Strengths Based Leadership has been a hot topic that goes against the grain on traditional leadership. Before, we thought that you should work on your weakness and not your strengths. You already knew your strengths and at the time it made sense to look at your weakness. People had thought, that to be successful, you needed to know everything to be successful.
As we talk about leadership, we want to know what makes an effective leader. Rath and Conchie state three key findings. They believe that the most effective leaders are always investing in strengths (Rath et al 2). Employers should focus on a person’s strengths rather than their weakness. This brings an uplifting atmosphere in the work environment. Second, the most effective leaders surround themselves with the right people and then maximize their team (Rath et al 2). Surrounding yourself with people of the same strengths as you, will not make a well-rounded team. Third, the most effective leaders understand their followers needs (Rath et al 3). When a leader can supply the follower’s needs, it can create a trust, caring working environment. Having an employee know that his boss and company truly cares about them as a personal strengthens the team’s unity.
In order to use Strengths Based Leadership, you need to first know what your strengths are. Without an awareness of your strengths, it’s almost impossible for you to lead effectively (Rath et al 10). Discover your strengths and maximize them to the fullest extent. This become the basis of leadership. Knowing your strengths does not come easy and there are ways to help you see what they are. “Strength Finder” was developed by Dr. Clifton and he has put together a web-based program where you answer a number of strategic questions to help you know your strengths. As people have studied great leaders in the past, they have discovered that no leader was similar and each one had their own strengths. Which means they surrounded themselves with people that were better at their weaknesses.
The leader’s followers are looking for basic needs. Rath and Conchie talk about four needs, they are trust, compassion, stability, and hope. When we talk about trust in a work environment, we want to be able to trust in the wisdom that our leader has. Trust also increases speed and efficiency in the work place (Rath et al 83). Compassion towards employees shows them that the leader and the company truly cares about their wellbeing. Showing employees that they matter by engaging in conversation, asking about their families are great examples. The third is stability. Followers want a leader who will provide a solid foundation (Rath et al. 87). Employees need support and they need to know that they are being looked out for. The fourth and final need is hope. Hope gives followers something to look forward to and it helps employees see a way through chaos and complexity (Rath et al. 89). In know that when a leader can give hope in rough a time, it will motivate people to continue to perform well. No one wants a leader to who is going to talk negatively about the future, employees want some who will give them inspiration. This example best describes The Authentic Leadership role, where a leader is genuine and trustworthy (Northouse 2016). The Authentic Leadership role has four characteristics; self-awareness, internalized moral perspective, balance processing, and relational transparency.
As a leader, we need to surround ourselves with people who are better at our known weakness. But first we need to find our strengths, Rath and Conchie describe four domains of leadership strength. They are executing, influencing, relationship building and strategic thinking. Instead of one dominant leader who tries to do everything or individuals who all have similar strengths, contributions from all four domains lead to a strong and cohesive team (Rath et al. 23). Leaders who can execute can get the job done, leaders who can influence, can make the team be heard, leaders with relationship building can hold the team together, leaders with strategic thinking can look for countless ways to be successful.
Leaders need to focus on a person strengths and not their weakness. Leaders are charged with making people better at what they do and if we constantly are talking about a person weakness, this will ultimately degrade the employee to the point that performance and efficiency is lacking. I know that first hand when we talk about a person weakness they seem to shut down. We should be talking about their strengths and how they fit into our organization. Putting people where they can excel at is something that gets looked over way too often. Northouse discusses Servant leadership and how the leader is really serving the follower. He states the servant leadership takes on the role of “nurturing and be attentive to their concerns” (Northouse p225). This type of leadership helps the follower excel to their maximum potential.
If any of this makes sense, then would you agree that we should be focusing on strengths rather than weakness or should we be looking at both when in a leadership role?
Reference:
Rath, Tom et al., Strengths Based Leadership. New York: Gallup Press, 2008
Northouse, P. G. Leadership: Theory and Practice (7th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc. 2016
Ryan J Soule says
I think people shouldn’t just focus on leaders for their strengths, I believe in a better and balanced approach. People strengths are his or her strengths, and shouldn’t have to be adjusted by anyone. If we, as leaders, focus on the weaknesses of someone, then we can possibly create a more balanced individual. In fact we could possibly create a leader who had struggled and failed in their career. The leadership style that would benefit having someone focus on his or her strengths is a “Coaching Leadership” style (Venkataramani, 2014).
By using the Coaching style of leadership we display and show empathy towards the folks we are trying to inspire. Leaders focus on how to train and exact improvement and performance out of someone they’re using the style on. If someone is a poor runner, make them run a lot, if someone is scared of public speaking, help them join a Toastmasters or other type of community public speaker group to get better. One thing that we must be carefully weighed is there’s a fine line of coaching and micromanaging. If this balance is exact, the people are going tune you out and not be acceptable to change (Musgrove, 2015).
Thanks for the post!
References:
Venkataramani, S. (2014, September 09). 6 Leadership Styles: Strengths, Weaknesses and Examples | 9Lenses. Retrieved February 06, 2016, from http://www.9lenses.com/6-leadership-styles-strengths-weaknesses-examples
Musgrave, J. (2015, June 25). 5 Leadership Styles: Pros And Cons. Retrieved February 07, 2016, from http://www.saxonsgroup.com.au/blog/leadership/5-leadership-styles-pros-and-cons/