Now, Discover Your Strengths

Now, Discover Your Strengths

3.9 of 5 stars 3.90  ·  rating details  ·  7,041 ratings  ·  381 reviews
Unfortunately, most of us have little sense of our talents and strengths, much less the ability to build our lives around them. Instead, guided by our parents, by our teachers, by our managers, and by psychology's fascination with pathology, we become experts in our weaknesses and spend our lives trying to repair these flaws, while our strengths lie dormant and neglected....more
Hardcover, 272 pages
Published January 29th 2001 by Free Press (first published 2001)
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Jeph
Like many business books, Now, Discover Your Strengths is a book about discovering who you are, what you're naturally best at and how best to apply it in a business or life sense. Interestingly, this book approaches skill and education as secondary to natural gifts, tendencies and talents. The book uses an online personality test called StrengthsFinder (also utilized in other business books) to determine your 5 strongest "themes" of character such as Harmony, Empathy, Activator or Development. T...more
Melissa
My supervisor mentioned this book to me so I started reading it. It also includes a website that you visit to take a strengths finder test which is suppose to help you excel at your job (and for this reason, you should buy the book new so you have the code to use). The idea is rather than focusing on trying to improve your weaknesses, you focus on improving your strengths, resulting in a near perfect performance anytime. I would recommend this book to anyone that wants to learn more about their...more
Farnoosh Brock
Yes, the title may be obvious but how many of us focus entirely on our strengths and not mind our weaknesses? The idea of managing a weakness to the point that it does not hinder us but still focusing and growing our strengths - now that is brilliant when put to practice. Thank you Marcus Buckingham!

Even though it took me a few years to leave my corporate job where I was all about overcoming my weaknesses and go into business for myself to let my strengths shine, I am GLAD I took the plunge.

In...more
Liam
There is evidence behind how people have the ability to excel in certain areas better than others. It is hard for me at this point to not believe what I have read. If I was a manager of a business, to carefully select my workers is just what I would do. The people who do best in a position are the one's with the strongest synapses. If my workers are a team of people who all have a unique strength in something, there will be no weaknesses. I will not send my workers to seminars to improve their w...more
Marlene Higgs loula
This book is based on the idea that individuals (and therefore organizations) thrive when they focus on developing strengths (as opposed to correcting weaknesses). It is written with managers and leaders in mind, but can easily be extrapolated for use by individuals. It is intended to be used in conjunction with the research and tools developed by Gallup and found at www.strenghsfinder.com.

Many corporations focus on improving employee's weaknesses. It is the authors' hope to start a strengths re...more
Craig Toerpe
The book is a good read because of the Buckingham's relational story-telling. I read this as part of my master's program for Education Administration. I think one of the most telling truths of the book is that most of us are in jobs that we do not enjoy. For those who are not working a position that they truly enjoy, I am sure there are reasons to support the action. But what Buckingham stresses in the book, is finding what you enjoy and do it. Find what you love within your strengths, and do it...more
Curtis
I got through this quickly since it was an abridged audio version. I may go back & read the full version on my Kindle. I have been researching strengths based movement and approach to leadership recently.

There was a lot of good insight here, but the big takeaway for me was the author's comment about incremental improvements. Once you discover your strengths, you can hone them by incremental improvements. It reminds me of Mack Anderson's book, 212 Degrees. 212  The Extra Degree

The difference between world class...more
Tom Franklin
This book starts with a very good thesis: Instead of trying to improve your weaknesses you should, instead, concentrate on improving your strengths. The authors, both pollsters, have done considerable research over many years to back this idea, questioning business leaders, etc.

The question, then, is what exactly are your strengths?

To make the 2/3 of this book work, you need to go online and take the quiz they developed just for the book. However, some marketing genius decided that the quiz shou...more
Angela Risner
How many years did your parents, teachers, coaches, professors, managers say, this is a weakness and you need to work on it? Sure, practice makes perfects in some areas of life: driving, some sports, parenting, relationships, writing.

However, there are just some areas for each of us that are weaknesses. Perhaps for you it’s organization, time management, drawing, singing, math…and no amount of practice will get you to the next level. It simply isn’t who you are.

This book breaks through those tho...more
Geraldine
How many of us, well into our careers, still live with the mistaken idea that the purpose of most of our activities is to work on those weaknesses and somehow turn them into strengths? I would venture to say, the majority of us, certainly those of us who grew up with post war parents who themselves believed that success in working life and achievement can be measured by the extent to which his has been accomplished.



In the meantime, strengths, natural aptitudes, and in most cases the activities t...more
Andrea McDowell
Enh.

