Now, Discover Your Strengths

Abstract

Based on a massive Gallup study of 2 million people, this book shows 1) individuals how to cultivate their own career strengths and strengths, 2) managers how to capitalize the talents of their people, and 3) executives how to build an entire organization around the talents of each employee. By the principal author of the national bestseller First, Break All the Rules. Most Americans do not know what their strengths are. you ask them, they look at you with a blank stare, or they respond in terms of subject knowledge, which is the wrong answer. With this remark last year, Peter Drucker captured an enduring and unfortunate truth: most of us fail to build our lives around our strengths and talents. Instead, guided by our parents, by our teachers, by our managers and by psychology's fascination with pathology, we become experts in our weaknesses and spend our lives trying to paper over these cracks. Our talents remain in the background, like sundials in the shade. This book will right our skewed perspective. It will throw light on each person's unique set of strengths and talents and show him how to focus and perfect these strengths. At the heart of the book is the StrengthFinder Profile, the product of a twenty-five year, multimillion dollar effort to identify the most prevalent human talents. Gallup has conducted psychological profiles with over 2 million individuals--from the world's best teachers to the world's best hockey players, from great nurses to great insurance salespeople. This last year the data was meta-analysed and from all these interviews emerged thirty-four distinct talents or themes. In this book we introduce these thirty-four themes and, using the StrengthsFinder Profile, reveal to each reader which of the thirty-four represent his or her most dominant. Here are just a few of the individual talent themes, of which there are countless possible combinations: Achiever: Your Achiever talent helps explain your drive. You feel as if every day starts at zero. By the end of the day you must rack up some numbers to feel good about yourself. Achiever is the power supply that causes you the set the pace and define the levels of productivity for your workgroup. Activator: When can we start? is the recurring question in your life. You believe that action is the best device for learning. You know that often you have to make a decision without every last bit of desirable information. This does not frighten you. Belief: If you possess strong Belief talent, you have certain core values that are Each copy of Now, Discover Your Strengths includes a unique access code to the Clifton Strengthsfinder assessment and website. This code is valid for one use only. If you have a problem with your code please visit strengthsfinder.com for help.

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