An interesting insight into the self; from Don Clifton, the Father of Strengths Psychology and Inventor of CliftonStrengths. Thanks to Gopal Sir our CFO for sending us the book, as a surprise in the last call at the time of his leaving. No wonder - his skills are Maximiser, arranger, empathy, communication and self assurance.
The aim is to help people focus on their strengths, and not bother or go about their weakness. What the CliftonStrengths assessment actually measures is talent, not strength. But the ultimate goal is to build a true strength, and talent is just one of the ingredients in this formulas. Its easier to add knowledge and skill to your repository, and the assessment don't ask questions about it. The belief is, most successful people start with dominant talent - and then add skills, knowledge and practice to the mix. When they do this, the raw talent actually serves as a multiplier.
Talent (a natural way of thinking, feeling, or behaving) X Investment (time spent practicing, developing your skills and building your knowledge base) = Strength ( the ability to consistently provide near-perfect performance)
These strengths insights describe what makes you stand out when compared with the millions of other people.
The maxim is "You cannot be anything you want to be - but you can be a lot more of who you already are"
At the end of the Part 1 of the book Finding your strengths - An introduction, it asks us to go to the site
press.gallup.com/code/sf2
and redeem the unique access code, to take the assessment, which is valid for one use only. It was an interesting exercise, after which we are to read Part 2 of the book containing Applying your strengths.
We often take our most powerful talents for granted, and many of us may not be fully aware of them.
The ways in which you most naturally think, feel and behave as a unique individual are such a dominant part of you that they are always there - everywhere you go and in everything you do. But because your greatest talents are such a natural part of you, they might be harder for you to identify than for others.
We all need a little help in discovering our greatest talents. That's where the CliftonStrengths assessment comes in. Grounded in decades of the study of talents, strengths and success, your CliftonStrengths report is an invaluable tool to help you find the source of your natural talent.
I enjoyed doing mine:
DOMAIN KEY
Executing themes
help you make things happen. (Black)
Influencing themes
help you take charge, speak up and make sure others are heard. (Brown)
Relationship Building themes help you build strong relationships that hold a team
together. (Blue)
Strategic Thinking themes help you absorb and analyze information that informs
better decisions. (Green)
Responsibility | Input |
Learner | Relator | Individualization
1. Responsibility (Executing): People exceptionally talented in the Responsibility theme take psychological ownership of what they say they will do. They are committed to stable values such as honesty and loyalty.
Driven by your talents, you try to finish the tasks you agreed to do. Perhaps you even overcome some unexpected problems. Occasionally you work longer hours when it is necessary. Maybe you do whatever you can to avoid breaking the promises you made to people. Chances are good that you have a strong sense of commitment. It motivates you to make sure that things are carried through to completion even when difficulties arise. Because of your strengths, you may reject the idea that telling a falsehood about something unimportant is acceptable. Perhaps you refuse to make an innocent social excuse to protect someone’s feelings. By nature, you occasionally take on additional tasks. Why? Maybe you want to keep busy. You may be compelled to assume full ownership of your work. Perhaps you continually discover more things you can do, should do, or must do. Perhaps you willingly accept the consequences of your words, deeds, action, or lack of action. It’s very likely that you sometimes volunteer to do things rather than wait to be asked to assume more duties.
2. Input (Strategic Thinking): People exceptionally talented in the Input theme have a need to collect and archive. They may accumulate information, ideas, artifacts or even relationships.
Driven by your talents, you may pay close attention to specific categories of current events. Some people merely recount what they heard, saw, or read. Perhaps you dive deeper into the topic. You might generate a few theories, concepts, or philosophies to explain some of the reasoning behind certain newsmakers’ decisions. Sometimes you can gather information about events, policy statements, people, or crises. Your fresh insights might draw equally engaged thinkers into the conversation. By nature, you sometimes enjoy instructing others. Because you like to read, you probably have more information to share with your students than some educators do. The individuals you tutor benefit from the facts or insights you gather from the printed page or the computer screen. Instinctively, you absorb the written word like a sponge sops up water. You revel in an opportunity to lose yourself in a book. Time seems to float by when you are the grateful guest of an entertaining or informative author. Your only choice is to finish the book as quickly as possible. Chances are good that you are the team member who usually acquires lots of information by reading all kinds of written material, including newspapers, books, websites or blogs. It’s very likely that you periodically engage in conversations that might allow you to showcase some of your knowledge on a wide range of topics or in a particular area of specialization.
