Each and every individual in this world is unique and different from others in their own way. Each of us has different talents and our strengths and weaknesses vary from others. Just think of all the different athletes that participate in the Olympics or other games; each athlete specializes in his sport and knows how to be the best in that particular field. A sprinter will know exactly when to increase running speed, the shot putter will know how hard to throw, the gymnast will know what technique to use to balance in the air, etc.

All of these are specialists in their field; if they changed sports, you couldn’t expect them to be the best at what they do. If they were to change sports, their strengths would be redundant; they would try to act in areas where they might be weak.

In the business world, managers tend to criticize work and do not tend to encourage or praise staff when they have performed well. Your boss will generally focus on areas you can improve, and you will remember negative comments more than positive, encouraging ones.

Criticism is more memorable and this leads you to work on improving your weaknesses and ignoring your strengths.

This article will provide information on:

• Importance of strengths.
• How to use this tool ( + Affinity diagrams)

Importance of strengths

Managers will highlight areas for improvement to staff. If staff strengths are ignored, performance will not improve.

The reasons are:

If managers constantly focus on staff weaknesses, it won’t encourage them to work in those areas, as negative feedback often makes people defensive. An individual will naturally feel that the observations about her work are not true and may feel that that particular aspect of the work is not relevant anyway. They will not be motivated to improve in that area.

We tend to react well to praise; when we realize that what we are doing is being appreciated, we try to repeat the same thing again in the hope of getting even more praise.

Second, it has been argued that human strengths and weaknesses are fixed to some extent. Therefore, you must be clear about your strengths. The traditional evaluation method does not help to identify strengths, so you need to find a way to identify your strengths and work on them.

The following is an overview of some steps that have been used in the Reflected Best Self technique:

Survey others about your strengths

First, gather around ten or so people who are in a position to give you unbiased and accurate feedback on your strengths. This could include colleagues, former colleagues, friends, and family.

Ask them to think about what their strengths are and to give an example of the strengths they identify. These can be any kind of strengths, not necessarily job related.

If you’re not happy with your current job, it’s important to get feedback from people who know you outside of work. They can identify your real strengths that you have not been able to show at work.

Make sure that the participants in this exercise understand that you are looking to identify and understand their strengths, and not just looking for compliments.

At work, you can do this exercise with your coworkers and let them do it on their own if they want.

However, if you are too shy to ask others to participate in this exercise, you can identify ten people close to you that you have known for quite some time and then write down what you think they would identify as your strengths.

The full version of the How to Appreciate Your Strengths eBook, available at most bookstores, helps you learn how to:

• Identify your strengths
• appreciate your strength
• Play to your strengths