Success is about getting what you want out of life. Building on strengths is the path to fulfillment and achievement in life. Fostering a culture of building on strengths is the path to accelerating performance.
Research from the Gallup Organization shows that:
- 87% believe that fixing weaknesses is the best way to accelerate performance
- Only 17% of the workforce believe they use all of their strengths on the job
- Only 20% spend most time on strengths during performance reviews
The following three strategies will help you build on strengths to accelerate performance.
1. Identify your strengths.
- Strengths Finder (e.g., Achiever, Relator, Learner, Self-assurance, WOO) (Strengths Based Leadership by Tom Rath and Barry Conchie)
- Emotional Intelligence is a 26% predictor of job performance (self awareness, interpersonal, stress, adaptability, mood)
2. Rate your top 30 activities.
List your top 30 work-related activities. For each activity, assess your ability to do each one based on the descriptions below:
- Masterful: extraordinary ability; passion; gives you energy
- Excellent: superior ability; no real sense of passion
- Competent: adequate ability; boredom; little improvement in performance over time
- Incompetent: inadequate ability; failure; stressful
3. Delegate your competent and incompetent activities.
Spend 80% of your time in areas of mastery and excellence to achieve extraordinary results.
Adapted from the book: The Talent Advantage by Dr. Alan Weiss and Dr. Nancy MacKay, published by Wiley.