3. Learner (Strategic Thinking): People exceptionally talented in the Learner theme have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve. The process of learning, rather than the outcome, excites them.
Chances are good that you might search for the factors that produced a certain outcome or started a
particular chain of events. Sometimes you are frustrated until you figure out why things happened the way they did. Driven by your talents, you may feel upbeat about life when your desire to acquire knowledge or skills is regularly satisfied. You might grow increasingly unhappy with a job or assignment that fails to challenge your mind. Being forced to do the same thing day after day is sometimes depressing. Even when individuals in positions of authority reward you or tell you how much they value your performance, you may eventually have difficulty disguising your dissatisfaction. It’s very likely that you might yearn to be inspired by your work. You might want experience to be your teacher. You might need to feel enthusiastic about your job or studies. Perhaps the acquisition of knowledge and skills is a lifelong activity for you. You might feel most alive when you study facts, ponder concepts, test theories, or sharpen your skills. You attempt to avoid people and situations that prevent you from expanding your mind. By nature, you might have extra energy to work hard when you are acquiring information to broaden your knowledge base. Perhaps you want to deepen your understanding of certain topics, opportunities, problems, solutions, situations, events, or people. Because of your strengths, you may adopt a more favorable outlook on life when you can identify the conditions that produced certain outcomes. Perhaps you need to know why something did or did not happen. You might be impelled to examine some of the details of specific events, processes, programs, or mechanisms.
4. Relator (Relationship Building): People exceptionally talented in the Relator theme enjoy close relationships with others. They find deep satisfaction in working hard with friends to achieve a goal.
By nature, you may embrace life more fully when you are surrounded by people whose personal aims or professional ambitions are clearly defined. Driven by your talents, you sometimes embody the adage: “If you want to get something done, ask a busy person.” You may deliver peak performances when you can tackle a task. Perhaps you experience a bit of satisfaction each time you accomplish something. You may like being held accountable for your actions or words. Chances are good that you may welcome the questions or concerns voiced by people. You might listen compassionately to some and offer counsel to others. People sometimes seek you out because your insights are helpful. Maybe they appreciate the way you occasionally cause them to think in new ways. Because of your strengths, you might feel upbeat and cheerful when you keep busy. Perhaps you derive satisfaction from producing certain kinds of tangible outcomes. It’s very likely that you may enjoy sharing your point of view with certain individuals who ask, “What do you think?” When you are familiar with the topic, problem, or people involved, you might be comfortable expressing yourself. From time to time, you set out to discover specific facts and weigh them with care before speaking your mind — that is, giving advice or openly stating your ideas.
5. Individualization (Relationship Building): People exceptionally talented in the Individualization theme are intrigued with the unique qualities of each person. They have a gift for figuring out how different people can work together productively.
Driven by your talents, you occasionally choose to be a spectator. As you watch people engaging in
various activities, you might enjoy discovering the unique backgrounds, interests, or talents of each person. Perhaps you find human beings utterly amazing. Maybe you appreciate who they are, what they can contribute, or what they have accomplished. Sometimes these insights fill you with optimism about life and hope for the future. Instinctively, you easily identify with what others are thinking and feeling. You intuitively understand their hopes, fears, joys, and sorrows. This helps you consider things from each individual’s perspective. Chances are good that you can stand in a teammate’s emotional space to gain insights into what that person feels and/or thinks. You probably have a gift for looking at the world through someone else’s experiences. You frequently set aside your opinions, ideas, and/or past history to attune yourself to another human being’s condition. Because of your strengths, you now and then pause to recognize how people are alike and how they are different. Maybe you know a lot about each person’s talents, interests, background, dreams, or limitations. By nature, you might feel more upbeat about life when you unravel the mysteries of a person’s talents, motivations, ambitions, fears, shortcomings, work style, thinking processes, or academic preferences.
Your Signature Themes are very important in maximizing the talents that lead to your successes. By
focusing on your Signature Themes, separately and in combination, you can identify your talents, build
them into strengths, and enjoy personal and career success through consistent, near-perfect performance.
