Developing your strengths
rather than patching your weaknesses
Leading is about revealing the best in people and in teams, and turning it into impact. It begins with a simple shift: cultivating what is already strong, rather than wearing yourself out repairing what is less so.
The impossible straddle
Can a heavyweight judoka win the Tour de France? Can one of the five best cyclists in the world become world judo champion? No. You can always try your hand at the other discipline, even enjoy it. But at the highest level, where titles are won, you excel only at what you are cut out for. The first thing to accept, and it is no easy thing, is precisely this impossible straddle: giving up the wish to be everything at once.
And yet it is what we do almost every day
We watch people, we spot what is wrong, and we tell them: here is what you need to improve. The shy one must become an extrovert, the analytical one must reach out to others, the creative one must get organised. Wasted effort, most of the time. We exhaust ourselves filling a gap, and we neglect the area where we are already strong.
Another, more fruitful path
We develop what is strong better than we repair what is weak. Investing most of your energy where you excel, and managing your weaknesses just enough that they do not hold you back: such is the principle of the strengths-based approach. And where you are not strong, there is a wiser path than relentless striving: surrounding yourself well. Entrusting what is not your talent is not an admission of weakness, it is a mark of intelligence. We do not grow by believing ourselves responsible for the whole world, but by composing a team where talents complement one another.
Four families of strengths
Everyone combines a few dominant talents: it is this unique signature that must be known and cultivated. They can be grouped into four families.
- Achieving — moving things forward, making them happen: tenacity, rigour, a sense of responsibility.
- Radiating — carrying, convincing, speaking up: boldness, presence, a taste for the audience.
- Connecting — weaving the bond, binding the team together: warmth, listening, a sense of accord.
- Imagining — thinking further and truer: vision, curiosity.
Every strength casts its shadow
A strength you do not understand, one you push to excess without pause, can over time turn against you. The tireless soul who strings together sixteen-hour days sometimes ends up burning out, and weighing on others. You may know the one who calls out "we all reach the top of the climb together," and who, on reaching the summit, turns round to find that no one was on their wheel anymore. Hence the stakes: know your strengths first, in order to steer them rather than be ruled by them.
Where to begin
Knowing your strengths and those of your team is the raw material of the leader who reveals: you coach, you delegate and you help others grow from them. That is precisely the role of our instrument, Florilège: knowing yourself, naming your three dominant strengths, and moving into action.