Who are you?

Most people come to me focused on figuring out their next move. What job to take, which opportunity to pursue, how to optimize their career trajectory.

I encourage people to pause.

When someone comes to me stressed about "what should I do next," I ask them a different question: "Who are you?"

This usually gets an "Oh, Piero, this is unexpected but makes sense" reaction. Then we embark on a journey not on action plans or career strategies, but on reconnection with the authentic self.

What happens even surprises me sometimes.

One person realized her mission for the next few years was to focus exclusively on her family, setting aside her entrepreneurial career entirely. Another discovered that her true passion wasn't what she'd been working on for a decade. Someone else told me: "I needed new words to describe who I am - the label I'd been using no longer fit who I actually am."

I rarely give advice. No "shoulds," no frameworks, no five-step processes. I create space for people to find their own answers. Sometimes there are tears, many times laughter, often confusion before clarity.

The interesting thing? Once people reconnect with who they are (their values, their authentic self), the "doing" becomes less of a burden. Decisions become easier because they're aligned with something tangible, rather than being optimized for something external.

Last week, I saw an exhibition by Polish artist Maria Pininska-Beres, who said she'd abandoned the traditional sculpting skills she'd mastered to make a radical breakthrough. Sometimes we have to stop doing what we're supposed to be good at to discover what we're actually meant to do.

That's what I see happen with the people I accompany with my mentoring. They stop trying to perfect their next move and start discovering who they really are. Everything else flows from there.

When someone comes to me stressed about "what should I do next," I ask them a different question: "Who are you?"