By Ruth Pearce
January 10, 2024
“A woman is like a teabag. You can’t tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water.”
– Eleanor Roosevelt
Character Strengths 101
I first encountered character strengths and the science of character in a course about positive psychology. The Certificate in Positive Psychology explored many aspects of this young science. Sometimes called “the science of peak performance” or “the science of flourishing,” the many tools of positive psychology each have their place in the helping professions, and in coaching. From growth mindset to cultivating courage, from neuroplasticity to the influence of language on our thinking, the field grabbed my attention. But no topic made as big an impression on me as character strengths.
Simply put, character strengths are the positive parts of our personality—the parts of us that give us the potential to be great. And they can also get in our way. When we know and show our character strengths, and invite in the strengths of others, collaboration, and innovation soar (as long as our strengths don’t go overboard).
Strengths and their appropriateness are contextual, and as we learn about our strengths, we want to be able to turn up—and turn down—the dial on them depending on where we are and who we are with. My curiosity can be great in a room full of outgoing people too nervous to get to know each other, but it can feel like the Spanish Inquisition to someone who is reserved and shy.
Strengths-Spotting in Coaching
I am first and foremost, a coach. And one of the best tools that coaches have is strength spotting. And as powerful as an assessment is, strengths-spotting from the stories that our clients tell is at least as, if not more, effective. Being able to notice and describe strengths in a client’s story is a very potent coaching intervention. And the language does not matter. In fact, it can be part of the coach-client bond to use descriptions that are personally meaningful to them even if they would not mean much to someone else. For example, a coaching client refers to Heat culture when he wants to remind himself about being determined, hardworking, collaborative, and putting the needs of the team ahead of personal needs. It is shorthand that he and I understand.
Some research has suggested that two-thirds of us are strength-blind.
That is, we don’t recognize our special qualities as strengths; we just assume they are “common.” Our focus tends to be on our gaps and deficits. We may forget to celebrate—and leverage—our strengths. And a coach who is on the lookout and is comfortable spotting strengths in their clients helps to build self-esteem, confidence, and a more balanced view of what the client has to offer the world.2 So, I am always on the lookout for strengths. Not just in coaching conversations—although that is a critical part of my practice—but in general and casual conversations, in line at the supermarket, or when getting coffee in the local coffee shop. Being able to see a behavior, name it, and describe the strengths behind it is very empowering for the person I am talking to, and for me! And, as I often tell audiences at conferences, no one has ever complained about my strengths-spotting.
I almost always get one of these responses:
- “Wow, you saw that in me? People don’t often say that about me.”
- “Thank you. I think that is a core part of who I am.”
- “You see that as a strength? I have never thought of it that way before.”
- “I just did what anyone would do.”
I find that when a coaching client has something they want to accomplish, tapping into their strengths is a great first step to progress because it ties that goal to what motivates, energizes, and excites them most.
Character Strengths as Core Motivators
Before I even became a coach, I discovered the impact that strengths-spotting can have—on teams, colleagues, friends, family members, and even on complete strangers.
There are several types of strengths.
First there are talents—those things we seem naturally able to do. For example, some people have great hand-eye coordination, others can quickly learn new languages, some have musical talent. Some are good at mathematics or visualizing abstract ideas.
Then there are skills. These are often talents that have been honed and trained and refined, but they can also be skills that have little to do with natural talents.
We also have values—those beliefs and principles that guide our lives and that influence our choices and decision-making.
All these strengths are important and have a significant impact on the quality and direction of our lives. But the last 20 years have been ones of great discovery in another area: character strengths.
Some Thoughts About Motivation
How motivated are you? What motivates you?
Of course, the answer to these questions depends on the topic at hand. Personally, I am not motivated at all to go to the dentist even though I know I should, but I am very motivated to write this book. Think of an area of life where you are expected or required to act, deliver something, care for someone, or get something done. How would you describe your level of motivation on a scale of 1 to 10 (1 not motivated, 10 very motivated). What is one word you could use to describe your level of motivation?
Now think of other aspects of your life. What is your level of motivation for them? Motivation is often discussed in terms of extrinsic motivation—things that come from outside us, such as money, prestige, and recognition.
But there is also intrinsic motivation—the motivation that comes from inside us, due to our values, beliefs, and . . . strengths of character.
All types of motivation have their place, and most of my coaching clients describe motivation as coming from multiple sources—or at least the most robust motivation does because that makes it resilient. If your salary is not feeling like much of an incentive today, but your sense of teamwork and connection to your colleagues feels good, you remain motivated.
