What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: Why Your Greatest Strengths Are Secretly Sabotaging Your Future

Picture this: You’ve built a successful career, business, or life by leveraging your natural strengths.

Maybe you’re the person who gets things done through sheer determination.

Perhaps you’ve succeeded by being the smartest person in the room.

Or you’ve climbed the ladder by being incredibly detail-oriented and thorough.

Then one day, you hit a wall.

The very strengths that brought you success start working against you.

• Your determination becomes stubbornness.
• Your intelligence becomes arrogance.
• Your attention to detail becomes micromanagement.

This is the brutal reality that Marshall Goldsmith exposed in his groundbreaking book What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.

After decades of executive coaching, he discovered something counterintuitive: the behaviors and strengths that create success at one level often become the very obstacles that prevent success at the next level.

I’ve lived this transition personally. The relentless work ethic and problem-solving abilities that made me successful in construction had to be completely reimagined when I shifted to entrepreneurship and coaching.

What worked in my 30s and 40s required fundamental changes in my 50s. And now, as I turn 60, I’m having to evolve again.

The leaders and warriors who thrive over decades aren’t those who perfect their strengths—they’re those who learn to continuously reinvent themselves.

The Success Trap

Here’s what nobody tells you about success: it can become your biggest enemy.

When you achieve results through specific behaviors and strengths, your brain creates a powerful pattern:

This creates what I call the “success trap”—a psychological prison built from your own achievements.

The more successful you become using certain approaches, the harder it becomes to see when those approaches stop working.

Classic examples I’ve witnessed:

The Micromanager—A project manager who succeeded early in his career by closely monitoring every detail. As he moved into senior leadership, this strength became a weakness that demoralized his team and bottlenecked growth.

The Solo Performer—A salesperson who built her reputation on personal relationships and individual achievement. When promoted to sales manager, she struggled to develop others because she couldn’t let go of doing everything herself.

The Technical Expert—An engineer who advanced by being the smartest person in every room. When he became CTO, his need to be right about everything prevented him from listening to innovative ideas from his team.

Each of these people was trapped by their own success.

The Martial Arts Parallel

I see this pattern constantly in martial arts.

Students develop favorite techniques that work well against certain opponents or in specific situations.

They become known for these techniques—”the guy with the killer guard” or “the woman with the devastating takedown.”

But then they plateau.

Other students learn to defend against their go-to moves.

New training partners bring different body types and fighting styles that neutralize their strengths.

Suddenly, what made them successful at blue belt becomes a limitation at purple belt.

The students who continue progressing are those who can let go of their comfort zones and develop new approaches.

They understand that mastery isn’t about perfecting what you already do well—it’s about continuously expanding what you can do.

This same principle applies to every area of life.

The strengths that got you here won’t get you there.

The Strength Blindness Phenomenon

One of the most dangerous aspects of relying on your strengths is what psychologists call “strength blindness”—the inability to see when your greatest assets become liabilities.

This happens because:

Success Creates Confirmation Bias

When your strengths produce results, you interpret all feedback through that lens. Even when those strengths start causing problems, you attribute the problems to external factors rather than your approach.

Strengths Become Identity

You start to define yourself by your strengths. “I’m the person who gets things done.” “I’m the analytical one.” “I’m the relationship builder.” This identity becomes so central to your self-concept that changing feels like losing yourself.

Comfort Zone Expansion Stops

Success makes you comfortable. Why develop new skills when your current ones are working? Why take risks when you have a proven formula? This comfort gradually becomes stagnation.

Feedback Quality Decreases

As you become more successful, people become less likely to give you honest feedback. They assume you know what you’re doing, or they’re intimidated by your success. This creates an echo chamber where you never hear about the negative impact of your strengths.

The Hidden Costs of Strength Reliance

Relying too heavily on your strengths creates several hidden costs that compound over time:

Resilience Deficit

When you succeed primarily through your natural abilities, you don’t develop the resilience that comes from struggling and overcoming challenges. When your strengths eventually fail you, you lack the psychological tools to adapt.

Critical Thinking Atrophy

If your instincts and strengths usually lead to good outcomes, you stop questioning your assumptions or analyzing situations deeply. Your critical thinking muscles atrophy from lack of use.

Innovation Blindness

Strengths create patterns, and patterns can blind you to new possibilities. You become so good at your current approach that you can’t see better ways of doing things.

Team Development Failure

Leaders who rely heavily on their personal strengths often fail to develop their teams. They either do everything themselves or expect others to operate exactly like they do.

Adaptability Loss

Perhaps most dangerously, strength reliance reduces your ability to adapt to changing circumstances. You become like a master of obsolete technology—highly skilled at something the world no longer needs.

My Own Strength Evolution

I’ve had to reinvent myself multiple times throughout my career, each time letting go of strengths that had previously defined my success:

Construction to Business

In construction, my strengths were technical problem-solving, attention to detail, and personal work ethic. I could outwork and out-think most problems. But when I started helping my wife build her business, these strengths became limitations. I had to learn to delegate, to think strategically rather than tactically, and to work through others rather than doing everything myself.

Individual Contributor to Mentor

As I began mentoring younger workers and martial artists, my strength in individual performance became a weakness in developing others. I had to learn patience, the ability to let others make mistakes, and how to teach rather than just demonstrate.

Expert to Student

When I transitioned from Hapkido to BJJ in my 50s, my decades of martial arts experience actually became an obstacle. I had to let go of my identity as an experienced martial artist and become a beginner again. My strength in one art sometimes created bad habits for the new art.

Doing to Teaching

Now, as I focus more on writing and coaching, I’ve had to let go of my strength in direct action and develop new abilities in communication, influence, and inspiration. The skills that made me effective on construction sites don’t directly translate to helping people transform their lives.

