How can you help college students identify their strengths and weaknesses for successful goal setting?

Self awareness, self knowledge, self love, self respect will contribute to successful growth. Careful active listening to what is said and not said by others will also contribute to success

"Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."

Its crucial to know your strengths as well as your weaknesses. Let's say for example you are shy and therefore poor in public speaking. Once you understand and appreciate that you have this weakness, you can easily be trained in public speaking. No one knows everything. I lost my self confidence back in lower primary school due to intimidation and didn't have it till I accepted it was a challenge almost 10 years later and purposely worked tirelessly towards improving myself....

Knowing your strength and weakness…. What if we call them differently What if we call them what I love to do and what I have to learn to do. I believe changing the terms the words that have an imprint in our believes can make a difference in the way we judge ourself Being weak has a negative imprint in ourselves. As a coach and a NLP practitioner I always look for easy ways to change the view or the perspective in our life. So I can help you to identify the tho of the you love to do. Focus on them and the thing that you need to learn a new way to look at them so they also became easy to do.

Creating that awareness first to show the understanding that people are different, no one is perfect and everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. The students need to know it’s on to have your strength and it’s especially ok to have weaknesses and sometimes our weaknesses gives us the avenue to get better, stronger and helps us evolve better

I have asked this question to students in my classes You will be surprised to know that not many of them even know what strengths do they have - Tell them about resilience - Ask students to take a pause and reflect on their decisions -Don't overthink things When life throws lemons at you, how do you plan to deal with those lemons is what can identify your strength. Experience is always your best friend when it comes to identifying both strengths and weaknesses I always tell my students to reflect on their actions and reactions

First find career opportunities then see what strengths would be needed. Dont invert the pyramid by seeing strengths and trying to fit Career opportunity accordingly. Thats a very old school model.

I believe the best way to know our strengths is to list the situations in life when we were so engrossed that we lost track of time. When we felt a sense of happiness and achievement, even without external validation or recognition. These moments reveal our true selves and our deepest passions.

Some ways to identify are: 1) Self reflection based on experience 2) Open and honest conversations with Inner circle family and friends, Mentors and Coaches. 3) Leveraging tools like Gallup's StrengthsFinder, my personal recommendation as I have gained huge when I've analyzed that report. This helped me in maximizing my strengths and is a reflection of who I am. They influence and impact our streams, careers and conversations and take us to the next level in our personal and professional life. By identifying strengths, I realized how and why certain experiences and situations are unique to me and how I was able to stay ahead in both personal and professional journey. Identify your strengths and see what it makes you to get to the Top 1% !

I encourage my students to explore using validated self-assessment tools, such as personality tests (like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) and strength finders (like Gallup's CliftonStrengths). These tools can provide insights into their natural talents and areas for improvement. It is not the end all be all for self assessment but it can serve as a starting point to build perspective and the language of where their strengths may be. I use these tools as exercises in my classes and discuss the results as a class. Its uncomfortable in the beginning but the students love it!

I became certified to administer the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)?? because I found it to be so helpful in understanding myself and others. It identifies patterns that are natural to how we take in information and make decisions based on how we see the world and what’s important to us. It can also show us blind spots and biases that we can overcome once we know we’re prone to them. For example, some types tend to wait to see if anything new will come up, and that looks a lot like procrastination. Others are more set in their ways and less open to new ideas, which can cause then to stagnate. Others don’t think ahead to the consequences of their actions when they act. It’s a baseline, and everyone can grow and change.

Seek feedback from four quarters. FAMILY MEMBERS FRIENDS MENTORS YOURSELF Make a list of genuine feedback without any bias. Genuine feedback means without any ill motive or preferences of people pleasing towards you. It should be an absolute non judgemental feedback.

I am a believer that each individual’s greatest room for growth is in their area of greatest strength. People excel by maximizing their strengths, not merely fixing their weaknesses. One can learn to manage around their weaknesses, however, they’ll be unable to truly excel by just focusing on incremental improvements on their weaker areas.

For college students who has just started to understand their own strengths and weaknesses, I would say, use your strengths as much as you can and see if they are really your strengths, and try out your weaknesses in some secondary tasks. You may discover a lot more about yourselves. Do not pigeonhole yourselves!

A lot of people will try to improve their weaknesses, which is helpful. However, it’s also helpful to outsource things or get training that would take you longer to do and cause you to miss oppportunities to capitalize on your strengths. For example, if you are having trouble with a messy space but are good at tutoring, you could trade with a classmate that they’ll help you clean in exchange for tutoring. If you’re weak at time management, you can find someone who is good at that to help you set up systems and alarms and reminders. Be aware that it’s possible to become too one-sided and only use your strengths, or double down on improving your weaknesses at the expense of time you could be using your strengths. Balance is key.

After teaching a Personality Theory course at a University for two years, I HIGHLY recommend any college student take the Strengths Quest test, and acquire the accompanying book. The test is a very positive, strengths identifier, and the book can point you to specific occupations where those strengths. would flourish! Most people do not adequately SEE their strengths, as they have always lived with them! Also, someone's strengths can often be "squashed" by family or friends - inadvertently, as certain traits come forth to a great degree and may make others uncomfortable. I believe strengths are God-given, and nothing is more fulfilling than to function where those strengths can be encouraged and utilized!

To me the most important thing in life is to find your passion, what gets you excited and what can you picture yourself doing every day that will give you a feeling that you are living out your calling. Establishing your strengths and weaknesses around this can put your goals in perspective, building around your passion and your dreams.

One of the most common mistakes we make is choosing a career because everyone said it was right and building our lives around it. Instead, we should design our lives based on our strengths and passions, and choose a career that fits.

If school is too much of a struggle, you might have picked a major that doesn’t align with who you are and what you’re naturally drawn to. Knowing your MBTI?? type and RIASEC score from the Strong Interest Inventory?? can provide data to show you if you’re on the right career path, or if something else would be a better fit. University is 4 years or more if you need an advanced degree. I like to say before you start climbing the ladder, make sure it’s up against the right wall.

Students can often access many of these assessments through the career center on campus. It is advantageous to use these resources well before you're looking for a job. Identifying strengths and weaknesses and setting goals are excellent first steps to take early in your college career. Then, you can build on that knowledge as you search for internships and explore how your values align with your future employment goals. Gaining self-knowledge is a significant first step in building your early career!

In goal setting in college years, look for what will make you engaged and motivated and develop you as a person. Connect your goals with your purpose and mission and how that can be developed through the work that you will do, studies chosen. Long term having goals that are aligned with personal values and strengths contribute to a meaningful and happy life, reduces the risk of burnout and social isolation. Look for opportunities that enhance the sense of belonging, community and contribution. Link your goals to a bigger why, bigger than your basic and immediate needs and then identify the road map to get there. Achieving 80% of audacious goals is more fulfilling that achieving 100% of ordinary goals, inspired by Thomas Zurbuchen.

Also, having worked where ALL the students, at the University where I taught, were assigned to take the Strengths Quest personality test, I know one student who was approaching graduation, shared that the most helpful part of his entire education was when he learned what his strengths were from the Strengths Quest test. Additionally, it is helpful for interpersonal relations. For instance, my husband took this test, at my request, and his top strength was Input. Now someone who obtains a high Input score LOVES to read and accumulates many books (true of him), and accumulates articles (true), and records (true), and is constantly gathering information. This helped me to understand his various "collections"! And to understand him better!