Knowing Your Strengths
- People who know their strengths are nine times more engaged at work. (1)
- People who know and deliberately use their strengths at work are 18 times more engaged. (2)
- People who know and use their strengths and are encouraged to use their strengths by their leaders and managers are 29 times more likely to be engaged at work. (4)
- The Gallup organization has been tracking engagement for years and has found that people who use their strengths are more engaged, are more likely to stay in their jobs, and are more productive and cause fewer errors/safety issues.
- Gallup also identified that by focusing on the strengths of their team members, managers make a bigger difference than any other single factor on the engagement of team members.
- Studies of personal relationships have shown that awareness and appreciation of a partner’s strengths increases relationship satisfaction and commitment. (5)
- Record or write a story about when you were at your best. Put the story away for a couple of days, and then reread it /listen to it and highlight the strengths you see. Don’t worry about the language: just describe what you read and hear.
- Find someone you trust—or work with a coach—and tell a story of when you were at your best and ask that person to listen for strengths and name and describe them for you. They are looking for behavior that makes them think of something they consider to be a strength. Another option is to join a group coaching program that uses a strengths approach.
- Take an assessment. As previously mentioned, I like the VIA Institute on Character’s assessment. The basic assessment is free. You receive your ranking of 24 strengths as soon as you complete the assessment. There are more in-depth personalized reports available as well such as one that combines character strengths with five facets of mindfulness. However, there are many other assessments to get you started. Check with your HR department to see if there is one that they recommend (and might pay for).
What Else Do You Need to Know About Strengths?
In addition to the great qualities and opportunities that strengths offer, there can be pitfalls too. For example, how are you over-or underusing strength? What do you know about how your strengths affect other people around you? When does your strength use cause you and others a cost?
The Golden Mean
Plato, the Greek philosopher, is credited with coining the phrase the golden mean. It is also sometimes known as the golden middle way. It is that point where there is not too much nor too little. There is just enough of a virtue, or in this case a strength. Getting it just right means considering context, the sensibilities of other people, cultural norms, customs, traditions, and more.
For example, my top strengths are:
- Appreciation of beauty and excellence—In my case, a deep appreciation and even excitement about trees, birds, bees, elephants, butterflies, blue sky, water, in fact everything in nature. I also appreciate exhibitions of skill, such as a wonderful pianist, or orchestra, painter, or scientist.
- Bravery—The ability to tolerate discomfort and to push through difficult situations.
- Curiosity—Wanting to know more about everything, or as I sometimes call it “shiny new thing” syndrome.
- Fairness—Wanting everyone to have the same experience, creating consistent experiences for all.
- Gratitude—Being grateful for opportunities, the things we have, focusing on what there is and not what is missing.
These are my top strengths. They are not my only strengths, but they are my go-to strengths. I use them almost without thinking, and that is where the trouble sometimes starts. Any of these strengths can contribute to excessive or unpopular behavior, but the two strengths that can get me in the most trouble are bravery and curiosity. While it is good to be tolerant of discomfort, uncertainty, and fear, not every discomfort can be justified. Sometimes bravery is just plain reckless.
For example, when I first started speaking in public, I would share some very personal information. It was usually well received and helped people to feel a more personal connection to me. I would share my experiences of lifelong struggles with anxiety and explain that my father suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and my mother was depressive.
While I don’t regret the sharing that I did so early on, I also recognize that I did it without much consideration for possible consequences. For example, the first time my anxiety and how it might affect my work came up in an interview, I was shocked. But the interviewer had been at the same conference as me. When clients explore with me what to reveal at work about their own mental health experiences, every fiber in my being screams share. How are we going to remove stigma and make workplaces safe for everyone if we don’t speak up and challenge norms?
But that is not my job as a coach to decide for you. Nor is it necessarily the best decision for you. You know best what is brave and what is reckless in the context of your life. We work together to find out what the priority is for you, to consider the benefits and disadvantages of whatever options are available. We look at things from different perspectives to help coaching clients reach the right decision for them in this situation.
The decision might look different for someone else, or even for the same person on a different day. Similarly, curiosity is my friend, and for a long time I thought there was no such thing as too much curiosity. Practically everything interests me; I inherited that trait from my father. Never would a meal go by without him jumping up to check a fact or look up a word. I was fortunate to live in a house where books were everywhere, and my father and mother were always learning new things.
The mantra in our house was, “If you don’t know, find out. If you do know, double-check!” As the years have gone by, and I have three times experienced burnout in relation to work, I have come to rethink my relationship with curiosity. If every topic that comes up piques my curiosity and I always act on it, then I am scattered, constantly distracted. The process of finding out something new and then storing that information away is energy sapping. Suddenly, I started to understand how curiosity may have killed the cat!
