StrengthsFinder

My mom being a psychiatrist, I grew up with lots of talk around the dinner table about psychology, and I've always had a fascination with figuring out how and why people think and act the way they do. That's why, when I started a contract out at Gallup two weeks ago and the client gave me a free pass to take their personality test, I was excited. I love personality tests. It's like reading your horoscope, except it's based in reality.

Gallup has published a book by Tim Rath called Strengths Finder 2.0, and in an interesting marketing strategy, the book doesn't supply any information not available in the online test, but you have to buy the book to get an access code to take the online test. (Great way to generate a best seller on the book charts and drive traffic to your website! Someone there at Gallup is a genius.) At any rate, there are over thirty personality traits (which are framed as "strengths") that they've mapped out, and the online test shows you your top five.

The idea behind the personality test is not that you try to figure out where you're weakest and improve it, but to figure out what you're good at, and leverage that the best you can. Gallup as an organization believes so strongly in this philosophy that every name placard at its office has that person's top five strengths on it. If someone feels weak in a particular area, they can find people who have a complimentary "strength" and ask that person to help them. I think it's a neat concept, and based on the positive work environment I see at Gallup, I think it's working. (And for the record, my top five strengths were "Input", "Intellection", "Connectedness", "Learner", and "Achiever". You can take the test yourself at http://www.strengthfinder.com/.