Career Advice: Use Core Strengths
Your Career Self Assessment Should Include a Core Strength Analysis
Advance your career by recognizing your unique core strengths and capitalizing on them.
Advance your personal and professional growth with this career advice: Take a free career self assessment to determine your core strengths and use them to give you the best opportunity to succeed.
The Flaw of Performance Reviews
Many large organizations use performance review programs that encourage employees to focus on improving what they don't do well; weaknesses or areas for development. The assumption is that improving your least effective capabilities will upgrade your overall performance.
Don't believe it!
Positive Psychology Studies
Current research studies in the field of positive psychology indicate people are most productive and happiest when they do what they do best. Whether you're an entrepreneur running your own business or an employee, you'll be most productive, happiest, and more likely to succeed when you incorporate your core strengths in nearly everything you do.
Core Strengths
What is a core strength? Recall a time or times when you were so wrapped up in some activity that you lost track of time, seemed to have boundless energy and enthusiasm, and hated to stop for sleep or food. At that time, you were using one or more of your core strengths. Do you recall how satisfying that was?
Using a core strength often brings with it the very satisfying and energizing experience called Flow. Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, in his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (Harpercollins, March 1990) describes Flow as the feeling of complete and energized focus in an activity, with a high level of enjoyment and fulfillment
When we're in the flow, using our core strengths, we're at our best. We're energetic, creative, and fulfilled. We immensely enjoy what we're doing. In contrast, an activity requiring abilities that we're not very good at is at best boring and at worst a drudgery.
A Self Assessment of Your Strengths
Psychologist Dr. Martin Seligman, author of Authentic Happiness, (Free Press, 2002) terms core strengths Signature Strengths, the five strengths at which you excel. You can identify your core or signature strengths with the free VIA questionnaire.
Succeed With Strengths
No matter what your job, your business, or the personal task you're undertaking, if you can find a way to utilize one or more of your core or signature strengths you'll enjoy what you're doing and you'll do it well. You'll have an opportunity to enter that very satisfying arena called Flow.
What About Weaknesses?
Find an alternative for those tasks that don't lend themselves to your signature strengths. If you're an entrepreneur or manager, assign those tasks to someone else. If you're an employee, get creative and find a way to modify your responsibilities to minimize the number of tasks that require your weakest capabilities.
Sure, you can learn to get a bit better at anything you put your mind to, but why spend time and energy getting a bit better at the expense of abilities at which you already excel? Focus on your core or signature strengths to be most productive, happiest, and successful.
Incorporate Strengths Each Day
Keep an index card of your core strengths in easy view. Tape it to your monitor, your bathroom mirror, or somewhere that will catch your attention each day. Consciously search for ways to use one of your top strengths every day. Soon, it will be automatic and you'll notice that you're not only getting more done, you're enjoying it more.
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