Strengthsfinder 2.1 Analysis

Strengths Finder 2.0, an online test that proposes to find your talents best suited for development. Another personality test in a sea of others, Strengths Finder does little to distinguish itself. Through poor wording, ambiguity, and no fact checks available, Strengths Finder 2.0 does not seem to cross the finish line.

Identifying and understanding your own personal strengths is key to being a successful leader. Knowing your strengths means you can focus your efforts to maximize results, in yourself and in others. Strengths Finder 2.0 is designed to uncover your strengths and utilize these strengths to your advantage (Rath, 2007). Identifying and applying these strengths to your leadership style, will enhance your effectiveness as a transformational leader.

My paper will discuss personal revelations about myself arising from the Clifton Strengths Finder Assessment , delineate the particular thought, behavior, and emotion patterns within the strengths of connectedness, empathy, belief, relator, and developer distinctive of my unique talents , and finally discuss personal application for further development of these innate gifts.

Based on the Clifton Strengths Assessment my top five strengths are strategic, deliberative, learner, maximize and individualization. As an individual, I rarely look into my weakness. I believe that when your too focused on your weakness, you forget about your strengths. Everything the book said is true, and we need to take the time to look at our strengths and make it perfect. It is true that in this world or the school system, we are taught to look at our weakness and correct it so that we can become stronger in our life. This book brings out the truth that I longed to hear for a long time. Invariably, I hear my professor tell their students that for them success in life, they must practice and look at our weakness. This book proves it wrong because for us to become successful, we must stay to our strengths’ path.

The Strengths Finder is an assessment that measures your real talents. Knowing your best skills and investing time on practicing and developing those talents are the two main ingredients to building and improve your true strengths and

After reading Tom Rath’s Strengths Finder 2.0 and taking his assessment my results for my top five themes, in order, are harmony, input, learner, analytical, and deliberative. Harmony is my top strength and it is the same as my Myer-Briggs results, since they avoid conflict and are realists. Some of the personal characteristics that describe me as a leader is by not giving the impression I know everything, I create a friendly environment for others, I know that is foolhardy to do things myself, I think before I speak, and I promote cooperation by helping people with their ideas. Throughout my college years I have been involved in many group assignments so I learned early on not to do things myself because assignments just start piling up. It was a major eye opener for me when I started college. So when I was in groups I spoke out when I had a problem so that I can receive help and I would in return help them if they needed.

When one thinks of the word “strong,” he or she thinks about weightlifting, muscles, and physically demanding tasks. But when I hear the word “strong,” I think of power, or what makes one powerful. What makes me powerful are the qualities that further build me up as a person. The StrengthsFinder Inventory identifies my powerful qualities through my top five themes, which are Significance, Achiever, Responsibility, Focus, and Relator. My Signature Themes present my five most prevailing themes of talent, in the rank order revealed by my responses to the StrengthsFinder Inventory. They are very important because they can ultimately lead to my successes in the near future. Who says being physically fit is what makes me stronger? My strengths

Current strengths: My punctuality is excellent, for example I am up to date with my diary and my class attendance is excellent.

The StrengthsQuest process is a thirty-minute online assessment. At the end of the assessment you will be provided with five talents and a short synopsis of how to apply those talents to your success. The assessment was founded by Donald Clifton. Clifton began studying the strengths of leaders by conducting interviews in the 1960s. Today the StrengthsQuest process is used in various schools all over the world.

Now the first half of the book expresses the importance of identifying the skills necessary to being engaged in the workplace. The second half of the book goes over all of the individual strengths as outlined by the author. To go over all of them would likely expand this report much further than needed, so I'll address a few of the strengths that were pertinent to me personally.

These are some of the features to having a ‘good character’, which has been proven through studies to having a significant relation to having a more thorough and enduring happiness. Seligman defines strengths as “moral traits that can be developed, learned, and that take effort.” He believes that strengths are different from talents which are developed ‘naturally’ because they can lead to the development of some of the “core virtues”, such as being patient and pleasant temperament. It is thought that using our strengths in everyday life can lead to significant increases in happiness.

In his book What You’re Really Meant to Do: A Roadmap for Reaching Your Unique Potential, author Robert Kaplan observes that most people actually have no clue what their strengths and weaknesses are. Kaplan believes that people should take ownership of assessing themselves. Knowing your own strengths and weaknesses gives you a better understanding of yourself and how you function. Understanding your strengths keeps you ahead in a lot of things. Focusing on your strengths is about seeking opportunities instead of problems.

Taking the StrengthsQuest survey highlighted five of my characteristics and presented them as useful tools for taking charge of my academic and professional life. The results were as I expected, but provided a new perspective on what I already knew about myself. During his visit, Craig Benson described talents or themes as predispositions (11). As a predisposition, a talent is how a person naturally thinks, acts, and feels (Benson 4). Many of the signature themes or talents assigned to me were similar in their application and results, but two stood out. My academic and professional life will be driven by these two traits: achiever and input.

The results of the Strengths Finder assessment show that I prefer to accomplish goals and tasks with people, I enjoy deep relationships, empathizing with others, including individuals who may not always be included and the process of learning. I do not prefer having to be in a position to create new ideas, I will take charge in a situation when needed, but not until needed, and I do not prefer competition.

Until the cold arms of death grips the soul, the human life continuous to be a learning process. To thrive on this pathway to success, being able to recognize one’s own strengths and weaknesses in every facet of life plays a key role. It could the positive abilities and skills that can help achieve our goals or the negative personal areas that need improvement. As humans, it is undeniable that we all have our fortes and faintness. There is therefore the need to realize our potentials and work on our weaknesses in our quest to become superior human beings.