New to Strengths-based working? Read this
If you are new to strengths-based working then this post is for you.
Teaming up with Strengths Consultancy will allow you and your organization to do what you do best every single day.
To understand strengths-based working, we will first clarify what strengths are. Everyone has a unique set of strengths that impact how we work and when we work the best. Your strengths are your natural talents. There are 34 recognized strengths in total. For each person, these can be ranked from most natural to least natural talents. The first ten strengths are the ones you should especially focus on, care for, and learn from. If you manage and understand your strengths well, the insight will enable you to improve all areas of your life.
The CliftonStrengths Assessment
To discover your strengths, you have to complete an assessment test named CliftonStrengths that takes around 30 minutes. The test will introduce you to pairs of questions that you have to consider. The test is fast-paced and forces you to go with your initial thoughts and gut feelings.
Overall, the 34 strengths are divided into four domains. Namely, Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building, and Strategic Thinking. Your strengths will be located within these domains, which allows you to see if certain ways of acting are predominantly present for you. However, the domains merely provide an overview, whereas the specific strength combinations carry the most significance.
There are 278,256 possible top five talent combinations possible. In fact, chances are one in 33 million that someone has the same top five as you. This shows how unique your specific ranking and the interplay between your talents is, and also why you should seek coaching to really understand what the strength combination means for you.
And now?
After discovering your strengths and receiving your report, what should you do? General advice is to read the report thoroughly, to identify the works of your top ten. However, there is much more to each strength than what could possibly be explained in a short report, which is why we, Strength Consultancy, exists. You will receive coaching and discuss your strengths in-depth, to understand how your strengths affect your daily life and how to utilize and practice your talents.
What about reliability?
To answer this question, Gallup, who is the founder of the CliftonStrengths test, ensures exemplary test-retest results. Meaning that people who complete the test and later on try the test again are highly likely to get the same results. Even when they try the test many years later. Usually, the results also resonate very strongly with people and they are able to identify the strengths in their actions and thus confirm that it is reliable.
A misconception is that after you discover your strengths all things run smoothly, however, this is not correct. The key is to know how to strengthen your strengths. Indeed the talents do show what you find satisfaction in and what your natural responses are but in order to get this satisfaction, you need to know how to structure your work around these talents.
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