Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction

00:01:03: Don't be defined by strengths you don't enjoy

00:01:52: Idea for action 1: practise sharing your strengths stories

00:04:15: Idea for action 2: stretch your strengths

00:05:31: Go-to guru

00:05:44: Relevant podcast episode

00:05:49: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Sarah Ellis: Hi, I'm Sarah.

Helen Tupper: And I'm Helen.

Sarah Ellis: And you're listening to the Squiggly Careers podcast.  This episode is part of our Skills Sprint series.  We've recorded 20 episodes, each less than seven minutes long, that we hope are going to help you to build some career development momentum.  In every episode, we talk about a Squiggly Skill, what it is and why it matters, share an idea for action each, and give you a go-to guru and a podcast episode so you can learn more.  And we want you to turn your skills sprint into a learning streak. 

And so for everyone who completes a 20-day learning streak, we'll be offering you a free Five Skills to Succeed in a Squiggly Career virtual workshop in September.  If you post about your progress on social and tag us @amazingif, and we'll be in touch to tell you more.

Helen Tupper: And in this skills sprint, we're going to be talking about strengths, which is one of our Squiggly Skills that we feature in our book, The Squiggly Career.  So, this is one that we talk a lot about and we've got lots of different ideas for you, so we've had to work really hard to only focus on two.  But let's just focus on what they are and why we need them for a moment, if it's not already obvious.

So, strengths are the things that give us energy, and I think it's really important that we don't say strengths are the things that we are good at, because there may be some things that you do that you actually are quite good at that you don't really enjoy doing.  And so, you don't want to be defined by those things.  Being defined by things you're good at that you don't really enjoy doing is not a great recipe for success in your Squiggly Career.  Starting with, "What is the work that gives me energy that I really want to be known for?" that's what we're talking about when we're thinking about strengths and Squiggly Careers. 

And when those are the things that stand out, when they're the things that we get known for, it means that we get to do more of the work that we enjoy, because people will basically spot opportunities for us to use our strengths, that's a bit of a win.  And it also means we increase our impact, because the more we do it, the better we become at it.  So, really thinking about your strengths is a bit of a win for you and also for the team that you're working in too.

Sarah Ellis: So, my idea for action here is, practise sharing your strengths stories.  So, often I feel it's a bit fake and probably not that helpful, unless you are in an interview, to kind of go, "Well, my three strengths are… and this is how I use them, and this is how I'm going to improve those strengths".  When do we ever have those conversations?  And even in a career conversation, say, with our manager or our mentor, it's very unlikely that that's how we're structuring those kind of conversations. 

And also, I think we tend to feel more comfortable with stories.  You don't even need to use the word "stories", it's just examples of the work that you've done that really bring to life you at your best, you using your strengths, what are the examples of things you've done that you feel most proud of in terms of your strengths really showing up and standing out and making a difference. The other benefit of stories is they're much more memorable. 

So, if I just tell you my strengths like, "Oh, I'm a great creator, I'm brilliant at starting stuff from scratch", okay, fine.  But if I then give you an example, if I then talk about, "Okay, so when it was lockdown one and we were in quite a challenging moment in our business, we created this new Ask the Expert series for our podcast, which meant that people who actually had got a bit of time on their hands suddenly said yes to us, that previously would have said no.  And actually, I'm always really proud of the fact that we created something, not only from nothing, but also from a really hard situation", and that feels much more memorable, and I could talk about that a little bit more and give you a few more details. I always love Bobette Buster's work on Do Storytelling, brilliant, it's a very short book on storytelling. 

And she talks about things like the importance of gleaming details and how when we tell stories, it sort of connects the mirror neurons in our brain.  I talked about lockdown one there, you were probably fast-tracked back to lockdown one and all the challenges that that brought for everybody.  And if it's useful to have a bit of a structure for those stories, SOAR can be helpful just to think them through, you don't have to tell them in this way.  But SOAR stands for Situation, Opportunity or Obstacle, Action and Result.  And it just helps you to frame sometimes the stories that you share. So, it might just be worth you thinking about that, like so far this year or in the last six months, what are the two or three stories that you would share with someone to show yourself at your best?  And often when we describe them in stories, we sort of feel less uncomfortable about talking about those things that we are really brilliant at.

Helen Tupper: And my idea for action is about stretching your strengths.  So, this is where you take that thing that gives you energy that you want to be known for, and we're trying to use it basically with more people in more places.  And the principle behind this is, the more you use it, the better you get.  So I think of it as like frequency builds competency. 

And the more people who see it, the more opportunities you get to use it, because you get into them spotting opportunities for you. So, when you're stretching your strengths, a couple of things here for you to think about how far am I really stretching them.  First of all, regularity, so that's how often are you using it?  That thing you want to be known for, just think about the time that you spend working in a week, how many hours are spent using that strength.  The second is range, so how many different situations are you using that strength in?  If it's just in the same meeting every week, for example, then it's going to be used in the same way; but if you're using it on a different range of projects, you'll be using it in different ways, it'll be getting bigger, it'll be getting better.

The third one is reach, so you really want to be thinking about, who am I reaching with that strength?  The further your strength goes, the more people it will be seen by.  And when you've got your regularity, your range and your reach really sorted, then you're going to be stretching that strength and improving it and really building your brand and your reputation around it too. Our go-to guru on this, who is actually the person who really taught me to think about strengths as energy, rather than what you're good at, is Marcus Buckingham.  He's written several books on strengths, so we'd definitely recommend looking at him and his work.

Sarah Ellis: And episode 122 of our podcast was on How to Make Your Strengths Stand Out.  So that's it.

Helen Tupper: Oh!

Sarah Ellis: That's number 20 of our Squiggly Career Skills Sprint.

Helen Tupper: I shouldn't have said that, I should have gone, "Woo-hoo!"

Sarah Ellis: We hope you found it useful, we'd love to know.  Please just email us at helenandsarah@squigglycareers.com.  This is a new format for us.  Does seven minutes work for you?  Do you feel like you've had ideas for action that felt relevant and relatable that you can go away and do something with?  Is this something you've worked through with someone else, like a work best friend or as a team?  So, give us some feedback so we can figure out whether to do more of these, or whether this was a good experiment but perhaps we need to make some changes for next time.

Helen Tupper: And if you want to repeat the sprint or you want to share it with other people, all the resources that we've created, so badges and we've got Ready Steady Sprint document, all of that will stay on our website.  So, if you go to amazingif.com and you go to our free career toolkit, you'll find everything to do with the sprint there and also lots of other toolkits to support your Squiggly Career.  But thank you so much for sprinting with us, we really appreciate all your Squiggly Careers support.

Sarah Ellis: Bye everyone!