Discovering your strengths is a process. Donald Clifton taught that the strengths’ theory is based on the premise that every person can do one thing better than any other 10,000 people. And this process allows you to access and use your many talents, so you can best achieve your dreams and respond to the challenges that await you on your route.
Stronger. Smarter. Richer.
Over the next few weeks in my blogs we will be going through the three phases of my Let’s Talk Strengths Coaching System—Grow Stronger. Work Smarter. Live Richer©. This system includes everything you’ll need to identify and then accomplish any goal in your life.
Sound good? One of my colleagues has a small sign taped above her desk which reads: “Which strengths am I going to use today?” Looking at these words centers her and helps her maintain a strengths-based mindset. What can you do to center and help maintain your strengths-based mindset so you can grow stronger, work smarter and live richer?
Grow Stronger
Identify Your Strengths—The first step to growing stronger is to identify your signature strengths using an informal approach of Strengths Spotting with my S.A.I.L. method. Ask yourself the following question and then write your responses. “Share a story you love of your most significant project, success, or accomplishment in your life or career to date that you are most proud of and why.” What S – Successes did you spot? What felt A – Authentic in your successes? What felt I – Invigorating to you in your success stories? What did you L – Love in your successes? Share several success stories with a coach, colleague, or mentor and get feedback on what strengths, patterns, and best practices they heard in your stories.
The second step is taking the Clifton Strengths assessment. Purchase your assessment code on my website at https://brentobannon.com/cliftonstrengths.
You have the option of discovering your top five signature strengths or your full thirty-four strengths report, which also reveals your dominant top ten talent themes, supporting themes, and your bottom lesser strengths.
If you’ve already taken the StrengthsFinder assessment many years ago, go to the updated gallupstrengthscenter.com site to create a new dashboard and access all the resources, tools, videos, and blog articles.
To grow your foundation for the Strengths Revolution, I also recommend you read the books that started it all, Soar With Your Strengths and Now, Discover Your Strengths, by Donald Clifton.
Next, you can dig even deeper by exploring the wide array of supplementary strengths assessments available to help you diversify and define the language you use for your strengths.
This process will expand the number of practical techniques you can use to put your talents into practice. The VIA Survey, for example, measures twenty-four character strengths, broadening the context in which you see and use your values and signature strengths. Why not check it out at https://www.viacharacter.org/www .
Another well researched, British based assessment is called the Strengths Profile formerly called Realize 2. It reveals sixty different strengths, your unrealized strengths that you’re underusing, your learned behaviors, and your weaknesses. Explore more at https://www.strengthsprofile.com/ .
Also, I’d recommend discovering your strengths edge in your work through the StandOut 2.0 assessment created by Marcus Buckingham. It reveals nine different strengths roles and your top two that make you stand out at work. Find your edge at work at https://www.tmbc.com/standout-2-0-assessment/.
In my twenty years as an executive coach, I’ve always believed every human being has their own code for success—their own combination of potential. This combination is not something you search for outside yourself, it’s already inside of you. And it’s your responsibility to access your potential.
The way to access your potential is via your talents, your natural patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving. When you identify your top strengths and begin to understand how these strengths apply to your personal and professional life, this knowledge will unlock your potential.
This happened for me several years ago, when I created a business mastermind group composed of a handful of entrepreneurs from my community. I wanted to learn from their successes and, to my delight, they jumped at the chance. In an early meeting, a member of the group—an executive coach—encouraged all of us to take the StrengthsFinder assessment. With my background in psychology, I’d taken piles of psychological assessments, and I dismissed the StrengthsFinder assessment as a fad. I was, at the time, a classic know-it-all.
Another member of the group took the assessment and shared with us how inspired he was by the results. That’s when I purchased the StrengthsFinder assessment and answered the questions. My results were inspiring.
From that moment, I’ve been a passionate advocate of discovering your strengths, applying them in your life, and building your life around them. As you might guess, many of my coaching clients—as well as my wife and two adult children—have also discovered their top strengths.
Which assessments mentioned have you used? What did you learn from taking these assessments? Please share below.
