The strengths based approach has been one of the most profoundly important shifts in the way we think about personal and professional development this century.
New and experienced life coaches, career coaches, executive coaches and more recently well-being and high performance coaches are gradually taking International Coaching Federation (ICF) certified training programs to qualify in this methodology.
The strengths movement, which started in the USA, has made it to Dubai successfully. Dubai based coaches are gradually training and certifying in this methodology. As a result, more and more Dubai based organisations are starting to call themselves strengths based organisations.
Its Roots
At the turn of the 21st century psychology grew a new branch of research – this was called Positive Psychology; The study of human well-being and flourishing.
The basic premise; if we want to understand how to flourish then we need to study human flourishing, not only suffering – which was what dominated the research previously.
Unfortunately, the workplace mirrored the traditional approach; make a light touch on people’s strengths (usually to soften the blow for what was coming next) and then relentlessly fixate on deficit, deficiencies and weaknesses, and identify those as the most fertile “areas for development” or “growth opportunities.”
The strengths methodology investigates both strengths and weaknesses. Then focuses on strengths as the most lucrative opportunity for strategic deployment and growth, and weaknesses as areas to be mitigated and managed around.
The return on investment when we develop our strengths is exponential; we grow faster, find deeper levels of engagement, happiness and performance. When weaknesses are the main focus area for development we are missing out on our greatest opportunity to find deep engagement and high performance.
If we want to help people unlock their potential, then we need to fixate on their potential, not the opposite.
Gallup finds that when individuals learn to focus on their strengths they are 6 times more likely to be engaged in their jobs and 3 times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life.
The business case for strengths is profoundly strong. In Dubai, which is such a business focused arena, the focus on getting the best from and for the talent in the region is unrelenting. When organisations make a commitment to a strengths based culture, almost every indicator of performance can be improved; from retaining talent to increased productivity and profitability.
For an accelerating market place in a small corner of the Arabian Peninsula, Dubai knows that in order to compete with the rest of the world, its people and businesses need to optimise the talent in the region.
“A person can perform only from strength. One cannot build performance on weakness, let alone on something one cannot do at all.” Peter Drucker
Organisations across the region are gradually being able to call themselves strengths-based organisations. And Dubai-based coaches don’t need to look outside of the country to gain a strengths based business coaching accreditation as ICF certified providers are certifying people on-line and in person in the UAE.
It’s catching on… but slowly.
Leaders, organisations and coaches are only gradually embracing the strengths based approach. But, even though the research is supportive, it still challenges the conventional wisdom, and goes against hidden biases that pull us back to conventional deficit thinking and weakness fixing.
In the turbulence of human relationships, looming deadlines, global pandemics and the drama of everyday life, humans generally default toward certain bias areas. The big one that often extinguishes the strengths based approach is the negativity bias. Human beings are prone to attributing more emotional weight to negatives than we give to positives. We study our failures and celebrate our wins… In the strengths based approach we also study wins!
However, even certified strengths based coaches work hard to resist the negativity bias and the unyielding urge to fixate on weaknesses. I once had a recently graduated coach share this challenge with me during a post training mentoring (supervision) session:
Newly Certified Coach: “I have my second session coming up with my new client and I am really worried about it…
Me: What’s happening?
Newly Certified Coach: I can’t seem to find any problems to work on… the client just said that everything was going well, so I don’t know what to do in session two”
Me: “Study their wins and find out how and why everything is going so well”.
Even though I have every confidence that this newly certified strengths coach will quickly become skilled and consistent with the approach, the impact that can create the most value in the world is when leaders within organisations develop their strengths based coaching skills.
When leaders coach, and coach through strengths they have the potential to make wholesale cascading changes to company culture, engagement, wellbeing and performance. Employees are empowered, enabled and given the best chance of finding mastery, engagement and performance.
Moreover, they create space for employees to be more open about where they have vulnerabilities and can then openly build strategies to mitigate those vulnerabilities.
In a weakness-focussed environment, it is normal for people to exert significant energy fighting against the flow of their strengths. As a result, they make slow progress, hit invisible ceilings, they disengage and worst of all, they hide their vulnerabilities, only to be found-out after months of poor productivity.
Impact – Dubai needs you at your best!
Understanding our strengths and knowing how to develop and deploy them is not that easy. If you have ever interviewed people for jobs you will recall the fuzziness that they demonstrate when asked to describe their strengths; “I’m great with people” is the typical vague answer when an interviewee describes their strengths.
However, being ‘good with people’ could mean so many things; Selling to people? Caring for people? Empathising with people? Following people? Leading people? Inspiring people? Challenging people? Developing people? Good with small groups of people? One to one? Big groups? and what kinds of people? Young, old, assertive, shy?
When managers and leaders understand how to give strengths based feedback to their employees they can massively reduce active disengagement and increase active engagement (Gallup, 2018).
Certified and accredited coaches who have done ICF accredited online coach training programs are leveraging the approach across a whole range of arenas. Whether it is a focus on strengths based leadership, strengths based relationships, strengths based sales or strengths based teams, exploring the very best version of ourselves is an exploration of our best chance of being successful.
