At the 28th annual convention of the National Association of Independent Life Brokerage Agencies (NAILBA), best-selling author Dan Pink raised a question that gave me – and countless others in the room – much food for thought.
Pink, the author of such books as "Free Agent Nation: The Future of Working for Yourself," "A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future," and the recently released "Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us," was the keynote speaker for the Nov. 12 general session. Pink primarily focused on how those with great left-brain abilities – organizational, analytical number-crunching skills – but zero right-brain abilities – creative, artistic, outside-the-box types – will fail in today's new economy.
He threw out a lot of compelling statistics to support his thesis that any job that can be reduced to a list of steps with only one "correct" outcome (e.g., accounting, software development, etc.) will continue to be outsourced to countries whose workers will work for far lower wages than their American counterparts.
One such statistic was that only 15 percent of India's population is greater than the entire population of Japan, the world's second-largest economy, and more than the entire workforce of the United States, the world's largest economy.
He then went on to talk about how audience members could strengthen their right-brain skills. This includes things like storytelling when selling insurance, and showing people how they need something they didn't know they were missing, such as life insurance.
But the last thing he said, the question to which I referred at the beginning of this post, was the kicker. He called it the "20-10 Test."
