StrengthsFinder strengths

Important: How Do You Keep Your Strengths Top of Mind?

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Because our StrengthsFinder® strengths are so natural to us, we tend to forget about them. When we forget, we negate the power of developing our strengths. It’s so fulfilling and rewarding to strengthen strengths! What’s one thing you can do on a daily basis to strengthen your strengths?

StrengthsFinder® Mini Case Study

Ann: My Activator would love to run the show. Ready, fire, aim is NOT the best strategy.

To make sure I’m activating the right things at the right time, I’ve put Connectedness in charge of all my strengths. Connectedness views things holistically and knows what’s most important.

Once Connectedness sees the direction, then Activator can engage Maximizer, Strategic, Empathy and Individualization in a far more beneficial way. Hooray – ready, aim, fire.

This Is as Important as the Top 5 Strengths

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Which of the top 5 strengths are in which of the 4 domains?

Of the 34 strengths, 17 of the strengths relate to people and 17 relate to task. The people strengths are 9 relationship-building strengths and 8 influencing strengths. The task strengths are 9 executing strengths and 8 thinking strengths.

All combinations of strengths have equal capacity for contribution. And those contributions will vary wildly based on how many strengths are in which domains.

Mini Case Study
Janae: two Executing Strengths and three Relationship Building Strengths.

Keith: all 5 strengths are Thinking Strengths.

What kind of contributions might Janae make?
What kind of contributions might Keith make?
How would they work well together?
What might be areas of conflict?

While we could answer these questions more specifically if we knew their exact strengths, we can also understand what’s important to them just by looking at the domains.

StrengthsFinder® – What is the Genius of the Top 5 Strengths?

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With each person I work with, I’m endlessly fascinated by what they can do beautifully and effortlessly. This naturally happens when their top 5 strengths are all working well together.

You can recognize this when a person is feeling fulfilled and energized and in the flow. Start with yourself. Then begin having this life-changing conversation with people you serve.

Mini Case Study
Adam: Strategic, Futuristic, Ideation, Significance, Achiever
He used to feel frustrated by being labeled the crazy thinker in the room. Owning his top 5 StrengthsFinder strengths, he realized he needed to start projects and businesses. Today he’s happiest and most effective when he’s creating structure for big visions.

Let me know if you or someone you serve would like to be featured in the Mini Case Study.

What Makes This a Good Life for You?

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Recently, I noticed something that might seem obvious.

When we get to be ourselves, we tend to be happy.

This struck me after I coached two clients back-to-back. The first client is doing work she loves that really engage all of her strengths doing work she is passionate about. The second client is doing too much of the back office work in his business instead of the creative work he loves.

Both at work and at home, the more all of our strengths and interests are engaged, the more life feels good to us. When our strengths are frustrated, overused or underused, well, we just aren’t very happy.

What Makes this a Good Life for You?

The simple act of taking this photo makes my own top strengths super happy.  Maximizer loves the symmetry I captured.  Empathy feels the artist.  Connectedness feels the connection of art, artist, nature and art appreciator.  Activator just had to take the picture.  Individualization chose to photograph only two pieces and this was one of them.

What about you? If you know your StrengthsFinder strengths, please do share your ideas and insights below.

If you’d like more direction for your good life, take the Gallup StrengthsFinder assessment. And, if you’d like some strengths coaching, I’d be happy to help!

Join the conversation – comment below.

Waste of Time or My Strengths at Play?

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Yesterday as I was preparing my fruit for breakfast, I took a spontaneous detour. I like my fruit room temperature (Individualization and Empathy toward myself) and I’d forgotten to take cuties out the fridge.

So I peeled a cold one and decided I wanted it warmer before I ate it. I started laying out the segments so they could warm quickly with air circulating around each individual segment. Activator and Strategic at work.

Waste of Time or My Strengths at Play AStrong

As I was doing that, my Maximizer, Connectedness and Strategic noticed a fun pattern. So, I created an amusing art piece for me, and now for you! And, after a few minutes, I ate it.

So fun!

What say you: waste of time or my strengths at play?

Join the conversation – comment below.

Strong You, Strong Work

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In the past few weeks, I’ve needed more support than usual from my own coach. And, most of my clients have needed more support from me. One day last week, I received two frantic emails in one day. The subject line of one of them was: Help!

In the 20 years I’ve been coaching, I’d never received a “Help!” email before that. I’ve been wondering what’s in the air.

And then I realized what might be more productive: let you know a bit about how I can help.

AStrong-Buffalo

Buffalo medicine includes abundance, manifestation, generosity, protection and courage.
Artist Karen Windchild. In Eldorado, New Mexico.

