Find Your Strengths

“Mastering others is strength. Mastering yourself is true power.” — Lao Tzu
Finding your strengths is one of the best ways to improve your energy and effectiveness.  If you know your unique combination of strengths, and you play to your strengths instead of focus on your weaknesses, you can dramatically amplify your impact.
One of the key things that can hold you back is spending too much time on your weaknesses and not enough time on your strengths.  The better you know your strengths and talents, the better you can pick the right situations or job to leverage your innate abilities.
How do you find your strengths, though? … What are your key strengths?  What are your talents that come easy for you, but are difficult for others?  Are you fully leveraging your unique combination of strengths?
In Now, Discover Your Strengths, Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, Ph.D. identify 34 key signature themes of strength, based on years of empirical research.

Key Take Aways

Here are my key take aways:

• Identify your signature strengths.  Don’t just know what you’re good at.  Identify what you are great at.  This difference makes all the difference in the world.
• Be your best. The key here is to be your personal best.  This is why modeling somebody else’s success may not come easy for you.  You may not have the same strengths.
• Cultivate your strengths.  The key is to focus on your strengths and not your weaknesses.  Reducing your weaknesses is not the path to greatness.  Improving your key strengths is your personal path to excellence.
• Use the sum of your talents.  It’s not about having a single strength, it’s about using the synergy of your strengths.
• Find a fit for your strengths. Leveraging your strengths turns your work into passion.   What’s work for somebody else is your play if you find the right way to leverage your unique talents.
• Amplify your results with your network. Once you know your key strengths, you can find the people that complement you in strengths that you lack.

How To Identify Your Strengths

You can go to the authors’ site at StrengthFinder.com – http://strengthsfinder.com/ and take the evaluation.  You need a copy of the book, Now, Discover Your Strengths, for an access code to take the evaluation.
You’ll likely recognize a lot of these strengths in yourself.  The key isn’t to whittle the list down to your absolute strongest talents.  Instead, find the strengths that differentiate you from others and that come easiest for you.
Many of the strengths resonated for me.  I took two passes.  On my first pass, I made the following list:: Achiever; Arranger; Competition; Deliberative; Developer; Fairness; Focus; Empathy; Ideation; Individualization; Intellection; Learner; Maximizer; Self-assurance; Significant.  On my second, pass, I modified some of my choices and whittled it down to the following five strengths:Achiever; Ideation; Individualization; Maximizer; Self-assurance; Significant
I don’t know that I’ve yet got the precision I need but it’s a start.  I plan to ask others for their feedback and to help me find my blind spots.  I also plan to take the StrengthsFinder evaluation.

34 Themes of Strengths and Talent

Here are the 34 strengths according to Buckingham and Clifton:

Achiever Activator Adaptability Analytical Arranger Belief Command Communication Competition Connectedness Context Deliberative

Developer Discipline Empathy Fairness Focus Futuristic Harmony Ideation Inclusiveness Individualization Input Intellection

Learner Maximizer Positivity Relater Responsibility Restorative Self-assurance Significance Strategic Woo

34 Strengths Explained

Familiarize yourself with the 34 key themes of strength.  If you can identify your top five themes, you can use the information to start cultivating your strengths for personal excellence and stop focusing on weaknesses.  Here are the 34 signature themes of strength according to Buckingham and Clifton:

Strength	Description
Achiever	A relentless need for achievement.
Activator	“When can we start?” is a recurring question in your life.
Adaptability	You live in the moment.
Analytical	“Prove it. Show me why what you are claiming is true.”
Arranger	You are a conductor.
Belief	You have certain core values that are enduring.
Command	You take charge.
Communication	You like to explain, to describe, to host, to speak in public, and to write.
Competition	You have a need to outperform your peers.
Connectedness	You know that we are all connected.
Context	You look back to understand the present.
Deliberative	You identify, assess, and reduce risk.
Developer	You see the potential in others.
Discipline	Your world needs to be ordered and planned.
Empathy	You can sense the emotions of those around you.
Fairness	Balance is important to you.
Focus	Your goals are your compass.
Futuristic	“Wouldn’t it be great if …” The future fascinates you.
Harmony	You look for areas of agreement.
Ideation	You are fascinated by ideas.
Inclusiveness	“Stretch the circle wider.” You can to include people and make them feel like part of the group.
Individualization	You’re intrigued by the unique qualities of each person.
Input	You collection information – words, facts, books and quotations.
Intellection	You like to think. You like mental activity.
Leaner	You love to learn.
Maximizer	Excellence, not average, is your measure.
Positivity	You are generous with praise, quick with smile, and always on the look out for the positive in the situation.
Relater	You derive a great deal of pleasure and strength from being around your close friends.
Responsibility	You take psychological ownership for anything you commit to, and you feel emotionally bound to follow it through to completion.
Restorative	You love to solve problems.
Self-assurance	You have faith in your strengths.
Significance	You want to be very significant in the eyes of other people.
Strategic	You sort through clutter and find the best route.
Woo	You win others over.