Time Mastery: How to Build on Strengths to Accelerate Results

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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.