 

Whenever you’re ready, here are 4 ways I can help you:


StrengthsFinder

1. Strong Work:
I can’t believe I get paid to do this! audio program
Imagine spending more of your work time fully engaged and feeling fulfilled . . .
When you focus and leverage your strengths, you’ll advance your career or get clients to hire you! Click to learn more.

2. Strong Couple
StrengthsFinder Coaching with me
What would it be like to enjoy more peace, love and understanding in your romantic relationship? When you each know and honor your own and each others’ strengths, that’s exactly what happens. Click to learn more.


Coaching

3. Strong from Within Transformation Forum, group program
How would your life be different if your strongest relationship was the one with yourself? When you focus on yourself, all areas of your life and business improve. Give yourself and the world the gift of more of you! Click to learn more.

4. Work with me one-on-one.
(For established coaches and business owners.)
I have a limited number of coaching opportunities available for established coaches and business owners who want to make more of an impact. When you commit to your greatest contribution, miracles happen. If this sounds like you, email me at Ann@AnnStrong.com, put One-on-One in the subject line and tell me about your Big Dream. I’ll reply to schedule a Coaching Conversation for us to determine if we’d be a good fit.

What about you? Have you needed more support? Been supporting more? What are you noticing?

As always, post your comments, experiences and insights below …

Do You Have One of the 5 Powerhouse Strengths?

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Recently, one of my coaching colleagues asked me about my observation of StrengthsFinder strengths that seem to have tremendous potential to both wreak havoc or make a huge contribution.

It was so much fun to share with her that I thought you might like to know – particularly if you have one, or more, of these 5 powerhouse strengths in your top 5.

Do You Have One of the 5 Powerhouse Strengths?

The 5: Responsibility, Restorative, Significance, Competition and Empathy.

The powerhouse effect can show up positively. Responsibility CAN be counted on. Restorative WILL solve the problem. Empathy DOES feel others’ feelings. Significance WILL make a huge contribution. Competition WILL win.

And, the powerhouse effect, can have negative results . . .

Let’s look at how your strength might go into overdrive and drain you . . .

Examples:

  • Responsibility being overly responsible to others at the expensive of your own health and/or well-being.
  • Empathy taking in everybody else’s feelings without an outlet. They then don’t pass through you, but rather take up residence inside you.

How might your strength be used immaturely?

Examples:

  • Restorative creating a problem where there isn’t one, so you can fix it.
  • Significance making a pest of itself by needing to be important, rather than contributing something important.

– How might your strength cause chaos or upset?

Example:

  • Competition not having something meaningful in which to compete, so you become depressed or make competitions about meaningless things and alienate those around you.

All 34 StrengthsFinder strengths can, and do, go into overdrive, show up immaturely and cause chaos or upset. All 34 also can, and do, make amazing contributions.

And, it has been my observation over the past 10 years, working with hundreds and hundreds of people around their strengths that these 5 strengths can feel particularly burdensome if we don’t stay on top of managing them properly.

For years, I wanted to give back my Empathy. While I was earnestly looking for the Returns Department, I had the good fortune to meet a coach who rocks Empathy in her top 5. She naturally receives the gift of Empathy without taking on the burden.

She has taught me so much. I no longer want to give back Empathy. And, I’m still learning how to be graciously detached!

As always, post your comments, experiences and insights below, especially if you have Rsp, Rst, Sig, Cmp or Emp in your top 5 …

2 Factors that Make a Strong Relationship

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I’m in the middle of reading a StrengthsFinder book, Strengths Based Marriage, by Jimmy Evans and Allan Kelsey.  The subtitle, Build a Stronger Relationship by Understanding Each Other’s Gifts, is an understatement.

2 Factors that Make a Strong Relationship

In my own relationships and in working with many couples around their relationships and each of their StrengthsFinder (now CliftonStrengths) strengths, I’ve found a profoundly deeper level of appreciation for our partners when we know and understand our own and our partner’s top strengths.

The two factors that naturally create strong relationships:
1.  Not taking differences personally.
2.  Noticing and championing the gifts of our partners’ strengths.

When my clients “Anna” and “Josh” learned their own and each others’ StrengthsFinder strengths, they immediately had far fewer arguments.  When I asked them exactly what had shifted, neither of them knew at first.  As we talked more, it became clear that they weren’t taking things personally anymore.

Both of them realized that the other wasn’t trying to hurt them, but rather they were naturally doing what their strengths guided them to do.  The more we talked and they came to understand the specifics of the others’ strengths, the more they appreciated the differences that the other brought to their partnership.

The second factor, after knowing our own and our partner’s StrengthsFinder strengths involves being willing to notice and champion the gifts, rather than the differences (which we often interpret as “wrong”) in both our own and our partners’ strengths.

For example, my partner has Deliberative in his top 5 strengths.  Deliberative makes decisions thoughtfully and carefully.  I have Activator in my top 5.  I jokingly call in my “dive in the pool and on the way down see if there’s any water” strength.