Wellbeing
It is no surprise to all of us that one of the biggest challenges emerging from the last 15 months is around wellbeing; our mental, physical and emotional health.
A deeper understanding of the strengths methodology is a reminder of how this approach has such an important role to play in supporting the wellbeing of us all.
Human beings have relatively stable personality traits. Those traits create patterns of behaving, thinking and feeling that we repeat over time. These patterns shape our personality – who we are. The strengths methodology explores these patterns and helps people work with the flow of these patterns. Because we are working with the flow we can sustain effort, energy and engagement.
Working against the flow of our natural traits is a move away from where we derive energy and engagement. When the pressure is on, and crisis looms, working against the flow is a threat to our wellbeing.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi once said: “There is nothing more entropic than unskilled work done under compulsion.” And this is the legacy of command-control, weakness-focussed leadership.
Coach training programs accredited by the International Coaching Federation and/or the Association for Coaching, that are underpinned by the strengths based approach bring a real advantage to leaders and coaches looking to unleash the potential of individuals, teams and organisations.
Imagine; not only a few companies being strengths based, but an entire city being strengths based. As Dubai emerges from the Covid pandemic and strides confidently forward, it will need all of its people, businesses and organisations to be at their very best.
Let’s study that best, and unleash it.
When Mick Todd founded 2b Limitless in 2004 he had no idea that the business would not only become one of the most trusted exponents of professional training and coaching for individuals and organizations; but it would become one of the most highly respected deliverers of executive, business and life coach certification in Dubai and beyond.
For the past 18 months the 2b Limitless coach training programs have been certifying leaders, life coaches, career coaches, businesses coaches and executive coaches throughout the region and globally through face to face and online coach training.
So what explains the extraordinary rise of 2b Limitless as one of the region’s most trusted coach certification providers in Dubai and the surrounding region?
Here are some of the reasons for the growth of 2b Limitless:
- The rapid growth and rising credibility of the global coaching industry;
- The gradual shift from command-control to servant leadership in organisations;
- The unrelenting hunger of the UAE and Dubai to get and give the very best for the talent in the region;
- The rapid growth of the personal-development movement;
- And, the arrival of the biggest shift in people development in decades; the strengths-based movement.
Servant Leadership and the Learning Generation
The 21st century worker has developed new demands on their place of work. New generations of employees are emerging from school systems that encourage independent learning, critical thinking and lifelong learning.
Teachers are encouraged to do less of the work in the classroom, and learners are asked to step forward and be the directors of their own learning.
When this generation arrives into the workplace, the directive leadership approach is the antithesis of how these young people have learned to grow and perform. In order to maximize the talent of people, educators (and now organisations) know that non directivity is the space-creator that draws out the very best of people, to the benefit of the person, the team and the organization.
What’s more, recent organizational research finds that employees consistently prioritize their development and growth above their job satisfaction as a fundamental need to be optimally engaged at work. Leaders who coach are not only moving the business objectives forward but they are creating an environment where consistent learning, development and growth in the workplace can happen.
It is often said that great learners are those who ‘know what to do when they don’t know what to do’. Coaching cultures create the space for employees to continuously ideate, innovate, solve unfamiliar problems and take psychological ownership, in an ever changing and challenging work and marketplace.
Successful workplaces are quickly understanding that if the potential of its business is to be maximised, then the potential of its people needs to be fulfilled.
“For organizations of the future, will learners replace employees, as people look for learning opportunities that pay, instead of looking for jobs?” (ANON)
So as the demand grows for external coaches and internal leaders who coach, so too does the necessity for certified and formally accredited coach training.
The rising growth and credibility of the global coaching industry
For the past 25 years, the International Coaching Federation (ICF) and more recently the Association for Coaching (AC) have been increasingly raising the credibility and respect of the coaching industry worldwide.
The tipping point has finally arrived. Coaching is no longer a remedial, mandated process for underperforming employees, but a transformational opportunity for every person and organisation looking to flourish.
As organisations and individuals understand the exponential value of developing people, they are looking to place that investment in professionals who are formally trained, certified and experienced. Certified coaches know that in order to be worthy of that investment, they need to have undergone a rigorous process of learning and practice, evidenced by the International Coaching Federation or the Association for Coaching.
Whether individuals are training to become certified career coaches, well-being coaches, executive coaches, business coaches, leadership coaches or life coaches; the importance of certification and accredited coach training has never been more important to perform ethically and professionally.
Not only does the credibility of the industry depend on it… but the extraordinary responsibility that coaches and leaders have to their clients and employees depends on it too.
Growth of the Personal Development Movement
This rise of the credibility of the coaching industry is moving hand in hand with the unstoppable growth of the personal development industry, which has become mainstream in its appeal. At an organisational level, companies know that a culture of learning is an actual asset, and individuals know that the single greatest investment they can make, that cascades into every aspect of their lives, is the investment that they make in themselves.
Individuals are looking to design-think about their lives; and a certified coach is the perfect partner to go about building a blueprint for an exponential life or career.
Gone are the days when our growth journeys stopped when we stepped out of the school gates for the last time. People want to grow, for the fruits as well as the intrinsic reward that it brings.
