Strengthen your STRENGTHS!

Strengthen your STRENGTHS!

You’re not smart enough, you’re not fast enough, you’re not thin enough, you’re not this, you’re not that…ringing any bells? In our society, focusing on what you don’t have or what you are not good at is all too common. After reading Tom Rath’s New York Times’ bestseller, Strengths Finder 2.0, I realized we all have it wrong…well, to a certain extent. To summarize Rath’s book, people do not take enough time to maximize their strengths and natural talents, rather, we as a society (coaches, teachers, managers) focus on an individual’s weaknesses and try to strengthen those. Rath’s concept can apply to all aspects of one’s life, not just professionally, but socially as well. Let’s say you have great eyes, try accentuating that feature or focus on something else positive about your appearance. This is not to say to let your short-comings or weaknesses just fall by the way-side. Those areas can still be minimized and improved upon, but just realize you may never be six feet tall if you’ve passed your growth spurt or a rocket scientist if math is not your subject.

Take the self-assessment test. It will indentify key areas that you can work on to develop as strengths. It helps in nurturing your natural talents rather than always focusing on fixing your weaknesses. There are 34 different “strengths” you could have and the online assessment will provide you with a brief report of your top 5 talent theme areas. There will be a short definition of each theme and a descriptive paragraph that is UNIQUE to you.

It will be great to finally answer the simple question, “What are your strengths?” with a more intelligent and descriptive answer that is individual to you. Knowing yourself and being honest with who you are will not only make you more successful, but also happier with who you are.

Remember, at the end of the day, knowing your areas of strength are fantastic, but time and effort are still the cornerstones to improvement. Use this newfound knowledge to re-focus where you spend your time to progress yourself to the next level.

Warning: call_user_func_array(): First argument is expected to be a valid callback, 'sociable_links' was given in /hsphere/local/home/thepinched/hiringwizard.com/wp-includes/plugin.php on line 395