the competitive advantage the marketplace demands is someone more human, connected, and mature. Someone with passion and energy, capable of seeing things as they are and negotiating multiple priorities as she makes useful decisions without angst. Flexible in the face of change, resilient in the face of confusion.

Depth of knowledge combined with good judgment is worth a lot. Depth of knowledge combined with diagnostic skills or nuanced insight is worth a lot, too.

She solves problems that people haven’t predicted, sees things people haven’t seen, and connects people who need to be connected.

Emotional labor is the task of doing important work, even when it isn’t easy.

Our economy has reached a logical conclusion. The race to make average stuff for average people in huge quantities is almost over. We’re hitting an asymptote, a natural ceiling for how cheaply and how fast we can deliver uninspired work.

By forcing myself to do absolutely no busywork tasks in between bouts with the work, I remove the best excuse the resistance has. I can’t avoid the work because I am not distracting myself with anything but the work. This is the hallmark of a productive artist. I don’t go to meetings. I don’t write memos. I don’t have a staff. I don’t commute. The goal is to strip away anything that looks productive but doesn’t involve shipping.

Anxiety, on the other hand, is dangerous paralysis. Anxiety is the exaggeration of the worst possible what-if, accompanied by self-talk that leads to the relentless minimization of the actual odds of success. Anxiety makes it impossible to do art, because it feeds the resistance, giving the lizard brain insane power over us. It’s impossible to be a linchpin if you agree to feed your anxiety.

The best way to overcome your fear of creativity, brainstorming, intelligent risk-taking, or navigating a tricky situation might be to sprint.

It’s possible, though, to view the work that comes with the launching of your art as an inevitable gravitational process, like an avalanche or a giant slalom. Start at the top of the hill, not the bottom. One little step to get you started, and then it grows and grows, ever faster.

The key distinction is the ability to forge your own path, to discover a route from one place to another that hasn’t been paved, measured, and quantified. So many times we want someone to tell us exactly what to do, and so many times that’s exactly the wrong approach.

Someone will hire you because you fit the description, look right, have the right background, and don’t ruffle feathers, or because you are a dream come true, an agent of change sure to make a difference.

the individual in the organization who collects, connects, and nurtures relationships is indispensable.

If you actually work for an organization that insists you be mediocre, that enforces conformity in all its employees, why stay? What are you building? The work can’t possibly be enjoyable or challenging, your skills aren’t increasing, and your value in the marketplace decreases each day you stay there. And if history is a guide, your job there isn’t as stable as you think, because average companies making average products for average people are under huge strain.