Strengths Assessment
Strengths come in a variety of formats including states, traits, domains and competencies.
There are a variety of definitions of strengths including:
- “the ability to consistently produce near-perfect performance on a specific task” (Rath, 2007).
- “a pre-existing capacity for a particular way of behaving, thinking or feeling that is authentic and energising to the user, and enables optimal functioning, development and performance,” (Linley, 2008).
- “a capacity for feeling, thinking, and behaving in a way that allows optimal functioning in the pursuit of valued outcomes.” (Lopez & Snyder, 2007).
This variety is reflected in the measures that have been developed to date. There are several ways to gather data on your strengths:
Strengths Identification can be done in the following ways:
- Psychometric inventories like the Realise 2, VIA, Strengthscope and Strengthfinder. These are usually administered as self-report so can lack the perspective of others.
- Interview data collected with a trained leadership development professional utilising the peak experiences or feed forward methodology.
- Multi-rater or multi-source methodology involving a leadership inventory like the MLQ360 which combines the insights of multiple stakeholders by their organisational level.