Now, Discover Your Strengths

Rating:
Summary: Test + Book = A+
Review: "Now, Disover Your Strengths", the follow up to "First Break All The Rules," is great for two reasons:

1) You get to take the StrengthsFinder test online and discover what your top five patterns of strength are in your life.

2) The book will help you go deeper with your strengths and find out how the best of the best use their strengths to get better.

Too many reviews on here focus on the fact that you can only take the test once, or the book does not go deep enough. Stop trying to find out what you are not, and start finding out what you are! Most people who want to take the test over and over again do so to validate what they think they are, and not how they were created. This test is meant to be taken once, in order to measure your instinctive responses to the questions, not your thought out answers. Unlike other psychometric tests, the StrengthsFinder tells you how you respond, your initial reactions, how you are.

I work with this tool on a daily basis and have seen over 500 results of this test and done many one on one interviews to follow up and help people go deeper in their strengths. 9 out of 10 people are amazed with the results and how accurate this test is. Most of the 10% who have questions can figure it out and be happy with some counseling and deeper discovery of their strengths.

The [money] is worth the price to take the test, and the book does an adequate job of going deeper with your strengths. The whole theory of focusing on what you are good at works, I have seen it and fully endorse this book and what it brings to the field of Leadership Development and Management.

Rating:
Summary: Don't buy reprint from India!
Review: This is a great book that I have used with clients, BUT reprints sold as NEW from India do not include the login code ... which is essential for taking the self test and using the book. I purchased three books for my students thru [x]; none included the code. ...

Rating:
Summary: 500 stars - Thank you M.B., D.O.C. and Gallup
Review: I listened to the audio CD's. Thank you Marcus Buckingham, Donald O. Clifton and the Gallup Organization for this collaborative gem! It presents strong material in an understandable format by a strong narrator. I would N-E-V-E-R use the term "mediocre" as one recent reviewer. The ideas presented here can help you make a real breakthrough to higher achievement and fulfillment in all your endeavors. The authors have taken a very complex topic and have refined it down to a predictable level to offer a very practical and useable approach for the layperson. Five Stars? I'd say more like 500 stars. If you are searching for a way to take stock of yourself and put it all together for a compelling and worthwhile future, then buy this item now. Don't put it off. ONE REGRET! I only regret that I have passed over this CD set on shelf of my local bookstore for two years before finally buying.

Rating:
Summary: quite useful yet not complete on the subject
Review: The strength of the book is that it puts you on the track of knowing yourself. It helps you understand the basic inclinations, the unique perspective that makes you who you are. These are general indications of how your mind functions and how these talents or instincts can be converted to strengths to create synergy in your life.

But these "significant themes", as the authors refer to them are not the complete answer. Firstly, I believe, going by the nuances of feelings and tendencies that humans possess, it is partially appropriate, if not incorrect, to categorize their strengths in such a fashion. To really understand one's strengths in fine detail and to use them, one must go through some finer observation over a period of time. Also, though there are discussions in the book about successful people being where they are due to their strengths, there ought to be some discussion about the process of honing individual talents too.

Rating:
Summary: Groundbreaking and Very Useful!
Review: Now, Discover Your Strengths goes beyond just strength finding. After reading the book and completing my own Profile, I found the profile to be so accurate it was almost frightening. The concepts in the book teach you how to focus on the positive and improve yourself. As I begin graduate work, this book gave me insight as to the specific direction I should go. This concept is also currently being put to test in two colleges in the U.S. The "Strengthsquest" text takes the next step in aiding incoming college students to discover their strengths, develop them as part of their 4 year college career and use them in selecting a field of study. All of this is a result of Now, Discover Your Strengths. My son attends one of those colleges, and we now know why he does the thing he does. We know his top five strengths and he knows mine and my wife's. Strengthsfinder goes beyond business and can be used in every endeavor we undertake; our marriage, home, church and other relationships. For those who have read the book and feel slighted, review your strengths and you will know why you felt slighted. Also, sign up for Gallup's e-mail service at the Strengthsfinder web-sight and you will get plenty of information to continue to use and develop your strengths. I also recommend reading Now, Soar with Your Strengths.

Rating:
Summary: Now, Pay Up for Your Strengths
Review: Beware! The Gallup Organization considers this book an *introduction* to Strengths Based Living. It is a small part of a larger program that their consulting group administers for large organizations. It appears that this book was developed as a primer to get managers interested in using the Gallup consulting program within their own organizations. If you ask for more in-depth information or a full report on your assessment results on an individual level (which they provide for corporate clients) you will be told it is not available.

The book itself reads like an introduction to StrengthsFinder. It offers interesting and insightful background information about managing strengths, but comes up short on follow through. After you take the assessment test there is very little information on how to truly capitalize on the results. Further, you may only take the assessment test once and then you are locked out. So if you want to share the book with your family or friends be ready to shell out another $27 so they can take the test too.

