What are your strengths?

Last week, we had a two day seminar on the Strength Finders program by Gallup. Following an extensive questionnaire, Gallup determined that – out of 34 possible strengths – my top 5 are:

1. Achiever

2. Intellection

3. Context

4. Input

5. Learner

Achiever means that I don’t feel good at the end of the day unless I have in some way been productive. It also means that I often have a gnawing sense that I could have done more. This is the ghost of the unanswered e-mails, the pending projects, etc. Achiever has an upside (i.e. several earned degrees), but the “shadow side” for me means finding it hard to relax.

Intellection means processing things mentally. This requires space and time. I’m typing this on a blog, probably a pretty good indicator of intellection!

Context signifies wanting to know the background to a situation before acting. It’s the historian’s gift, and can be very helpful, as long as wanting to know background doesn’t become an excuse not to act.

Input and learner go together. It is collecting and classifying data, as well as hunger to know more about the world. Like context, the shadow side of these strengths might be paralysis, or simply categorizing data rather than using them for some good purpose.

Since we did this activity in a group, each of us wore a name badge listing our top 5. It’s a helpful tool for teams, as we seek mutual understanding and for leaders as they assign tasks to team members in-light of their strengths.

I like how Strengths Finder focuses not on who I am not, but rather on who I am. When I know where I’m strong I can maximize those abilities for the best possible impact.

Are you interested in discovering your strengths? You can check it out on Gallup’s website.

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Image: Sport Bay