Build From Strength
Notes on Strengths
Deep Life Notes | Strengths
We spend too much time repairing weaknesses when some of our best growth comes from understanding what already comes naturally.
When we were kids, my sister and I loved playing board games. One of our favourites was the strategy game, Risk. The prize at stake was no less than world domination by conquering the six continents and 42 territories that made up the small plastic board.
Having the advantage of age, I realised a little more quickly that the key to winning was not overextending yourself when setting up your armies. Spreading yourself too thinly across one continent, for example, left you vulnerable to a sweeping attack from a much bigger army concentrated in only one or two territories in a neighbouring continent. Better to build from a few strong bases.
So with this strategy, I ended up owning the world. At least until dinnertime. Then my mum was back in charge. I was a short-lived tyrant.
Building from strong bases
Board games aren’t often used as important life lessons, but Risk seemed to tap into something innate: that when we focus on where we are strong, we grow faster than when trying to improve where we are weak. In fact, research suggests we make more progress when we build from our strongest bases.
Studies have shown that people who use their strengths, especially four or more of their top strengths, are more likely to experience satisfaction and meaning in their work, and feel happier, less stressed, and more confident.
Not enough people use their strengths every day
Research group Gallup has spent more than a half-century studying human strengths. In 2001, they released a groundbreaking book, Now, Discover Your Strengths, which revealed only two out of ten people use their strengths every day. That set the scene for serious conversations about organisations building strength-based cultures. But in the two decades since, many people still do not use their strengths enough.
That is a lot of unused potential.
We can put much of this down to the conventional management wisdom that our greatest potential for growth is by fixing our weaknesses. But author and speaker Marcus Buckingham says that focusing on our weaknesses only drains and demotivates us. By building our strengths instead, we feel more positive, get more energy as a result, and actually lift our weaknesses, too, because the point is not to ignore our weaknesses, but to understand where our lesser talents sit.
It’s not what you have, it’s how you use it
When we think of strengths, we can use an equation to define them:
Strengths = Talent x Investment
Talent is something we have. Investment is something we develop through regular, deliberate practice. This creates skills and builds knowledge.
Talent is trickier. We form our talents at an early age. By age six, we’ve already developed 90 percent of our brain activity. Every talent we possess is neutral. We can develop our talent or let it drift, which is why we hear so many stories of wasted talent.
I like to use the analogy of tools in a toolbox when thinking about talents being neutral. Each tool represents a talent. Take a hammer out of the toolbox. In your hand, it’s neutral. You can use it to build something, which is the positive side of talent. Or you can use it to smash a window, which is the negative side of talent. The point is that we first need to know there is a hammer in the toolbox, recognise what it does, and then use it deliberately so we get the best from it.
Some people think “focus on your strengths” means “just do what you’re good at and you won’t need to improve.” Those same people believe talents are natural gifts. But talents need to be nurtured. They need the investment part of the equation for the talent to become a strength.
There is also a belief required: that strengths can be improved.
Dr. George Gallup, the founder of the research company of the same name and whose research I highlighted earlier, is a good example of someone who lived out the strengths equation. Gallup knew he wasn’t cut out to become a successful businessman. He once said he couldn’t even run a popcorn stand, and he was proud of this. But he could teach, and so he focused all his energy and investment on that. He became so good that many leaders around the world said he was the greatest teacher of his time.
Understanding your strengths
There is value in spending time identifying and better understanding your own strengths.
A few routes can help:
Ask people who know you well. A good starting point is to ask for an honest assessment from your colleagues, friends, and family. This can give you a fuller picture based on the different roles you play in life. A colleague may see different strengths in you than a lifelong friend, but all feedback is useful. The value is often in the patterns, especially the strengths you may not have noticed on your own.
Use a strengths assessment. You can also take a strengths test. The CliftonStrengths tool helps you discover your top five strengths by measuring the presence of talents in 34 areas or themes. There’s a small cost and you can do it online. I took the assessment and discovered my top five strengths were in this order: Discipline, Learner, Intellection, Relator, and Analytical. They all made sense. I enjoy routine and structure; I love to learn and continuously improve; I’m introspective and appreciate intellectual discussions; I take pleasure in close relationships with others; and I like to take a thorough, logical and well thought out approach in everything I do.
Look at your accomplishments. Creating a list of your accomplishments is another good way to help identify your strengths. Not just work accomplishments, but right across your life. An Annual Life Review can help give you a framework for a holistic set of accomplishments.
Notice what gives you energy. Lastly, ask yourself how you think about strengths and weaknesses. Strengths make us feel strong. Weaknesses make us feel weak. Think about how your activities make you feel in order to identify your strengths. Does it make you feel successful or fulfilled? Are you drawn to it? Does it engage you? Does it get you into the flow state? You can be good at something you hate doing. That’s not the type of strength you necessarily want to improve. Part of my early career was organising events. I was good at it—see my strengths above—but it wasn’t something I enjoyed.
Developing what is already there
Once strengths become clearer, the next question is how to develop and use them across work and life.
A few things seem to matter most:
Learn around them. Books, articles, courses, conversations, and training can all deepen a strength that already exists. Books are the Himalayas of knowledge.
Find people further along. A mentor, teacher, colleague, or even a good friend can help you see how a strength might be used more fully in your own life.
Teach or practise them deliberately. Seneca said, “While we teach, we learn.” Teaching someone else, developing a related skill, or making time for deliberate practice can turn a natural talent into something more durable.
A few final thoughts.
Recognise that every strength or talent you have has both an upside and a downside. The downside of my Discipline strength can be a rigid, mechanised approach. The downside of my Learner strength can be a lot of learning, but little end result. This self-awareness is important because strengths still need steering.
We often forget and underestimate our talents. When we can identify them, understand them, and give them somewhere useful to go, a six or seven can become a nine or ten.
As we start recognising our talents better, we begin appreciating which strengths to use in certain situations, and which ones may need to be amplified, softened, or moderated. For example, if you have Discipline as a strength, you may become more aware of your natural tendency towards structure, routine, and sticking to the plan. That can be useful. But it may also make you less willing to break the structure than someone who doesn’t have Discipline as a dominant strength. That may not always be in your best interest. You might pass up the chance to catch up with a good friend, even when changing your plans would have been perfectly possible.
The more we understand ourselves, the better we can use what is already there.
Unlike the board game Risk, the goal isn’t world domination. It’s about finding our place in the world by using the talents we already have with more intention.
And making them last beyond dinnertime.
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