It may seem counterintuitive at first—Why would I want to leverage my so-called weaknesses? Don’t I want to minimize them? Mitigate them? Avoid any situations where these weaknesses may start to seep through?
The principle of strengths-based leadership is awareness of, first, your natural, innate talents and, second, the manners in which these talents influence elements like your work habits or communication style. You can leverage that awareness through performance for positive outcomes. Translated, when you’re aware of your relationship-building, strategic thinking and processing tendencies you can use that understanding to most effectively invest your efforts and achieve results.
As a strengths coach, I spend a lot of time increasing awareness of dominant talents or strengths—the ones that research shows lead to the greatest success, highest productivity and most engagement.
But it is also beneficial to know where you’re least prone to perform—what weaknesses or blind spots exist.
For one, by addressing these weaknesses you can collaborate with others who, perhaps, have your least-dominant talent in spades and, in effect, can compensate for your area of weakness. You can also use this least dominant talent to your advantage, as was demonstrated to me during a recent client engagement.
“Ellen” is a hospital system CEO. According to StrengthsFinder, which ranks talents by type or “themes”, her least dominant, dead last, #34 talent is “Harmony.”
That doesn’t sound great, does it?
You may assume someone who is “low” in Harmony is abrasive, insensitive and tolerates conflict. After all, Harmony is partially defined as seeking out areas for agreement, and harmonizers recognize there is “little to be gained from conflict and friction, so you seek to hold them to a minimum.”
On the contrary, instead of reflecting with dismay upon what may be viewed as her “lack of consensus-building,” Ellen considers her comparatively low Harmony to be an advantage for many reasons. She is comfortable spurring debate among her leadership team or medical staff and she isn’t afraid to challenge the status quo.
It makes sense because, by encouraging discussion, new ways to undertake projects surface.
She doesn’t tolerate mediocrity.
She innovates.
Not only is she sensitive to how others perceive her “Harmony” (or lack thereof) she is as intentional with this talent theme as she is with her more dominant strengths—like being a “Relator.” She shines in her ability to connect genuinely with others. She is very authentic. What you see is what you get with her. And, as someone who doesn’t have “mediocre” in her vocabulary, she doesn’t just flex those more dominant strengths—the areas that come easiest for her—but she also finds a way to apply the talents at the bottom of the list—like her “low Harmony”—for the good of her organization.
So the next time you ponder your “weaknesses,” try looking at them from a different angle. Maybe these weaknesses aren’t so bad after all.
