A primary responsibility of effective leaders is to develop key people as well as themselves. In the area of leadership studies, quite a bit is known about how managers develop. We know, for example, that much of it happens on the job; challenging jobs, for example, can bring out latent capability.1
Another common way of helping managers to develop is to confront them with their shortcomings. If job challenges pull capability out of managers, feedback (especially 360-degree feedback) is intended to strongly encourage managers to correct their weaknesses. This is an effective way to address performance issues, although, as you will see, not the only way.
The purpose of this report is to call attention to a kind of development that goes beyond addressing shortcomings, yet one that is often overlooked. I propose that much of the energy spent in developing managers is channeled into getting them to see and take seriously their deficits, but what is often not considered is that it may be equally valuable to help managers recognize and internalize their strengths. A counterintuitive notion—yes, but one that is borne out if one takes a close look at the stance that many managers take to their strengths.
The report begins with the idea that the failure to recognize one’s strengths is, in fact, at the root of many performance problems. Next I take up the difficulty of getting through to managers about their strengths. Following that I treat the gains that can be realized from internalizing strengths. Finally, I identify a series of principles to guide practitioners in using strengths as leverage for helping managers develop.
Certainly recognizing strengths as developmental tools has relevance for anyone in the field of management or executive development. No less so, it has value for managers at all levels seeking to grow and improve. It is also a useful idea for supervisors at any level to keep in mind when they enter performance appraisals and coaching conversations with their direct reports.
1 McCall, M. W., Jr., Lombardo, M. M., & Morrison, A. M. (1988). The Lessons of Experience: How Successful Executives Develop on the Job. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.