2b Limitless, at its heart, is a learning community. A growing family of people that know that their growth ultimately is for the benefit of us all.
Your world needs you at your best – The 2b Limitless Purpose Statement understands that we are all the beneficiaries of the growth of every person.
The strengths-based movement
At the turn of the 21st century, psychology grew a new branch of study called Positive Psychology which is the study of success and human flourishing. When that branch emerged, a new way of thinking about human growth and development exploded into organisations and businesses – that approach is called the strengths based approach.
As Don Clifton famously said:
“What will happen when we start thinking about what is right with people, rather than fixating on what is wrong with them?”
The answer: A positive transformation in almost every indicator of individual and organisational performance; engagement, productivity, fulfillment, retention, wellbeing, profitability etc…
Understanding that the fruits of human flourishing, wellbeing, engagement and performance are in people’s strengths (not their weaknesses), is the mindset shift that has transformed those lucky few who have stumbled upon this secret.
2b Limitless Certified Coaches learn to not only leverage the strengths-based approach to unleash the potential of their clients, but they use it to advance every aspect of their mission including the development of their own life and business interests.
2b Limitless is also strengths based on how we pursue our mission. Employees and associates are hired based on their unique potential, the business strategy is based around team and individual strengths, the teams development areas are their strengths not their weaknesses, and the language of strengths is infused into every part of our mission.
The Accredited Performance Coach (APC), is a synchronous coach training course designed to accredited managers, leaders and independent people in the skills of coaching. A mode of support that can be leveraged toward career coaching, leadership, performance, well being or general life coaching. The program is accredited by the International Coaching Federation, The Association for Coaching and the CPD Standards office UK.
When participants emerge from the other side of the APC journey, they are not only certified, but they are equipped with the tools and confidence to completely transform their ability to unlock the potential in others. The methodology is a hybrid of the latest in organisational and individual performance psychology, and tens of thousands of hours of real world experience working with elite performers all over the world.
And the alumni of extraordinary APC Coaches continues to grow, some of the most influential leaders in the Region: from Saudi Initial Group CEO John Nolan, the CO CEO of AES International Sam Instone, Bluehaus CEO Ben Corrigan, and Emirate MD Shada ElBorno (Standard Chartered Bank MD).
This collision of ideas; the credibility of the coaching industry; the focus on learning and development; the move to a strengths based approach; the personal development explosion and the timing of Mick Todd and his mission to help others succeed have created a wave that continues to build momentum.
1. Negativity Bias: Cognitive psychology teaches us that the negativity bias is a trait that skews our perceptions, particularly in the heat of day to day professional turbulence. From an evolutionary perspective, the consequences for when things went wrong were existential compared to the potential upside of when things went right. Our radar for negativity in others is far more sensitive than our positivity radar. It served our ancestors survival well, but it can cause havoc for company culture in 2019. Don’t forget to dial down the unconscious focus on weakness, and dial up the frequency to strength-mode more consistently.
2. Availability bias: It may sound negative (read above!) but it is clear that we have far more weaknesses than we have strengths. In fact, the list of what humans are incapable of is infinite. And the list of what we are capable of is finite. We see the weakness in others so easily, because there are far more of them to see. What matters is not the broad areas where we are weak, but the narrow sweet spots where we are strong. Warren Buffet called it our circle of competence… and he encouraged us not to try and make it too wide. Keep it narrow and see where our collective strengths can complement each other.
3. Blank Slates: Some narratives contend that natural traits do not exist, that people are infinitely malleable, and all human achievement is down to effort alone. Ignoring innate dispositions, traits and characteristics, directs our focus to weakness fixing because of the assumption that we can just re-wire ourselves with more hard work. People do have an extraordinary capacity to change, but they also have characteristics that are relatively stable… let’s not ignore these characteristics but learn to leverage them. Swim with the tide of those dispositions… there is a reason why it is called a flow state… easier and faster!
4. The failure obsession. Learning from failure is an important message with great intent and utility. However, even though its only half the story, it completely dominates the learning discussion. The ignored half of the discussion is that we also learn from our successes. We learn about the unique ingredients of winning, by studying our wins. The sole emphasis on learning from failure makes it the focal point for building success, while strengths are relegated to a token cushion, used mainly to soften the impact before hitting people with what’s wrong with them. Actually, those wins, no matter how small, are pieces of evidence to be studied with rigor. Let’s learn from our successes as much as we learn from our failures by making success an equal partner to failure in our learning journey.
5. Grit. The idea of grit has become a ubiquitous success meme. Never, ever, ever give up! Steady on, this is of course only half of the story. Resilience is a critical trait in anyone’s journey toward a worthwhile achievement. However, sometimes. Taking your head off the brick wall, looking up, and pointing yourself in another direction might just be the best idea. Balance resilience with navigation. The focus does not always have to be just on working harder.
Pete Turner is an individual & team performance coach with 2b Limitless (2blimitless.useodemo.com/), an award-winning training and coaching company in Dubai. He has a background in applied psychology, elite level sport coaching and specializes in strengths, engagement, performance and talent in the workplace.