Knowing yourself, especially your strengths and weaknesses, is essential work for personal development and for reaching your potential. Through a lifetime of feedback, recognition, and reward, most people have a relatively keen understanding of their personal strengths and favorable attributes. They know what they’re good at and what contributes most to their success. But that doesn’t mean they know how to
I love the idea of looking at the combination of strengths and characteristics. I've preferred using CliftonStrengths (formerly Strengthfinders) for our team to look at everyone's top 5 to see where they excel as an individual and complement the team.
Are you a proponent of strength assessments to help fuel this conversation, and if so, which ones?
Morning, Josh. We certainly don't lead our coaching engagements with assessments, but we see the one you mention and others as having some value. Typically, however, they seem to act as a distraction if one centers their personal or organizational development program on these assessments.
I'm sure you've seen this play out before. Normally it is a non-senior leader who discovers these kinds of tools and ends up pursuing expertise in administering and debriefing the tool instead of working on universal leadership skills and behaviors... which is where the most powerful impact is.
We have noticed that the best senior leaders have a tendency to really hate assessments, usually because they have done them all before. They also rightly point out that they are all telling them things about themselves that aren't a surprise. These tools seem to be better suited for people who lack in self-awareness. The self-aware senior leader is instead ready for the practical and powerful how-to advice.
That is a quick summary as to why we default to taking a behavioral approach to development instead of a psychological one. But if a leader can deploy assessment tools for their team without the conversation becoming navel-gazing, these tools can be a value add for that 'how-oriented' leader seeking to know their team even more.
Dec 27, 2023·edited Dec 27, 2023Liked by Admired Leadership
Love this response, and I appreciate the thoroughness. Your points are well taken. I look at assessments similar to the expectation for a model. George Box, a British statistician, wrote, “All models are wrong, some are useful.”
His point was that we should focus on applying the model with the data it provides instead of looking at it as a single source of truth.
So, while I certainly don't hate these assessments, I recognize that they're simply data points and should not be misused as the primary direction for personal and professional development. Real growth happens in learning and application of leadership principles that traverse individual backgrounds and belief systems.
I have, however, seen it add value as a starting point for looking at the combination of strengths a person has to form a unique approach to how they show up. Especially for a young leadership team that has yet to do a lot of work on self-awareness. That said, using it repetitively as a cornerstone of leadership growth becomes counterproductive.
So, for a senior leader, I can relate to how doing more assessments becomes a distraction instead of a value add.
That describes me perfectly. I've been distracted by all the personality assessment fads at one time or another to the point where I now have a strong bias against them all. Your answer has shifted it back into perspective for me.
The greatest strength of these assessments is their greatest weakness. They all rely on self-reporting, which means the test-taker is literally just self-describing. They can have some usefulness in starting a conversation, but I would not rely on them to make serious decisions.
Like so many other things, assessments are an ok place to begin (at best) and a lousy place to stop. In coaching, I lean into stories of past successes and failures to identify reliable strengths.
I love the idea of looking at the combination of strengths and characteristics. I've preferred using CliftonStrengths (formerly Strengthfinders) for our team to look at everyone's top 5 to see where they excel as an individual and complement the team.
Are you a proponent of strength assessments to help fuel this conversation, and if so, which ones?
Morning, Josh. We certainly don't lead our coaching engagements with assessments, but we see the one you mention and others as having some value. Typically, however, they seem to act as a distraction if one centers their personal or organizational development program on these assessments.
I'm sure you've seen this play out before. Normally it is a non-senior leader who discovers these kinds of tools and ends up pursuing expertise in administering and debriefing the tool instead of working on universal leadership skills and behaviors... which is where the most powerful impact is.
We have noticed that the best senior leaders have a tendency to really hate assessments, usually because they have done them all before. They also rightly point out that they are all telling them things about themselves that aren't a surprise. These tools seem to be better suited for people who lack in self-awareness. The self-aware senior leader is instead ready for the practical and powerful how-to advice.
That is a quick summary as to why we default to taking a behavioral approach to development instead of a psychological one. But if a leader can deploy assessment tools for their team without the conversation becoming navel-gazing, these tools can be a value add for that 'how-oriented' leader seeking to know their team even more.
Love this response, and I appreciate the thoroughness. Your points are well taken. I look at assessments similar to the expectation for a model. George Box, a British statistician, wrote, “All models are wrong, some are useful.”
His point was that we should focus on applying the model with the data it provides instead of looking at it as a single source of truth.
So, while I certainly don't hate these assessments, I recognize that they're simply data points and should not be misused as the primary direction for personal and professional development. Real growth happens in learning and application of leadership principles that traverse individual backgrounds and belief systems.
I have, however, seen it add value as a starting point for looking at the combination of strengths a person has to form a unique approach to how they show up. Especially for a young leadership team that has yet to do a lot of work on self-awareness. That said, using it repetitively as a cornerstone of leadership growth becomes counterproductive.
So, for a senior leader, I can relate to how doing more assessments becomes a distraction instead of a value add.
Appreciate this author's answer here.
That describes me perfectly. I've been distracted by all the personality assessment fads at one time or another to the point where I now have a strong bias against them all. Your answer has shifted it back into perspective for me.
The greatest strength of these assessments is their greatest weakness. They all rely on self-reporting, which means the test-taker is literally just self-describing. They can have some usefulness in starting a conversation, but I would not rely on them to make serious decisions.
Like so many other things, assessments are an ok place to begin (at best) and a lousy place to stop. In coaching, I lean into stories of past successes and failures to identify reliable strengths.