I've to this one with a solid decade of reading neuroscience and positive psychology behind me, so not only am I already familiar with the research he cites, but I am well aware of when it is misused. Let's just get this out of the way before we discuss any strengths (haha) the book may have, as I have yet to see its weaknesses covered in any of the reviews:

a) it is NOT TRUE that you can't significantly strengthen your weaknesses. Read The Brain that Changes Itself for a good introduction. S...more
Mike Knox
This book builds on the previously written, First, Break All the Rules. Its main assertion is that a “strengths revolution” is required in order for businesses to achieve excellence. Organizations must switch their focus from fixing weaknesses to maximizing strengths (3-4). It is not true that each person can become good at anything. It is not true that the greatest potential for personal growth is the areas we are weak in. The greatest potential for growth is in the areas of our greatest streng...more
Loy Machedo
Are you in the right job career but at the wrong position?
OR
Are you in the right position but with the wrong job career?

Should you focus on your strengths?
OR
Should you focus on your weakness?

What are your key strengths?
And how many are there?

Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham, Donald O. Clifton is a brilliantly crafted book which can answer these questions or at least shed some light into answers you wanted so badly.

On the upside, I loved the test that I could take to get to know...more
Terry
This book is a quick read and I found it very useful in helping point out the areas of my strongest talents or strengths. Unfortunately, to take the StrengthsFinder test, you have to purchase this or a second book on the same theme. I borrowed this book from the library. I would have been willing to pay on-line to take the test, but the website isn't set up that way. Regardless, I found the book very helpful. I particularly appreciate the insight that our greatest growth potential is NOT in tryi...more
Thehobbyseeker
Have you ever been depressed? Have you ever felt like a piece of garbage? Don't be afraid, I was there too. In fact I was there many times in my life, last time less than year ago. And all of that even despite I know what is the best cure for such thinking. Would you like to know what I'm talking about? It's not a secret: you must fall in love with yourself, because when you love yourself everything is better. Yeah, easy to say, but how to do it and (which is even more important) sustain this fe...more
E
This was the typical "make your business better" and "improve yourself as an employee" book. The theme of which was selling their theory throughout. To be precise, in order to read past the 2nd third of the book, you have to sign up on their website, take their "personality" quiz, and "learn your top five strengths". Beyond doing that, the book is about re-tooling everyone's definitions of certain characteristics. In short, it's a gimmick book, but what do you expect from picking one of these up...more
Khalid
In this book, the author calls out for us to focus on our strengths rather than our weaknesses, and makes a very good case for that. I enjoyed listening to the book, and was even encouraged to get the Strength Finder 2.0 program (which is a quiz that tells you your top 5 strengths). This book provides an older version of the Strength Finder, but I borrowed it from a friend and thus it was already used.

I have one criticism of the book, which is that it strongly says that you cannot really change...more
Carlos Rodarte
Philosophically, I believe in the message this book expounds, namely to focus on strengths - or what you one is good at - versus trying to overly improve weaknesses... however, I found the book a bit dry. It's a short read and well worth it, but keep in mind that it's likely to tell you something you already know but just hadn't thought about a whole lot. It does provide a set of personal strengths, a brief description about them, and how best to manage employees with that particular strength -...more
Jenny
Довольно много воды, но тем не менее, очень интересно читать. Основная идея: для того чтобы преуспеть в какой-либо области, нужна комбинация "талант+знания+умения". Задача каждого - выявить свои таланты и не зарывать их в землю:) Для определения ваших личных талантов нужно пройти онлайн тест, код прилагается к книге. У меня была аудиоверсия, поэтому тест пока пройти не удалось, и на амазоне эту книгу для киндла тоже временно не продают. Но все равно интересно узнать, какие же у меня таланты, так...more
Kent
I enjoyed this book. It takes an interesting approach to self-improvement. The main point being that you have certain talents that you develop in your early life. Beyond your teens it is difficult to develop new talents. The general emphasis on self-improvement is traditionally focused on areas where you lack skill or talent. This book asserts that this approach is wrong. The idea that they promote is that you should focus on your strengths (talents) and focus on developing skills around your ta...more
Graeme Roberts
This is cynical bullshit book. The Gallup Organization conducted a survey of over two million people to discover the source of their strengths. They provide a login for an online survey to "discover" your strengths. No book, no survey, so they keep selling books to people who want to find out their talents, and don't we all. Of course, everyone that takes the test further "strengthens the validity of the database." Reading through the list of strengths it was very obvious to me what mine were, w...more
Hans
This is a tough one to rate. I found a lot of value in the first chapters and the closing chapters. The online test was interesting and the results feel like a good fit for me. The middle however has to cover so much that won't be relevant to every person that even if you want a better sense of what each of the 34 themes entails or how to manage someone who has one of those themes, your eyes will start to glaze over. Those sections are much better for reference rather than a read through.

