Discovering, Growing, and Applying My Strengths in Leadership

If you were to ask a room full of professionals what leadership meant to them, each individual would provide you with a unique answer. The truth is that there are many sides to leadership, and at the core of every good leader lies many different strengths. Dr. Donnie Bechtel began the first day of my Honors Supply Chain Leadership Colloquium class 6 weeks ago by asking us this question. Since then, my definition has drastically changed and continues each day as I learn more about myself and others. After taking the Clifton Strengths Finder assessment, I must apply my strengths to my definition of leadership and to the leader I want to become.

Discovering My Strengths

Clifton Strengths Finder is a book and an assessment that measures the intensity of your talents in each of the 34 themes and gives you 5 main themes you possess the most. The idea of the test is to identify your strengths and how to build on those to make you a better leader; not focusing on weaknesses.

“A person can perform only from strength. One cannot build performance on weakness, let alone on something one cannot do at all.”

Initial Reaction

Upon receiving my results I was initially shocked, as I think of myself as a very strategic thinker, and was surprised that I didn't possess any of the leadership traits that fall under that category. However, as I read more about my 5 main traits, I resonated with each of them and understood my results from the test. I have always enjoyed connecting and communicating with those around me which explains my top four strengths being categorized under influencing and relationship building. As a goal-driven person, I was not surprised by one of my strengths falling under executing.

How My Strengths Will Apply to My Leadership Style

1. Communication is something that I have always been good at; I know how to put my thoughts into words and I am eager to strike up a conversation with anyone. When others struggle to articulate their thoughts, I am the first to step up and help them communicate their point. As a leader, I will strive to make sure that everyone feels heard and will help those around me share their feelings openly. I will offer a place where everyone can speak and be heard freely.
2. Woo stands for "winning others over" especially in regards to new people. As a leader, you must first earn the trust of your team. I will use my "woo" to do this. Woo isn't just about ensuring that I am liked as a leader, but that everyone feels connected and supported by me.
3. Competition, in this context, concerns not only competition with others but also with myself. I will use my competition to measure my success in my tasks as a leader. I will also use competition as a way to look up to other people as role models in my career and strive to be like them.
4. Positivity is a trait that I use every single day and will continue to each day as a leader. Positivity is about praising those around you and expressing your confidence in them. I look up to leaders around me who pour into me with positivity and I will strive to be that person for others.
5. As an achiever, I have a constant need for attainment and feeling fulfilled in my work. Once one project is done, I am thinking about how I will execute the next. As a leader, I will use this strength in unison with my others to encourage and help those around me to achieve their goals as well as my own. I will not feel fulfilled in my leadership until I am confident that everything is done that needs to be done.

Growing My Strengths

Now that I have identified and learned about my strengths, I must work on growing each of them to become a good leader. To improve my communication, I will practice active listening and ask others around me for feedback on my communication style. To grow my woo skills, I will work on growing my network and making more connections. I will also work on being more vulnerable and authentic to deepen my connections with others. I will set personal growth for myself to practice channeling my competition internally. For positivity, I will grow by celebrating every victory, big or small, and work on showing more gratitude to those around me. Lastly, to grow my achieving strength I will work on taking time to reflect on things I did well and how to apply that to future tasks. All of these strengths will work together and be equally important in my future as a leader.

Manager vs. Leader

At the beginning of this semester, I would not have been able to give you a clear answer about the difference between a manager and a leader. After reading an article by John Kotter, What Leaders Really Do, I was opened up to the differences between the two. Kotter explains that managers execute, while leaders guide the way. Managers answer the questions of "how" while leaders answer the question of "what" and "why."

Management is about “coping with complexity” and leadership is about “coping with change.”

Applying My Strengths

The key to a good leader is continually growing and adapting. Change is constant in supply chain, and a strong leader can use their strengths to continuously adapt to new challenges. I am glad that I have learned my strengths; however, I recognize the need to work on them every day to grow into the leader that I want to become. I anticipate that in my supply chain career, I will use communication the most. Communication is at the core of everything, and I can use it as one of my strengths to grow into a strong leader. This assessment has given me the tools that I need to become a strong leader, and I believe that it will be useful in my future career.