How do I think I can apply these five strengths to my leadership? In order to understand that, first I needed to understand the description of each of these terms. Starting at the top with belief, this means that I have certain core values that I keep at the forefront of everything I do. For me, the two most important values I hold are that my family and my faith come before anything else. I saw the value of my family to me come into play when instead of planning on staying home and going out to a party next Friday night and working Saturday night, I planned to get off work Saturday and go with my family to see my brother play baseball in Alabama next weekend. My brother and I have grown really close these past couple of years, and it was important to me to spend time with the rest of my family supporting him playing college baseball. Sometimes it might be more difficult than others, but I can use this strength of belief in my values to be an honest, ethical leader and to never compromise my principles. Empathy means that I am able to understand easily what other people might be going through. This is a particular strength of mine, and I saw it best in action when a friend of mine had a family member fighting through bone cancer. Once having cancer myself, it was difficult to see what her uncle and the rest of her family was going through, long surpassing the time he was given upon diagnosis, only to ride a rollercoaster ride of getting better and worse, until he finally passed recently. I was able to use empathy to understand what my friend was going through, at least on some level, and understand that in order to help her, I did whatever I could to help her and her family in this time, even if that meant simply being there for her when she needed me. I can use this strength of empathy in future leadership to always seek out and understand what members of my group might be going through, so that I can help lead them more effectively towards completion of a task. Being a relator means I seek out deep, meaningful relationships. I see this in that I’d rather have a deep relationship that means something with my family members or a few close friends from high school or college than a large number of shallow relationships with people I don’t really know at a big party. Seeking out deep relationships, really getting to know the people I work with, will help me be an effective leader by being open and supportive of the people I am leading. Being a developer means that I like to help people, and that people seek me out when they need help. I see this in a relationship I developed with a friend that started out with me helping her understand and pass chemistry in high school. I wanted to major in nursing in college because I saw it as a profession where I could really help people, and being a developer as one of my strengths will certainly help me as a nurse. Being an achiever means that I like to get things done, that I am driven by my need to achieve. I see this in my life when I worked really hard in high school in order to graduate in the top ten of my class. Being an achiever will help me accomplish goals in my leadership career and motivate others to accomplish a task, in my case that would be to provide the best possible care for my patients.
My top five strengths from the StrengthsFinder assessment report were, in order, Belief, Empathy, Relator, Developer, and Achiever. When I first copied down my five strengths for class, I wrote down refractor, instead of relator. I assumed refractor meant I’m one who gives credit to others around me first, not always taking credit for myself. Because this also describes me, I was surprised and humored when I couldn’t find refractor on the list of themes, but found relator instead. After reading the descriptions of each of the terms, I was not surprised at all that those were my five strengths. I was even less surprised to find that three of my five strengths came from the same theme matrix, that of the relationship matrix. I am a very relationship-oriented person, so I assumed that would be where most of my leadership strengths would lie.
How do I think I can apply these five strengths to my leadership? In order to understand that, first I needed to understand the description of each of these terms. Starting at the top with belief, this means that I have certain core values that I keep at the forefront of everything I do. For me, the two most important values I hold are that my family and my faith come before anything else. I saw the value of my family to me come into play when instead of planning on staying home and going out to a party next Friday night and working Saturday night, I planned to get off work Saturday and go with my family to see my brother play baseball in Alabama next weekend. My brother and I have grown really close these past couple of years, and it was important to me to spend time with the rest of my family supporting him playing college baseball. Sometimes it might be more difficult than others, but I can use this strength of belief in my values to be an honest, ethical leader and to never compromise my principles. Empathy means that I am able to understand easily what other people might be going through. This is a particular strength of mine, and I saw it best in action when a friend of mine had a family member fighting through bone cancer. Once having cancer myself, it was difficult to see what her uncle and the rest of her family was going through, long surpassing the time he was given upon diagnosis, only to ride a rollercoaster ride of getting better and worse, until he finally passed recently. I was able to use empathy to understand what my friend was going through, at least on some level, and understand that in order to help her, I did whatever I could to help her and her family in this time, even if that meant simply being there for her when she needed me. I can use this strength of empathy in future leadership to always seek out and understand what members of my group might be going through, so that I can help lead them more effectively towards completion of a task. Being a relator means I seek out deep, meaningful relationships. I see this in that I’d rather have a deep relationship that means something with my family members or a few close friends from high school or college than a large number of shallow relationships with people I don’t really know at a big party. Seeking out deep relationships, really getting to know the people I work with, will help me be an effective leader by being open and supportive of the people I am leading. Being a developer means that I like to help people, and that people seek me out when they need help. I see this in a relationship I developed with a friend that started out with me helping her understand and pass chemistry in high school. I wanted to major in nursing in college because I saw it as a profession where I could really help people, and being a developer as one of my strengths will certainly help me as a nurse. Being an achiever means that I like to get things done, that I am driven by my need to achieve. I see this in my life when I worked really hard in high school in order to graduate in the top ten of my class. Being an achiever will help me accomplish goals in my leadership career and motivate others to accomplish a task, in my case that would be to provide the best possible care for my patients.
2 Comments
Erin Alanson
2/16/2015 11:37:46 pm
After traveling with you and seeing you interact with others at Give Kids the World, I am not surprised in the slightest by your strengths! You did a really nice job making sense of how your strengths play out in your interactions with others. Your strengths make perfect sense given the major you've chosen -- there is no doubt that you will be able to activate and use these strengths on a daily basis as a nurse. As for your own leadership development, this also means that you will be able to relate well with others. Key to leadership is being able to relate to those around you. Keep this in mind as we enter into our group project and you consider your own leadership development.
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Sam
2/22/2015 11:57:02 pm
It's interesting that you almost created one of your own strengths. While StrengthsQuest is great at helping people discover strengths they never thought about before, it also gave you the chance to think about yourself and what your strengths are. Sometimes 34 words aren't enough to describe people, so it's always good to be able to describe yourself in your own way! I encourage you to continue to use your strengths to serve people.
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