Each transition required me to acknowledge that my previous strengths were no longer sufficient and to develop entirely new capabilities.

The Adaptation Imperative

In today’s rapidly changing world, the ability to continuously evolve beyond your current strengths isn’t just helpful—it’s essential for survival.

Consider these modern realities:

Technology Changes Everything—Skills that were valuable five years ago may be obsolete today. AI is automating many traditional strengths.

Markets Evolve Rapidly—Customer needs, competitive landscapes, and business models change faster than ever.

Career Longevity Increases—People are working longer, meaning you need multiple reinventions within a single career.

Complexity Multiplies—Problems today require interdisciplinary thinking and collaborative solutions that no single strength can address.

Global Competition Intensifies—Your local strengths now compete against global talent and capabilities.

The message is clear: adapt or become irrelevant.

The Letting Go Process

Learning to evolve beyond your strengths requires a systematic approach to letting go:

Step 1: Honest Assessment

Regularly examine whether your current strengths are still serving you. Ask trusted advisors for feedback. Look for signs that your approaches are creating unintended consequences.

Step 2: Future Visioning

Identify where you want to be in the next phase of your career or life. What new capabilities will that require? What current strengths might become obstacles?

Step 3: Identity Flexibility

Separate your core values and character from your specific skills and approaches. You can maintain your integrity while changing your methods.

Step 4: Deliberate Weakness Development

Intentionally work on skills that don’t come naturally. If you’re naturally analytical, develop emotional intelligence. If you’re naturally collaborative, develop decisiveness.

Step 5: Experimentation Mindset

Approach new situations as experiments rather than tests of your worth. Be willing to fail as you develop new capabilities.

Step 6: Support System Building

Surround yourself with people who complement your weaknesses and can provide honest feedback about your evolution.

The Resilience Connection

One of the most important benefits of moving beyond your strengths is the resilience it builds.

When you only rely on natural abilities, you develop what psychologists call a “fixed mindset”—the belief that your capabilities are static.

When you regularly push beyond your comfort zone and develop new skills, you develop a “growth mindset”—the confidence that you can learn and adapt to any challenge.

This resilience becomes crucial when faced with:

• Industry disruption that makes your skills obsolete
• Personal setbacks that require new approaches
• Leadership challenges that demand capabilities you’ve never developed
• Life transitions that require completely different ways of being

The Critical Thinking Renaissance

Moving beyond your strengths also revitalizes your critical thinking.

When you can’t rely on instinct and natural ability, you’re forced to:

• Analyze situations more deeply
• Question your assumptions
• Seek multiple perspectives
• Test your hypotheses
• Learn from failure

This enhanced critical thinking makes you more effective even when you do use your natural strengths.

The Daily Practice

Evolving beyond your strengths requires daily commitment:

Morning Question: “What assumption am I making based on past success that might not apply today?”

Midday Check: “Am I defaulting to my usual approach, or am I considering new possibilities?”

Evening Reflection: “What did I learn today that challenges my current way of doing things?”

Weekly Review: “What feedback have I received that suggests my strengths might be becoming limitations?”

Monthly Evolution: “What new capability do I need to develop for my next level of success?”

The Reinvention Roadmap

Here’s a practical framework for continuous evolution:

Quarter 1: Assessment

• Identify your core strengths and how they’ve contributed to your success
• Analyze where these strengths might be limiting you
• Gather feedback from trusted sources
• Identify the capabilities needed for your next level

Quarter 2: Experimentation

• Choose one area where you’ll deliberately develop new approaches
• Start small experiments in low-risk situations
• Practice new behaviors consistently
• Track what works and what doesn’t

Quarter 3: Integration

• Combine your new capabilities with your existing strengths
• Apply new approaches to higher-stakes situations
• Refine your methods based on results
• Build confidence in your expanded toolkit

Quarter 4: Mastery

• Make your new capabilities natural and automatic
• Teach others what you’ve learned
• Identify the next area for development
• Plan your next evolution cycle

The Bottom Line

​Marshall Goldsmith’s insight is both humbling and liberating: what got you here won’t get you there.

Your greatest strengths can become your greatest limitations if you’re not willing to continuously evolve.

This doesn’t mean abandoning what makes you unique or effective.

It means building on your foundation while expanding your capabilities.

It means having the courage to let go of outdated approaches even when they feel comfortable and familiar.

The leaders and warriors who thrive over decades aren’t those who perfect their strengths—they’re those who develop the meta-skill of continuous reinvention.

In a world of accelerating change, your ability to evolve beyond your current strengths becomes your ultimate competitive advantage.

Not because your strengths are bad, but because the combination of your proven strengths plus new capabilities creates exponential rather than linear growth.

The question isn’t whether you need to evolve—you do.

The question is whether you’ll proactively reinvent yourself or wait until circumstances force you to change.

What got you here was good. What will get you there will be even better. But only if you’re brave enough to let go of what no longer serves and embrace what you’re capable of becoming.

Your next level of success is waiting.

It’s just beyond the comfort zone of your current strengths.

P.S. If you found this content helpful, I have a favor to ask.

Actually two of them, a selfish one and a not-so-selfish one.

First the selfish one, if this was helpful to you, forward it to someone you think it might help. That helps me to grow my reach.

Now the not-selfish one, the one thing I learned on the mat and on the job was that the most successful leaders were not the ones who knew the most but were the ones who applied and taught the most.

So, if you want to be a better leader, do two things, take immediate action on what you learned today AND share it with someone else. You'll look badass, I promise you.

Also, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions, hit me up, reply to this email and let me know what's going on and how I can help you to be a better warrior, leader, and badass.

Thank you, I appreciate you being here in The Daily Dojo, you can learn more at CharlesDoublet.com​