Strengths Finder

| December 2008 Posted in Consulting, News, Personal Development |

0 Comments Tags: Business, skills, strengths, talents

Team Work When you started your business (or maybe you are considering starting a business) did you go to school and get a degree in finance, business management, marketing, law, sales, and all the other important things that you need to know in order to run a business?

Well don’t worry, just in case you did not know, not every business owner knows everything that it takes to run a business.

I can’t say that I am the smartest when it comes to finances and taxes and those other fun things that change a bit when you are a business owner. And it would be dumb to just let those things be neglected and consider them less important. Which could easily be done if I wanted to avoid a headache. But instead of trying to cram a bunch of knowledge into my brain and risk it, I hired an Accountant. He has an education in finance and knows the tax laws. Now, I don’t just sit back and let him run the show, I have been educating myself so that I can understand what it is he is suggesting and doing with my money. The key is to not let those things consume your time. I spend my time focusing on the things I am good at!

When you start your business I would recommend that you find your strengths. Play on your strengths and then find others that can add to your weaknesses. You see for a lot of years people have been writing books that tell us how or teach how we can improve our weaknesses. But how many books are their that teach us how to play to our strengths? Don’t get me wrong it is important to improve ourselves and get learn new things, but it is easy to get caught up in what we cant do or those things we are not good at, and we forget the things that are our strengths.

Consider your strengths your talents, or those things that you are naturally good at. And don’t just think in business terms, step outside the box. I talk a lot about relationships, because they are important in every aspect of our lives. If you can not build and maintain relationships you are not likely to succeed.

In Tom Rath’s book ‘Strengths Finder 2.0′, he talks about 34 themes of talents. We do not poses all the talents associated with these themes, but you will find that some of these themes fit you.

Here are the 34 themes:

Achiever
Activator
Adaptability
Analytical
Arranger
Belief
Command
Communication
Competition
Connectedness
Consistency
Context
Deliberative
Developer
Discipline
Empathy
Focus
Futuristic
Harmony
Ideation
Includer
Individualization
Input
Intellection
Learner
Maxamizer
Positivity
Relator
Responsibility
Restorative
Self-Assurance
Significance
Strategic
Woo

I do realize that none of this really makes sense, but let me give you a few definitions of these themes, I will use my top 5 strengths.

Responsibility – People who are especially 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.
Achiever – People who are especially talented in the Achiever theme have a great deal of stamina and work hard. They take great satisfaction from being busy and productive.
Ideation – People who are especially talented in the Ideation theme are fascinated by ideas. They are able to find connections between seemingly disparate phenomena.
Maximizer – People who are especially talented in the Maximizer theme focus on strengths as a way to stimulate personal and group excellence. They seek to transform something strong into something superb.
Relator – People who are especially talented in the Relator theme enjoy close relationships with others. They find deep satisfaction in working hard with friends to achieve a goal.

When you know your strengths you will know what areas you should focus on when building your business. They can also tell you, what types of people you should relay on for advice and support. For example, my number 5, I find satisfaction in working with friends to achieve goals. If I was going to develop a mastermind group, I would look to my friends for support first.

There is one other valuable step that Tom provides in his book that should be applied in your business, an Action Plan! For each of your strengths you are going to need to establish an action plan. Plan to make your strengths your core, or to make them more prevalent in the way you manage and run your business.

When you play to your strengths you will see a much higher level of success in your business, family and all areas of your life.

I think that when we are running a business, especially a new business we have our hands in too many cookie jars. We are trying to perform ever act at the circus, when our perfected act is to perform the walk across the high-wire. Just like pretending to be the lion tamer can prove to be fatal, so can pretending to be the accountant when you know nothing about tax laws and business money management.