WHY are your strengths important?
Donald Clifton, founder of Selection Research, Inc. was fascinated by what differentiated successful people from not-so-successful people. In 1988, Selection Research, Inc. acquired The Gallup Organization and continued his research to discover the best ways to maximize a person's potential.
He found that successful people did two things.
- They invested in their strengths, not weaknesses
- They organized their lives to play more to their strengths and away from their weaknesses
How much time are you wasting on filling the gaps in your skillset, i.e. your weaknesses?
I've been talking about and coaching on the Zone of Genius (named from Gay Hendricks in his book The Big Leap) for years.
The concept founded by Donald Clifton and Gallup resonates deeply with me. If you're going to be more successful, happy, energetic, jazzed, passionate, and on-fire because you're working mostly in your Zone of Genius, it's probably because you're utilizing your top strengths.
Merging Hendricks's work with Clifton's, now it makes sense why working in your Zone of Incompetence, Zone of Competence, and even your Zone of Excellence is a waste of time and a drain on your resources. When you're in those other three zones, then you're working AWAY from your strengths and focusing on your weaknesses.
When you're in alignment, you're much closer to the right side of this meter, where you're thriving. When you're out of alignment, you're closer to the left side, where you're suffering.
Alignment means you're functioning at optimum levels, producing positive emotions, engagement, productivity, and rapport in your relationships and environment.
When you're out of alignment, function is impaired, which produces negative emotions, lowered engagement and productivity, and perhaps some issues in your relationships and environment.
So what do you think playing to your strengths will do for your alignment?