STRENGTHS

A positive way of being and of leading has been proven not only to impact wellbeing but also business results. This section in the toolbox invites you to consider the impacts of choosing to focus on what’s possible, what we can do, how we might do it and to engage with our strengths and those of our team.

The following is an excerpt from the work of Martin Seligman:

What is Positive Psychology: A Definition

Positive psychology has been described in many ways and with many words, but the commonly accepted definition of the field is this:

“Positive psychology is the scientific study of what makes life most worth living” (Peterson, 2008).

To push this brief description a bit further, positive psychology is a scientific approach to studying human thoughts, feelings, and behaviour, with a focus on strengths instead of weaknesses, building the good in life instead of repairing the bad, and taking the lives of average people up to “great” instead of focusing solely on moving those who are struggling up to “normal” (Peterson, 2008).

Positive psychology focuses on the positive events and influences in life, including:

1. Positive experiences (like happiness, joy, inspiration, and love)
2. Positive states and traits (like gratitude, resilience, and compassion)
3. Positive institutions (applying positive principles within entire organizations and institutions)

As a field, positive psychology spends much of its time thinking about topics like character strengths, optimism, life satisfaction, happiness, well-being, gratitude, compassion (as well as self-compassion), self-esteem and self-confidence, hope, and elevation.

Strengths-Based Leadership

As you read “Strengths Based Leadership”, you’ll hear first hand accounts from some of the most successful organisational leaders in recent history as they discuss how their unique talents have driven their success. To help you apply your own talents, you’ll have the opportunity to take a special version of “Gallup’s StrengthsFinder” programme that will provide you with specific strategies for leading with each of your Top 5 talents. The new version of the assessment will also enable you to plot the talents of your team based on the four domains of leadership talent revealed in the book. Loaded with novel research, stories, and actionable ideas, “Strengths Based Leadership” will give you a new roadmap for leading people toward a better future.

A unique access code (enclosed in the back of this book) allows you to take a new leadership version of Gallup’s StrengthsFinder program. The new version of this program provides you with specific strategies for leading with your top five strengths and enables you to plot the strengths of your team based on the four domains of leadership strength revealed in the book.

The results of this assessment will form the basis of your conversation with Andy Swanson. This will cover how you use your strengths with your team, across the AH system and outwards to the wider community.

Written in an engaging, conversational style, their book includes colourful stories, 5 strategies for increasing positive emotions, and features an online test that measures readers’ Positive Impact. How Full is Your Bucket? is a quick, breezy read. It will immediately help readers boost the amount of positive emotions in their lives, and in the lives of everyone around them. The book is sure to inspire lasting changes in all who read it and has all the makings of a timeless classic. In addition to the learning about appreciation, feedback and engagement the book enables you to complete the Gallup Strengths Finder Diagnostic.

Guidance

Go to the end of the book and complete the strengths assessment on the Gallup website.

You will be able to have an in-depth conversation in your 1-to-1 about your results.

Listen to Andy Swanson talking about the importance of a positive strengths-based approach to leadership and self-awareness.

Patterns of Strengths

There is an opportunity to purchase the book for the team that you lead and identify the patterns of strengths across the four domains.

• Executing: People with strengths in this key domain know how to rally around a goal and get things done. Differing strengths might dictate the style of getting to the goal, but people who have strengths in this area make a massive contribution to things happening.

• Influencing: People with strengths in this key domain know how to share and embed the team’s ideas both inside and outside the organisation. These people are natural persuaders, inspire others to adopt their ideas and are vital to moving teams forward in communities.

• Relationship Building: Those with strengths in this domain tend to keep groups together. They’re the social glue: the mortar between the foundation building blocks. They know how to create and maintain groups such that the whole is much greater than its parts.

• Strategic Thinking: People with strengths in this domain tend to force the group to look at the big picture and toward the future – what might be. Always reviewing the data and applying what they learn, strategic thinkers move the organisation forward – stretching its members to think beyond what is, to the possibilities of the future.

Resource: Strengths Based Leadership