Bottom line, this book is a thinly veiled money-making sham designed to maximize profit and open the door to corporate consulting contracts. Spend your money on something else.

Rating:
Summary: Great OD advice for business leaders
Review: As an Organizational Development professional and a business leader, my first thoughts after finishing the book are that the majority of the information and guidance in this book is great food for thought for corporate executives. In the current economy where "business as usual" is anything but, senior executives continually turn to old-school methodologies of sustaining their business viability. While the focus on individuals areas for improvement are a standard approach to ensuring corporate success, it bears little evidence that there is a direct correlation that focusing energies on individuals' weaknesses results in positive improvement in corporate morale and performance. And that is what this book is all about - no-nonsense, backed by extensive research from a notable research corporation, stick-to-your-ribs data and evaluation. Does it provide singular actions that individuals can take to leverage their strengths to overshadow their areas of weakness? The process of doing so would require individualized performance plans related to the multitude of variations in the theme combinations. Readers should not expect this book to provide step-by-step actions to take in order to give the illusion of different themes. Take heed - this book does provide the baseline guidance of which every reader can not only identify aspects of their own organization, but also identify areas of strength on which to explore further on a self journey. While corporate America continues to struggle with improving performance by focusing on the weaknesses of its employees, the light is at the end of the tunnel, awaiting to be read. I applaud Marcus Buckingham, Dr. Clifton, and the Gallup Organization in having the courage and guts to "tell it like it is" and send out a wake-up call to business leaders everywhere. Kudos!

Rating:
Summary: Shallow
Review: The basic premise of the book is great, and the on-line tool is useful. However, there is very little discussion of how to use these strengths. Also, I tend to be skeptical of the results when I'm not allowed to complete the survey again, 6 months or a year later, unless of course I buy another copy of the book!

Rating:
Summary: Top-Notch Tool
Review: This book quite simply can change your life. Since I took the StrengthsFinder test, I have dramatically increased my effectiveness in my current job.

Donald Clifton has spent twenty years monitoring and discovering patterns of strength in the best of the best. This testing and research shows in the accuracy and precision of this test.

Whether you have achiever, context, futuristic, emphathy, restorative, or whatever, this book and test is going to dramatically change the way you look at the world. I currently work in the field of Leadership Identification and Development and this test time and time again shows students and young adults ages 18-30, a new way to approach life.

If there is a weakness in this book, it is that is does not go deeper. Clifton does a great job showing how he and others developed this process over years and years of study. Personally I want to be compared against the best, and this is what the book and test do. Have you ever wondered why you always size yourself up against everyone else and if you knew you could not win you did not even play? --Competition.

The beauty of this book is that your personal combination of strengths can put you as unique as 1 in millions, and the chances of meeting someone that is your exact double is next to impossible. How great is it that we are all so unique? Does not lend much credence to the theory that we are all here by some cosmic accident.

Our society, educational systems, businesses, and so many other institutions always try to build us up where we are weak. I worked at a company in Washington, DC and was utilized as an office manager and executive assistant, a job I was clearly not wired to do. With the the themes of competition, achiever, activator and significance, how could I ever handle ordering pens and pencils and organizing a contact database? I could not! I want to change the world, and now I know why-- I was wired to do it.

Do you know instantly how people are feeling when you walk in a room? I cannot, and I know my emphathy is low or non-existent. My dreams of becoming a counselor were misguided at best. This book, and the test will help you find out how you are wired and what a perfect job for you would be.

Can you wake up and say, I am doing what I was created to do and enjoying it? If not, I suggest you read this book and meditate over the information you receive back from it. Thanks to Donald Clifton for an excellent and cutting edge work.

Rating:
Summary: A refreshing approach to success.
Review: Based on extensive research done by Gallup (the polling organization), NOW, DISCOVER YOUR STRENGTHS is about developing human strengths instead of trying to improve weaknesses. The authors begin by making a remarkable point: that people succeed better in their careers when they go with what comes naturally to them instead of trying to develop abilities they are lacking in. They illustrate their ideas from the point of view of an employee as well as from a management viewpoint. After a 30-year study including interviews with over 2 million people, the authors condense the results into a detailed description of 34 strengths - patterns or themes that can contribute to your personal and professional success. They provide a website where you can take their online strengths test, and they stress the fact that it is not the type of test you fail. It is more about observing yourself without judgment.

The tone of the book is good-natured and encouraging: "Spontaneous reaction, yearnings, rapid learning, and satisfactions will all help you detect the traces of your talents." One of the most valuable things I read in the book was how often people are reluctant to build on their own strengths because mediocrity and failure are so much less risky. I encourage anyone attracted to this book's ability to present new possibilities for your life to read a copy of WORKING ON YOURSELF DOESN'T WORK by Ariel and Shya Kane. The Kanes are masters in the art of showing people how to transform possibilities undreamt of into everyday realities.