Profile Tips help you put your strengths profile to work
It’s easy to name reasons you and your team members are not productive at work: endless meetings. Email overflow. Tardiness. No deadlines or clearly-established goals. Distracting work environment.
How about this one? “My strength in building relationships may not be as productive as you think.”
Even though your role requires that you build healthy relationships with those in your circle, you may unknowingly use your people-oriented strengths as a stumbling block to low productivity and not even realize it.
Here’s a Tip
Use your people-oriented strengths as a means to an end – not the end itself.
Suppose you’re gifted in people contact. You’re able to bring enthusiasm to relationships, focus in on the needs of those you serve, and give others a feeling of safety… whether it is in leading others, coaching, counseling, connecting donors to your organization, or making a sale.
No question – that’s a gift. But have you made it your goal?
Check yourself: conversations get off track. Phone calls linger much longer than you intended. You’re so concerned about someone’s feelings that you don’t confront and get to the real issues. You routinely get off schedule. It can be tempting to focus on using your people-oriented gift so that simply having conversations becomes an end in itself.
But when that happens, your productivity crashes. You do not accomplish the tasks you’ve been assigned because you’re so busy talking with people that you’re not really meeting their spiritual needs.
Examine the fruit of your strengths. People-oriented gifts are good, but they are simply a means to do the work God has entrusted to you – whether it is making contacts, earning the right to be heard, or ministering to God’s people at a deeper transformational level.
Honor the gift God has given you by using it to be productive in the responsibilities you have been given.
More about Productivity in the Workplace
Profile Tip: Don’t Let Strengths Tags Throw You
Checklist for Communicating with Your Colleagues
What Value Do You Bring to Your Team?
Coffee Debrief: An Exercise in Meaningful Interactions