In today's fast-paced and ever-changing work environment, it's not uncommon for people to feel stuck or stagnant in their careers. You might feel this way right now. Perhaps you feel you’re not making the best use of your skills and talents, or you don't feel fulfilled by your work.

If this sounds familiar, it may be time to identify and embrace your strengths. Embracing your strengths can help you find greater satisfaction and purpose in your work, which can lead to greater productivity and fulfilment in your career and life.

‘I can’t change jobs, so I can’t embrace my strengths’

Many times, clients have told me that they are concerned that they will need to change jobs to embrace their strengths. But they don’t want the disruption and feel anxious that that transition and change would be too much at their stage of life.

However, as I remind clients, the value you bring to an organisation comes from what you know and who you are. The best way to know who you are is by identifying your strengths. When you utilise your strengths, you feel more like yourself, have greater satisfaction and a sense of purpose, and feel fulfilled in your work. And, as a bonus, you feel happier in your work and life!

Embracing your strengths does not necessarily mean a holistic change in your life. It does not mean you must leave your job, completely change yourself, or make any other overwhelming change. Instead, embracing your strengths is something you can do in your everyday work, career and life. And it is just as impactful!

This is why, with my coaching clients, together we identify where you can utilise existing strengths in a new way to get greater enjoyment from your work and find your career fulfilling and purposeful once again.

What are strengths?

Strengths are your positive personality traits; aligned to your values, they generally represent how you like to work. Strengths are different from your talents. Talents are what you do naturally, and your character strengths are your driving force. But, importantly - your strengths are also the things you LOVE to do.

It's the alignment of both:

the things you are naturally good at + the things you love to do = strengths.

Everybody’s combination of strengths is unique; they are core to you and make you who you are. Tapping into these is your hidden superpower, which, when utilised, can bring greater clarity, increased confidence and a deep sense of contentment within your career and life.⁠ In effect, your strengths help you flourish!

Your strengths can also be seen in the activities you feel invigorated by; before you undertake them, you instinctively look forward to them. While doing them, you don’t struggle to concentrate but instead are in flow; so immersed are you that you lose a sense of time. When you are done, you feel great, energised, authentic, and connected to the best parts of who you really are.

Why should you embrace your strengths?

In many career discussions, the focus is often on areas of weakness or areas that are not working. We want to fix or improve these areas, as we are told that changing ourselves this way is necessary for our careers.

Instead, strengths can be described as your superpowers! When you identify and embrace your strengths in your career or business, you uncover your preferred way of working and the activities that give you momentum. As a result, you are in flow, which in your job can look like being super productive!

For example, you might already be very productive—the go-to person when a task or activity needs to be completed. But as much as you might have excellent time management skills and techniques, you are also playing to your strengths, which means it’s an energy management skill. The work you love gives you the energy to create and do more. When you combine your values and strengths, you are energised by your work and will find greater meaning and purpose in it, making staying on task easier.

For example, I am energised after working with clients; I LOVE coaching them. Many years ago, before I became a coach, I hadn’t made the connection as to why certain corporate clients were easy to work with and others were hard. Only later did I realise that the people and tasks that felt easy to me were where I was directly using my strengths rather than working against them.

Knowing your strengths can also provide greater certainty and clarity about what is suitable for you and what depletes you in your career and life. This knowledge, aligned with your values, helps you focus on what matters to you.

How do you embrace your strengths?

Identify your strengths

Complete a Self-Audit to raise your awareness of your strengths

First, you need to identify your strengths. Here are three ways you can do that.

Complete a Self-Audit. Look at your activities and the tasks you must complete as core to your role. Over a week (or month), notice how you feel before, during, and after each. This will increase your awareness regarding work that you enjoy, which will help you identify areas that you naturally excel at.
Ask others. I promise —they will know! Family or close colleagues are especially useful for this approach, as they know when you are “lost in your work” vs. “slogging away.” Asking others can be as simple as a quick question via email, over coffee, or as detailed as a 360 degree feedback survey. I encourage my clients to send a few select questions to their family, friends, and colleagues; the data that comes back is invaluable!
Use a strengths identification tool. There are many, but I prefer the VIA Strengths survey, as it’s universal. That is, the strengths referenced in their tool are found in all cultures worldwide, and they are based on extensive scientific research. Another reason I like the VIA strengths assessment tool is that all 24 character strengths are strengths! So, if a strength you want to develop is listed at 24, it’s still a strength you possess, and with practice, you can develop it further.

2. Explore and play

Once you know your strengths and the tasks or activities that light you up and build momentum, the advice is to do more of those. However, I understand that is where it can feel challenging.

For example, if your number one strength is love, how do you bring more of that into your corporate career?

This was my experience. Love is my top strength. However, once I realised it’s all about valuing close relations with others, in particular, those in which sharing and caring are reciprocated, being close to people, it made much more sense—and helped me realise why, in my previous roles, the prospect of process-based work lacking in human interaction was not attractive.

But how do you explore and play with your strengths?

I’ll share some case studies to help illustrate what embracing your strengths in your work can look like.

Case Study One

One of my clients, let’s call him Joe, was equally thrilled and concerned to discover that Humour was one of his top five strengths. He knew how it showed up in his life but didn’t know how to bring more of it into his work without looking unprofessional.

Together, we explored how Joe could add small amounts of fun or ‘pops of personality’ to his emails and other interactions at work. He started small and slowly, but he felt liberated once he embraced this new way of working! The reports and content he was expected to create as part of his role flowed, and ideas flourished. And the best part is that his confidence increased significantly, leading to an attractive offer to undertake his dream job.

Case Study Two

Another client, let’s call her Jane, had Love of Learning as her top strength but felt unsure how that could be a strength in a role where her manager had said there was no budget for learning and development. Jane was upset because she genuinely loved the work and industry and knew she’d be far more fulfilled if she continued to learn in her role.

We brainstormed ideas and settled on a combination solution to present to her manager at her next one-on-one meeting. Jane would pursue her love of learning in her own time, continuing to focus on what she was fascinated by, and then, once a quarter, she’d present to the team in a ‘brown-bag lunch’ knowledge-sharing session. The manager wholeheartedly agreed, and my client was delighted as it helped her feel her work was meaningful again. Additionally, she was building leadership and presentation skills and enhancing her reputation as an expert. It was a great outcome all around.

I hope these case studies provide insight into how leveraging and working with your strengths can boost your work satisfaction and improve your career and life confidence without needing to change jobs or careers.

Ultimately, when you embrace your strengths, you will become more yourself. Our strengths make us who we are; embracing them means we feel like ourselves in all areas of our work and life.

More Support

Be an active architect of your career; craft jobs to align with your values, strengths and interests. Working with a strengths-based professional coach (that’s me) with a tailored approach will ensure you know your specific strengths and have various options for embracing them in your life and career, providing enhanced career fulfilment and confidence.

Clarity Kickstart coaching is an ideal way to work with me as you identify and embrace your strengths. Learn more and book your first call below.

Clarity Kickstart - Learn more