Responsibility:
Your Responsibility theme forces you to take psychological ownership for anything you commit to, and
whether large or small, you feel emotionally bound to follow it through to completion. Your good name
depends on it. If for some reason you cannot deliver, you automatically start to look for ways to make it up to the other person. Apologies are not enough. Excuses and rationalizations are totally unacceptable. You will not quite be able to live with yourself until you have made restitution. This conscientiousness, this near obsession for doing things right, and your impeccable ethics, combine to create your reputation: utterly dependable. When assigning new responsibilities, people will look to you first because they know it will get done. When people come to you for help—and they soon will—you must be selective. Your willingness to volunteer may sometimes lead you to take on more than you should.
Input:
You are inquisitive. You collect things. You might collect information—words, facts, books, and
quotations—or you might collect tangible objects such as butterflies, baseball cards, porcelain dolls, or
sepia photographs. Whatever you collect, you collect it because it interests you. And yours is the kind of mind that finds so many things interesting. The world is exciting precisely because of its infinite variety and complexity. If you read a great deal, it is not necessarily to refine your theories but, rather, to add more information to your archives. If you like to travel, it is because each new location offers novel artifacts and facts. These can be acquired and then stored away. Why are they worth storing? At the time of storing it is often hard to say exactly when or why you might need them, but who knows when they might become useful? With all those possible uses in mind, you really don’t feel comfortable throwing anything away. So you keep acquiring and compiling and filing stuff away. It’s interesting. It keeps your mind fresh. And perhaps one day some of it will prove valuable.
Learner:
You love to learn. The subject matter that interests you most will be determined by your other themes and experiences, but whatever the subject, you will always be drawn to the process of learning. The process, more than the content or the result, is especially exciting for you. You are energized by the steady and deliberate journey from ignorance to competence. The thrill of the first few facts, the early efforts to recite or practice what you have learned, the growing confidence of a skill mastered—this is the process that entices you. Your excitement leads you to engage in adult learning experiences—yoga or piano lessons or graduate classes. It enables you to thrive in dynamic work environments where you are asked to take on short project assignments and are expected to learn a lot about the new subject matter in a short period of time and then move on to the next one. This Learner theme does not necessarily mean that you seek to become the subject matter expert, or that you are striving for the respect that accompanies a professional or academic credential. The outcome of the learning is less significant than the “getting there.”
Relator
Relator describes your attitude toward your relationships. In simple terms, the Relator theme pulls you
toward people you already know. You do not necessarily shy away from meeting new people—in fact, you may have other themes that cause you to enjoy the thrill of turning strangers into friends—but you do derive a great deal of pleasure and strength from being around your close friends. You are comfortable with intimacy. Once the initial connection has been made, you deliberately encourage a deepening of the relationship. You want to understand their feelings, their goals, their fears, and their dreams; and you want them to understand yours. You know that this kind of closeness implies a certain amount of risk—you might be taken advantage of—but you are willing to accept that risk. For you a relationship has value only if it is genuine. And the only way to know that is to entrust yourself to the other person. The more you share with each other, the more you risk together. The more you risk together, the more each of you proves your caring is genuine. These are your steps toward real friendship, and you take them willingly.
Individualization:
Your Individualization theme leads you to be intrigued by the unique qualities of each person. You are
impatient with generalizations or “types” because you don’t want to obscure what is special and distinct
about each person. Instead, you focus on the differences between individuals. You instinctively observe
each person’s style, each person’s motivation, how each thinks, and how each builds relationships. You
hear the one-of-a-kind stories in each person’s life. This theme explains why you pick your friends just the right birthday gift, why you know that one person prefers praise in public and another detests it, and why you tailor your teaching style to accommodate one person’s need to be shown and another’s desire to “figure it out as I go.” Because you are such a keen observer of other people’s strengths, you can draw out the best in each person. This Individualization theme also helps you build productive teams. While some search around for the perfect team “structure” or “process,” you know instinctively that the secret to great teams is casting by individual strengths so that everyone can do a lot of what they do well.
Remember the story - Mark Twain once described a man who died and met Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates - and asked him who was the greatest general of all times - as he was interested in Military history. Saint Peter pointed out to a common laborer, who the man knew. Saint Peter said, only if he had been.
Our natural talents and passions - the things we truly love to do - last for a lifetime, but mostly goes untapped.
