Performance reviews are designed to highlight weaknesses, right?  What if we used them to find strengths and capitalize on those?  360 degree reviews can be enlightening about an employee's strengths as well as their weaknesses.  Think about questions like "What is this person's greatest strength?" or "What is the best quality this person brings to the team?"

By focusing on strengths, managers unlock employee potential, encourage honest feedback, and challenge the perception that all feedback is negative.  These are three huge gains in any organization, and the cost of achieving them is shockingly low.  Read on to learn how to identify strengths and what to do with the information.

Focus on Strengths

Gallup has shown that employees whose managers focused on developing their strengths were:

• more engaged - their chances of being actively disengaged are only 1 in 100!
• more loyal - they both plan on staying in the company longer and are more likely to recommend the company's products or services
• more productive - engaged workers are more productive, creative, and innovative in their companies

Research overwhelmingly supports the idea that when we use our strengths at work, we are happier, more productive, and more likely to stick around.  This isn't to say, however, that we forget about weaknesses.  Instead, it means that we set goals for improving those weaknesses while also putting time and energy into developing and fostering already-existing strengths.

Identifying Strengths through Feedback

Your employees probably have a decent idea already of their strengths, but they've likely never thought about how to capitalize on those to do their jobs better or be happier.  This is where feedback comes in.  Invite employees to evaluate their own strengths, and then compare those answers with what the employee's colleagues believe are their strengths. 

So I'm a good communicator.  So what?  How is that going to help me in my job?  Identifying concrete ways to apply those strenghts is the next step.

Focus questions around tangible things the person can do to employ those strengths.  For example, "What next action could this person take to use their biggest strength on the job?" and "How can this person's strengths help you do your job better?"

Questions like these are a fantastic jumping off point for personal reflection, goal setting, and conversations between managers and employees.  By using feedback to collect positive information on an employee, rather than identifying their biggest weaknesses, managers and organizations go a long way to changing the opinion of feedback and evaluations among their workforce.

Using Strengths Feedback in the Workplace

Once you've identified a team's collective and individual strengths, what do you do with that information?  Look for ways to engage employees in what they do best.

When forming a new team, choose a leader that can drive clarity, get people excited, and move toward action.  When you notice an employee having a difficult time, reach out to a trusted colleague who is especially skilled at building relationships and empathizing with others.  When pairing employees for a task, look for people who will push each other because of their different talents and strengths.  If an employee has identified a strength they wish to continue developing, look for training classes or projects that specifically call for that kind of individual.

Additionally, recognize and celebrate employees' strengths.  Strive to create a culture of acceptance by acknowledging publicly that different people have different strengths, and that's ok.  In every organization, there is a need for big-picture thinkers as well as detail-oriented, micro-focused individuals.  Let go of the cookie-cutter mindset and see what your employees can achieve.