Book Review: Strengthsfinder 2.0 (Part 3 of 3)
Posted in Personal Development
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In this final installment, I’m going to use myself as a case study of how the book Strengthsfinder 2.0 can be used to identify what you are good at, so that you can arrange your business so that you spend more time doing what you do best, and thereby become more profitable.
Last summer, I took the online test after reading the book Strengthsfinder 2.0 and I found out what I had suspected all along. It turns out my strengths and talents are:
1) Focus. This means that I know what I want and set goals to get there. Constantly. And if I don’t have a goal in mind I flounder and am miserable. People with focus examine everything they do and ask themselves if it is helping them reach their goals or not.
How I Could Apply This To Real Estate: Create Yearly, Weekly, Daily goals, and focus on them like a laser beam. Ignore the avalanche of useless, distracting, or time-consuming information and tasks that could slow me down from what gets results (finding deals, closing deals, raising money).
2) Learner. I love to learn. The process is exciting and energizing. I would thrive in environments where I need to learn a lot about the subject in a short period of time.
How I Could Apply This To Real Estate: It certainly helped in the beginning. You get a call fro a seller, you think it might be a deal, and you research like crazy to confirm whether it looks good or not. Later on, I became absorbed in learning about business, marketing, networking, asset protection, with each topic becoming the focal point of an intense amount of study for a good while.
3) Intellection. I like to think, and use my brain for practical matters. I’m introspective, and like to solve problems.
How I Could Apply This To Real Estate: The daily grind bores me to tears, and the more tasks that don’t involve a lot of thinking, the better off I’d be delegating to someone else. Thank heaven I got some assistants early to take care of a lot of work for me so I would be free to lock myself away in my office, writing systems and working ON my business.
4) Futuristic. This kind of person loves to think about what the future will be like. Pictures of a better world and a better life inspire me, and can help me to inspire others, too.
How I Could Apply This To Real Estate: Begin with the end in mind. The one thing I emphasize over and over again when I’m speaking at events is to identify 1) What you want your real estate business to do for you, 2) Why you want it to give you those things, and 3) What your organizational chart will look like when your business is at the point you want it to be. I don’t think that without this kind of vision I’d have gotten anywhere.
5) Input. I ask questions and like to collect things, especially information, because it’s interesting.
How I Could Apply This To Real Estate: Create a system for storing all the gobs of information I take in from books, magazines, seminars, courses, tapes, conversations, and so on. I currently use Microsoft OneNote and it has been wonderful. What is the point of reading a lot if you won’t be able to access what you learned later? I don’t trust my own memory for squat anymore. Now I have notes filed away and indexed so that all I have to do is search the word “postcards” and everything I’ve read in the last 2 years about using postcards to market your business appears on my screen. That’s been powerful, as it helps me to eventually implement great ideas when the time is right, rather than abandon them in the back of my mind where they are as good as dead.
The Bottom Line: I recommend reading Strengthsfinder 2.0 and then taking the test online to see what YOUR strengths and talents are. Nothing beats knowing yourself. Then you can plan accordingly and accomplish much more. If you were going to hire someone to work for you, wouldn’t you want to know their talents, personality, and competencies really well in order to know where to place them in you organization? Knowing yourself is no different, even more important, but much harder to do objectively. Take the test, and I think you’ll be surprised.
