Here are a few pics from the past month (including photos of Monkey Business, my new braids, my roomie Theresa, Amelia's bday party, etc.)
Life's been a blast lately. Theresa and I keep coming home at 11 or midnight. Just not enough hours in the evening for all the fun we want to have :o)
Work's been going well too. One fun project has been writing drafts of 2 papers about things I've learned from singing with my choir.
I recently took the "Strengths Finder" test in preparation for an upcoming leadership workshop in Cameroon in September. The premise is that we work best by turning our talents into real strengths (rather than emphasizing overcoming our weaknesses). Gallup compiled like 34 themes of different talents people possess. A talent becomes a strength when you invest in it through learning, practice, etc.
My top 5 themes were: Communication, Strategy, Belief, Activator, and Woo (Winning Others Over). I definitely agree with Communication because I love giving presentations and writing. Woo was cool because it says that networking is one of my talents and that's exactly what I've been working on lately. Belief I definitely resound with because I absolutely have to do work that resonates with my values or life is completely meaningless to me. Strategy is sort of me because I'm analytical and can pull out the important themes in a discussion, but it doesn't really describe me in that I don't think through all the possible outcomes before making decisions. Activator is what I wish I were, but I don't really see that it's my natural strength to get things started and be impatient to put ideas into action. Looking forward to the leadership workshop because as team leader I have a lot to learn!
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2 comments:
L3 Portal, eh? Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on it. I've been thinking about attending one, but timing hasn't worked out so far.
Interesting hearing about your strengths & evaluation of their tool. Not sure what I think of the overemphasis of Strenghs Finder... (does this mean it's OK for leaders to continue rolling over people if that's one of their weaknesses?). But it's cool that you can use this to get in touch with your strengths & develop them better.
Whoops, this is becoming an email instead of a comment :)...
Thanks for the comment, John. I don't know too much about this whole strengths finder thing, and frankly even though I used to love these kinds of tests, I'm getting a little tired of them.
I don't think you're supposed to focus on your strengths as an excuse to continue in your weaknesses. The idea is to choose activities where you can use your strengths so your weaknesses won't matter as much. And part of the action plan is to find others who have complimentary gifts to help you. For example, if your talent is "command" find someone with "empathy" to partner with you. If you're good at thinking up a lot of ideas, partner with someone who puts ideas into action, etc.
The idea is that you shouldn't spend your whole life working towards becoming a star basketball player if you're only 5'3" and have no hand/eye coordination! Spend your energy in the areas where you have talent and then you can really produce something great.
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