Coaching practices for Working Genius Self Assessment

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Working Genius Self Assessment, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

  • We decide things by group vote and the loud idea-lovers always carry the room, while the one person whose gut is usually right about what won’t work gets drowned out
  • There’s a part of my work that quietly wrecks me, but admitting it feels like confessing I’m not good enough, so I just grit my teeth and say nothing
  • On paper I’m good at my job, but certain parts of it leave me hollowed out even when I do them well
  • I genuinely can’t tell if what I produced is any good
  • I genuinely can’t tell anymore where I’m actually good and where I just feel good

Practices that may help

  1. Route decisions to your Discernment genius
    Evaluation decisions drain Wonder and Tenacity geniuses — protect your evaluators and route decisions to them.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
  2. The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
    Patrick Lencioni’s Working Genius model describes six activities — Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, and Tenacity — that are required to complete any meaningful work. Each person finds two of these energizing (geniuses), two draining (frustrations), and two neutral (competencies). The model is a practitioner framework; it lacks independent peer-reviewed validation, but it provides a practically useful vocabulary for team role awareness.
  3. Name frustrations without shame
    Frustrations are not weaknesses — they’re a mismatch signal that the team can act on.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
  4. Identify your two working geniuses
    Name the two of the six activities that consistently energize you, not just where you perform well.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
  5. Structured reflection on performance
    Systematically compare your performance to an expert model to build accurate self-assessment.
    Cognitive Apprenticeship: Learning by Making Thinking Visible
  6. Map your actual competence across domains
    Explicitly rate your ability in each domain, then check the rating against external evidence.
    The Dunning-Kruger Effect, Understood Clearly
  7. Reality-check the best-at circle with outside input
    Ask credible people who have seen your work directly whether you have genuine advantage — not people who love you.
    The Hedgehog Concept
  8. Protect time for work that matches your genius
    Deliberately schedule blocks of genius-type work before filling the rest of the week.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
  9. Take the VIA survey and identify your signature strengths
    Discover your top five to seven character strengths using the validated VIA survey.
    VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
  10. Use genius mapping in onboarding
    Surface a new hire’s geniuses early so you design their role around energy, not just skills.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)

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