Turning Talents into Strengths
In the culture of business today, many companies are focused on developing or fixing the weaknesses of their company or more importantly, of their team. We were recently introduced to the StrengthsFinder? process and assessment and find the concept both fascinating and exhilarating!
With the facilitation by our very own Lorri Kelley, CSMO and Founder of Lorri Kelley Advisors, we were able to nail down some specifics in order for our leadership team to really hone in on who brings what to the table to better work together serve UNITERS, each other and untimely, our customers and clients. Lorri has put dozens of companies through this assessment and corresponding Team Strengths Grid, to also articulate how the team can best utilize those strengths to improve how they interact together daily.
What is StrengthsFinder? you may be asking?
We asked Wiki - It is a self-help book written by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, first published in 2001. At the heart of the book is the internet based "Clifton Strengths Finder," an online personal assessment test that outlines the user's strengths based on completing a series of questions. The authors advocate focusing on building strengths rather than focusing on weaknesses.
The theory behind the book is that each adult individual possesses a certain number of fixed universal personal-character attributes, defined by the authors as "talent themes," which, together, result in an individual's tendency to develop certain skills more easily and excel in certain fields in a sustainable way while failing or not being able to sustain success or high levels of effectiveness in other fields.
The authors claim that by identifying the individual strength of the members of the organization, its members can be utilized in more suiting positions, hence developing the required skills easily, helping to reduce turnover, improve employee morale and the organization's overall performance. (Wiki)
“What I love about the content of StrengthsFinder is that when you take the time to identify a person’s strengths, and then put them into a position to best utilize and work to leverage those strengths, you get a happy, dedicated and amazingly productive person in the workplace”, said Kelley. “We have all been told throughout our lives that we can be whatever we want to be if we just work hard enough. The reality is that this statement not true - you cannot be whatever you want to be, but you CAN be extraordinary at who you are now if given the right opportunity, position and environment to thrive!”
"We all know that for a business to succeed it needs a strategy, but do we know that for a strategy to succeed it needs the right people, in the right place, at the right time.” said Gordon Higgs, UNITERS CEO. "So how you successfully identify those opportunities really must begin with identifying their strengths, and that is where using the StrengthsFinder? analysis truly helps. By identifying your team members talents, and then comparing them to the strengths of the rest of the team, you create a beautiful road map to put the entire team in a position to help ensure their long-term success and overall job fulfillment."
How do we intend to use the results from our tests? By discovering our teams’ talents, we are basically giving the team permission to flex them intentionally and to better utilize those strengths for the greater good of the company. We are encouraging each other to use them daily to achieve the goals we have set out as well as reaching out to others on the team to work more closely together utilizing their talents and skills. There are 34 different types of strengths and when you blend some together you better be ready for what comes next! Allowing our team to flexibility to run with their strengths better strengthens, no pun intended, our mission and in the end that is what we want. Ultimately the ones to best benefit are the relationships we have with our clients! This makes UNITERS an extremely valued partner to their business.
UNITERS North America