Book Review: Now, Discover Your Strengths

This book review is part of a series that covers the topic of Motivation. The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to Motivation is Keith A. Shaw. Motivation refers to the initiation, direction, intensity and persistence of behavior which demonstrates desire and willingness to do something. nnNow, Discover Your Strengths is a valuable resource for people interested in motivation, and it is available through Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.nnAmazon.com's Best of 2001nEffectively managing personnel--as well as one's own behavior--is an extraordinarily complex task that, not surprisingly, has been the subject of countless books touting what each claims is the true path to success. That said, Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton's Now, Discover Your Strengths does indeed propose a unique approach: focusing on enhancing people's strengths rather than eliminating their weaknesses. Following up on the coauthors' popular previous book, First, Break All the Rules, it fully describes 34 positive personality themes the two have formulated (such as Achiever, Developer, Learner, and Maximizer) and explains how to build a "strengths-based organization" by capitalizing on the fact that such traits are already present among those within it.nnMost original and potentially most revealing, however, is a Web-based interactive component that allows readers to complete a questionnaire developed by the Gallup Organization and instantly discover their own top-five inborn talents. This device provides a personalized window into the authors' management philosophy which, coupled with subsequent advice, places their suggestions into the kind of practical context that's missing from most similar tomes. "You can't lead a strengths revolution if you don't know how to find, name and develop your own," write Buckingham and Clifton. Their book encourages such introspection while providing knowledgeable guidance for applying its lessons. --Howard RothmannnThe Barnes & Noble ReviewnChances are that if someone approached you and asked for an honest list of your weaknesses and failings, you'd be able to oblige them without too much difficulty. But could you describe your strengths as easily? As Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton point out, we've all been so programmed to identify, analyze, and overcome our faults that we've done relatively little to nurture our native talents, even though success is typically won by tapping into those talents and turning them into real-world strengths. Attacking the myth that "each person's greatest room for growth is in his or her areas of greatest weakness," the authors of this highly useful book maintain that the first priority for individuals as well as corporations must be to identify and then capitalize on the unique, enduring talents latent within each one of us. nnBuckingham and Clifton begin with a look at the lives of a few famous people -- Bill Gates, Tiger Woods, Warren Buffett -- who've turned their inner passions and drives into successful careers. But they also share the stories of some more ordinary folks: Sherie, for example, loved the idea of being a doctor but found that she disliked being around seriously ill people. She ultimately became a dermatologist, thereby putting her talent for healing into action without trying to "correct" the feelings that would have made her less effective working as an oncologist or an emergency room physician. These personal stories lead the authors into a larger discussion of strength building, a skill they view as necessary to happiness and achievement at work. nnNow, Discover Your Strengths is a thoughtful and persuasive book that will enrich the lives of many people by teaching them to focus on their unique potential rather than forcing themselves into jobs or roles that will probably alienate them from their own true abilities. (Sunil Sharma)nnnAnnotationnWith accessible and profound insights on how to turn talents into strengths, and with the immediate on-line feedback of StrengthsFinder at its core, Now, Discover Your Strengths is one of the most groundbreaking and useful business books ever written.