Libby Paul
As Talent Development Manager at Keating & Associates, Libby Paul uses Kolbe Wisdom™ to empower her clients and colleagues. But the power of Kolbe shows up in Libby’s home, too.
Libby and her husband are conative clones, meaning they have the exact same Kolbe MO- 8623. “It was just such an eye-opening and relieving thing to understand.” Libby observed, “We truly do think very similarly and move about decision making in very predictable ways.”
Besides being surprising, humorous, and even rare, this knowledge has helped Libby and her husband work with their conative strengths, rather than against them. “We were able to see some missing methods that we have in our marriage and to just talk about who we need to bring into our marriage to help us make decisions where we get stuck sometimes.”
For example, Libby and her husband are both CounterActing Implementors. “We don’t instinctually fix things or do things with our hands very well.” They more naturally envision solutions, but don’t have a need to be hands-on when doing things around the house. Understanding this gave them the freedom to outsource previously stressful work in their home. “[We] make no excuses about it, not putting any pressure on each other to fill in on that, but to just own that that’s how we’re wired!”
As Libby owned how she is wired, she encouraged her daughter to do the same and discover her own conative strengths. Libby’s daughter took the Student Aptitude Quiz, a 15-minute assessment that reveals the instinctive talents and abilities of students aged 10 and older.
It turns out, in this case, two conative clones made a conative opposite. “She’s opposite of me, and I expected that.”
“She’s a 9 in Quick Start. She comes up with new business ideas about once a week… I know that she’s going to be an entrepreneur one day, she’s already trying to flex that muscle,” Libby says of her daughter. “It helps me to parent her better because I already know to expect her to have a different path than I did.”
The best thing the SAQ offered Libby’s daughter was understanding more about who she is authentically. “She did her assessment, and it gave her so much confidence as a 12-year-old.” Libby explained, “She’s understanding how she is wired and feeling confident about who she is to really affirm her strengths.”
One of the most important things we can do is understand and work alongside our own instinctive strengths. That opens the door for us to understand and honor others’ instinctive strengths if they happen to be our conative clone, our conative opposite, or anywhere in between.
Whether it’s a team or a family, understanding what makes us each unique is a wonderful place to start! Want to learn more about your instinctive strengths? Start with a Kolbe A™ Index, or a Student Aptitude™ Quiz for your kids!
Make sure to check out our full conversation with Libby Paul below!