You can probably imagine if I hadn’t known our top 5 strengths, I would have thought my way of making decisions was right and his frustratingly wrong.

Because I did know our strengths, I deeply appreciated some decisions were far better made with his Deliberative in the mix.  I also had more patience than I would normally have had when he needed to think things through because I knew that was his process and he was good at making great decisions that way.

The more I work with individuals and couples around strengths, the more excited I get about facilitating far less misunderstandings and far greater respect and appreciation!

If you would love to give and receive more love, appreciation and understanding in your relationship, I have 2 openings in August for Strong Couple StrengthsFinder Coaching packages.

Get the details here:
http://annstrong.com/strong-couple-strengthsfinder-coaching/

As always, post your comments, experiences and insights below . . .

How Do You Know If You’re Living Your True Nature?

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“A fish cannot drown in water.
A bird does not fall in air.
Each creature God made
must live in its own true nature.”
~ Mechthild of Magdeburg

For us humans, we are the only species that has the joy and the burden of discovering, remembering, our own specific true nature. We each have free will to live or not live our true natures.

We can work a job that hurts our soul or spend a lifetime wishing we had different strengths. Or, we can courageously create work that celebrates our true nature and embraces our strengths.

One of my private coaching clients has Executing and Influencing strengths in her top 5 strengths. She used to wish she had some Relationship Building strengths. Instead of wishing, we began to coach her around how to create good relationships with the strengths she does have. The work has paid off beautifully because her desire for close relationships is part of her true nature.

Another client who has mostly Strategic Thinking strengths in his top 5 strengths spent much of his life feeling bad because he was considered the “crazy thinker” in a room of doers. Today he has started a company that embraces his Strategic Thinking nature. I have no doubt that his name will one day be well-known for the huge contribution of his true nature.

And, another client hired me to mentor her to become a business coach. She would have been an excellent business coach, but her heart wasn’t in it. Today she runs a non-profit that provides addiction recovery and education. She passionately writes and speaks about this issue that is so meaningful to her.

How Do You Know If You’re Living Your True Nature?
Ah, to live our true nature as effortlessly as these little loves! Might we be over-working it?

So how do we each know our own true nature?

By paying attention to what lights you up, what energizes you, what engages you.

When do you feel most alive? In what situations do you make contributions that feel effortless? Or that require focus and effort, yet feel meaningful and fulfilling to you?

When do you feel most you? When do you have the sense, “I was born for this”? When does time stand still for you? Or fly by? When do you feel connected – body, mind, heart and spirit?

How might the world shift if we all were living our true natures? Oh my goodness, that question gets me out of bed in the morning . . .

I’d love to hear your experiences . . . post them below in the comments section . . .

Might you like coaching
to discover, remember and live your true nature?

Let’s have a conversation to see if you and your situation would be a good fit for Strong from Within coaching. My gift to you.

I keep a few openings in my schedule for these important conversations – Access my calendar here now.

(Excerpted from my forthcoming book, “Strong from Within: Simple perceptions and practices for transforming stress and overwhelm into clarity and purpose”)

No Permission Needed

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Confident Vulnerability changed my life. I learned this empowering way of being in my advanced StrengthsFinder® training a couple of years ago. Thank you DeAnna Murphy of Strengths Strategy!

Confident Vulnerability looks like this.

I know what I am. I know what I’m not. I’m comfortable, confident and non-judgmental with and embrace both. I am confident in my strengths and vulnerable about the needs of my strengths and my weaknesses. This also allows me to embrace what you are and what you are not without judgment.

Full disclosure: I am still working on doing all of this more consistently.

And, as I embraced confident vulnerability as a way of life, I quit trying to hide or apologize for my weaknesses. That then freed a bunch of energy to be more fully who I am without messing around in the areas of who I’m not.

And one day recently, it occurred to me that I do not need permission to be who I am, to do what I do, to live how I live, to explore what I feel drawn to explore.

And, neither do you.

How would the world shift if we all lived in confident vulnerability, full out, unapologetically?

What if we weren’t afraid of what people will think?

I do love doing my part.

Last week I was in San Diego attending the Ascend conference. Anyone who knows me well knows that I’m not exactly the athletic type. Well, after hanging with my 12-year-old nephew Justin and 15-year-old niece Hailey, in the few minutes each evening in San Diego before it got dark, I engaged in my new sport.

Yes, I have a new sport.

Ann Strong Blog Post No Permission Needed

Four Square. Yes, the one little kids play. It’s never too late to start. I love this game. Who wants to come to the Land of Enchantment and join me?

No permission needed. Permission slips unnecessary as well!

(Excerpted from my forthcoming book, “Strong from Within: Simple perceptions and practices for returning to the joy of you”)