Now Discover Your Strengths

Now, Discover Your Strengths 
by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, Free Press, 2001 ISBN: 0743201140 

First here is the official review and then my opinions:

Effectively managing personnel--as well as one's own behavior--is an extraordinarily complex task . . . That said, Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton's Now, Discover Your Strengths does indeed propose a unique approach: focusing on enhancing people's strengths rather than eliminating their weaknesses. Following up on the co-authors' popular previous book, First, Break All the Rules, it fully describes 34 positive personality themes the two have formulated and explains how to build a "strengths-based organization" by capitalizing on the fact that such traits are already present among those within it.

Most original and potentially most revealing, however, is a Web-based interactive component that allows readers to complete a questionnaire developed by the Gallup Organization and instantly discover their own top-five inborn talents.

I liked this book. It is easy to read and is careful about using neutral and positive language. The 34 themes of StrengthsFinders are carefully "labeled". It appears to be a sound model that has good back-up data. It has an interactive piece with the Internet. Half way into the book, I thought, great this is going to get my top rating – four balls. To bad that they didn’t fully leverage what they have here. The cover jacket says "The revolutionary program that shows you how to develop your unique talents and strengths – and those of the people you manage." Unfortunately, that is precisely where the book started to let me down. It is only the last two chapters, 6 and 7, that the authors begin to address how to use and build on the model and information they have provided.

I have taken just about every quiz, personality inventory and assessment around. I love them and I love them even more when they have more than just face validity but good reliability. I also want to see if it fits with the other models and theories as I know them. This one does. So what is the problem. Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton fail to give us a working program. There is no "How To" or "So What". One critic wrote: "What is missing is how to apply this insight...what the particular combination of strengths means, how to communicate with and lead people with differing strengths." I concur.

There is so much more here. Sure, I may not have learnt anything surprisingly new about myself. However, the perspective on how the information was grouped did provide new insights and for that I am grateful. Sure I now that I have a "Strategic" approach to my life and I am clearly a "Learner" who likes "Command" roles. It was the other two themes that put a new twist on things and just fit for me. It has made me realize what is an important value in my life, my friends, and what an important role they play. It also reinforced the strengths that I have in my professions as a business coach and where I can really make a difference.

One more caveat from another critic: "After reading the book, I wanted to take the quiz again (as the book implies you can), but Gallup *refuses* to allow you to take the quiz more than once. This means that your spouse or friend that you loan the book to won't be able to take the test until they fork over money for a new copy of the book. If you get a used or a returned copy, I hope the previous owner didn't take the test and then return the book!"

This is a reasonably priced book when you consider that you get an online assessment. Overall a good investment – either for the fun of it or to ponder it more closely. I wish that additional online inventories could be purchased. There are many ways that I can see how I would use it with clients. I truly hope that the authors do something more with this new tool that they have developed.

RFH (01/03)

For more information