Everything Your Parents Did Not Tell You About Strengths and Weaknesses

Everything Your Parents Did Not Tell You About Strengths and Weaknesses

Written by Markus Eriksson

Strengths and weaknesses in interaction with each other often create exciting

and some times hard to handle dynamic in relationships. It is also a topic that is

not too often discussed in a mature and open manner. I might fear that talking

about my strengths might be labeled as boasting. Weaknesses might be avoided

because they make me feel vulnerable and, well, weak.

I have several people who have a much easier time with making a list of their

weaknesses than to talk about some of their strengths. When asked to share

their strengths they go silent and have to ask people around them for help. Of

course I have also encountered the opposite type, the one who immediately lists

three to four strengths, but is totally unable to even think of one weakness.

A word I tend to implement when dialoging with people to use instead of

weakness is the words "area of improvement". For if we find that there is

something that we are not so good at, then it is also reasonable to think that that

is an area of my personality where I have the biggest potential for growth and

improvement.

Another interesting perspective on strengths and weaknesses is found in a tool

called SDI®, which is an inventory of our strengths in relation to other people.

The inventory was developed by Elias Porter and you can read more about it at

www.personalstrengths.com, the website of Personal Strengths Publishing.

Porter labels weaknesses as overdone strengths. This is a very interesting way

to look at it.

Say for example that you consider yourself to be not so good at putting forth your

opinion in group discussions. Most of the time you sit quiet, observing what the

others are saying. One might then say that you are "weak" in the area of

expressing your personal opinions to the group. If we use the perspective of Elias

Porter, we would exchange that and say that you