When I...more
John
I originally got this book from my best friend.

This book highlights the different strengths we have as individuals, and how they can work within vocations and lives.

One of the ideas this book promotes is concept that we are created with a preset group of strengths that cannot be added or dropped.

In my Christian-based perspective, I believe that God in his sovereignty through genetics and experience creates us as individuals in a certain, specific way for his glory and purposes.

I haven't done...more
Judith
Buckingham is into you finding your best self. Instead of concentrating on your faults and trying to repair them he wants you to see your talents.
The problem is to actually find your real talents you have to take a test on line. You do it by getting a code from the back cover of the book and enter it into the correct place in his site. I got the book from the library and was all excited to do the test until I got to the place to put in the code and found someone (of course) already used it. I al...more
Nick Smith
This book was worth the read if for no other reason that is showed me how weakness-focused most Americans are and why that's so detrimental to personal development.

Not only did it help me understand that, but it also helped me identify what I think are five strength themes that very accurately describe me. I don't think I would have come to the conclusions it did on my own.

Much of the book was devoted to descriptions of the 34 different strength themes that are possible. I only needed to read my...more
Nicole Smith
This book was a gift from a former supervisor. Ultimately, I wish I had been able to learn a lot of the great stuff in this book through it being practiced at my job. I really love strengths based approaches. The authors made all the information very accessible, and I appreciated their discussion about how easy it is to think that we are on the same page as those around us when really we aren't even speaking the same language. The section on how to manage from a strengths based approach was inte...more
Ginger
My strengths, which at first, 1-2 didn't make sense to me, but gradually I saw how they rule my life in every way. My entire family did this b-c my sister gave us all the books and it made for great holiday discussions and greater understanding and appreciation for our unique strengths. I also bought the books for all my co-workers and we had a discussion date to understand what each of us brings to our workplace and how we could better position ourselves to utilize our strengths. Every person i...more
Laura
One of the best and unique tests I've seen to uncover what people are truly good at. Started as a gallup poll, and using millions of people,they devised a system that is the best one I've seen in determining what talents you have, and how to manage your talents and those of the people you manage. It doesn't box people into only a few profiles - you end up with 5 themes or talents out of 34. The possible combinations with this system are in the millions - so it much more truly reflects all the di...more
Bill
I liked this book more than I thought I would. Its premise is very intriguing. As someone who has worked in corporate America for over a decade, I felt that Buckingham's criticisms of the way most organizations handle employee development are completely justified. To paraphrase, most organizations are more concerned with closing skill gaps ("damage control") than they are with discovering and nurturing their employees' strengths. I might have given this book 4 stars, but I read a library copy of...more
Teresa
This book should have a disclaimer on it stating you have to buy the book for full price new, or else it's useless. The whole premise of the book is analyzing your results from their "Strengthsfinder" test, but you don't find this out til halfway through the book. It takes even longer for you to find out that you are supposed to use the code from inside the dustjacket. If you get this from the used bookstore, the library, or even brand new and someone else has stolen the code, you've absolutely...more
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Now, Discover Your Strengths (Paperback)
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Now, Discover Your Strengths
Now, Discover Your Strengths (Audio CD)
Now, Discover Your Strengths: How To Develop Your Talents And Those Of The People You Manage

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In a world where efficiency and competency rule the workplace, where do personal strengths fit in?

It's a complex question, one that intrigued Cambridge-educated Marcus Buckingham so greatly, he set out to answer it by challenging years of social theory and utilizing his nearly two decades of research experience as a Sr. Researcher at Gallup Organization to break through the preconceptions about a...more
More about Marcus Buckingham...
First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance The One Thing You Need to Know: ... About Great Managing, Great Leading, and Sustained Individual Success Find Your Strongest Life: What the Happiest and Most Successful Women Do Differently StandOut: The Groundbreaking New Strengths Assessment from the Leader of the Strengths Revolution

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“If your senses are numbed with delusion and denial, you will stop looking for these true strengths and wind up living a second-rate version of someone's life rather than a worldclass version of your own” 7 people liked it
“Back in the 1930s, Carl Jung, the eminent thinker and psychologist, put it this way: Criticism has 'the power to do good when there is something that must be destroyed, dissolved or reduced, but [it is] capable only of harm when there is something to be built.” 5 people liked it
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