My personal experience of curiosity is that it is fickle and that satisfying my curiosity can get in the way of being focused and getting things done, even things that are my stated priorities. When I am researching for this book, for example, I can find myself down a rabbit hole—or more like a rabbit warren—of tangentially related material that is fascinating but not getting the book developed. And that, for now, is a huge priority.
To reach that golden mean, I call on other strengths to create balance. Before we go further, pause a moment, and think about your top strengths. In what ways do they make life better?
In what ways do they sometimes get in the way? And what actions can you take, and which strengths and habits can you engage to bring your strengths back to their golden mean?
Bringing It Back to Motivation
We started this chapter by talking about motivation. So why all this discussion about strengths?
It turns out that our strengths have a lot to do with our motivation and engagement in what we do. As mentioned earlier in the chapter, people who know, show, and are encouraged to grow their character strengths feel more engaged at work. They are motivated to contribute more to a team or organizational goal—what Gallup refers to as discretionary effort. People who are engaging their character strengths are more focused, more productive, more innovative, and more satisfied.
One area that has garnered quite a bit of attention is job crafting. This is when we as individuals adjust the way we do our job to consider our values, strengths, and preferences. We don’t necessarily have to find a new job to feel like a better fit; we can change the way we approach the jobs we have. The same is true in the rest of our life. Parenting, learning, exercising, and recuperating can all be made better by focusing on optimum use of our strengths. We don’t need to use all our strengths in everything we do, but we need to engage our strengths enough to have a sense of satisfaction.
For example, recuperation for me often comes from walking outside in nature, engaging my strength of appreciation of beauty and excellence. Or enjoying a performance—a movie, music, theater, dance—where I can use my appreciation strength. If I am having a bad day, just making a conscious effort to identify one or two things to appreciate can lift my mood. Curiosity has helped me develop healthier sleeping, eating, and exercise habits. By being curious, I created an experiment where I was the experimenter and the experiment. And I learned so much (see Chapter 8, “Being Curious: Exploration,” of my new book Be Hopeful; Be Strong; Be Brave; Be Curious for more about this story).
I can use appreciation and curiosity together to help me prioritize where it makes sense to use my curiosity and where it makes sense to dial it back—using self-regulation and even fairness.
Here are three motivational equations that work for me. What strengths will you bring together to get motivated?
Appreciation + Curiosity + Self-Regulation + Hope + Gratitude = Motivation to Prioritize and Stick to My Priorities Curiosity + Deep Listening + Social Intelligence + Patience = Discernment
Love + Kindness + Honesty + Humor + Love of Learning = Motivation to Coach
Curiosity + Social Intelligence + Feedback of Others + Self-Regulation + Humility + Hope = Motivation to Collaborate with Others
Think about your strengths.
Or take your strengths assessment here: https://BeHopefulBeStrong.pro.viasurvey.org/. Then construct some equations to help you stay on your journey!
Ruth Pearce is an ICF accredited ACC coach, author, and speaker. Her first four Linkedin Learning courses on Character strengths, mindfulness, and burnout and bravery are already available. She is planning two more courses for 2023 and an update to two of the current courses. More than 80,000 people have viewed the courses so far. You can find them here: https://www.linkedin.com/learning/search?keywords=Ruth%20Pearce
Since giving up day to day project management, Ruth has focused her attention on coaching project managers to high performance AND wellbeing. She coaches for BetterUp and Coach123 and in 2023 will be launching a full Burnout Recovery track to include a book, self-paced course with practices and drop-in group coaching. Ruth lives in North Carolina near the Cape Fear River with her husband, two dogs, two rabbits and lots of soul nourishing nature all around.
Find out more about Ruth Pearce on her website https://www.pearceinsights.com
Or connect with her on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ruth-pearce-projectmotivator/
1 L. C. Hone, A. Jarden, S. Duncan, and G. M. Schofield, “Flourishing in New Zealand Workers: Associations with Lifestyle Behaviors, Physical Health, Psychosocial, and Work-Related Indicators,” Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 57, no. 9 (2015): 973–983.
2 Ibid. 3 Ibid. 4 T. B. Kashdan, D. V. Blalock, K. C. Young, K. A. Machell, S. S. Monfort, P. E. McKnight, and P. Ferssizidis (2017). Personality strengths in romantic relationships: Measuring perceptions of benefits and costs and their impact on personal and relational well-being. Psychological Assessment. http://doi.org/10.1037/pas0000464
Ruth is presenting at this year’s Leadership & Innovation Online Conference! Register today.
Disclaimer: The ideas, views, and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of International Institute for Learning or any entities they represent.
