Ever wonder why most of us have been asked the same 2 questions in every job interview we’ve ever had?
What are your strengths and weaknesses?
If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be?
They’ve become cliché from overuse, and I even did a small eye roll while typing them. But stay with me—there are good reasons why they’re so popular.
Being fully aware of where you’re strong and where you could use some work is so important for success in any area. Hiding from and ignoring your weak points will only trip you up and cause you to atrophy further in those areas. If you’re hiding or avoiding this is a good sign that you’re not acknowledging an area that needs your support. It’s cool. We all have areas that need attention and growth.
For the same reasons people go through physical therapy—to rebuild strength and regain control—it makes a lot of sense to lean into our soft spots, the places we feel most vulnerable, and improve day-by-day.
Let’s start with the fun stuff: where we feel strongest.
List 5 areas where you feel complete mastery. I’m talking in-the-zone, top-of-your-game areas where you really excel.
Do you know how to talk to almost anyone? Catch errors that no one else notices? Could you sell water to a fish? Toot your own horn here, don’t be shy!
After you’ve finished your list, re-read it and rank the areas from strongest to weakest. This part may be a bit harder but you can do it.
Focusing on our weak points isn’t fun, and we’d much rather ignore them or hide from them.
If we don’t feel very good at something, but find we have to do it anyway, it’s normal to procrastinate…trying to avoid it completely. But don’t do that to yourself it just compounds something that wasn’t ever a problem, just an area you needed to grow into.
Where do you feel weak right now? What areas of your life need physical therapy, exercise, strength training?
What are your TOP 3 key areas that need help?
Take the time to identify the top 3 key areas that you’re results are less than stellar in, you’ll make huge sweeping changes that’ll make it seem like you sky rocketed your productivity with a simple solution… and you did. But most of my clients think they need a HUGE productivity overhaul. Nope, not when you identify your top 3 key result areas to focus on!!
For me this was my scheduling system. I have two software programs one for therapy and one for coaching clients— but they didn’t speak to each other. This caused a lot of problems and was taking up precious time. I’d attempted to solve it before but when the solution was more complicated than I thought, I allowed it to go “unscheduled" in my calendar (a BIG no-no). The project stalled as other things “seemed more important.” Then a light bulb went off, yep, again. “What am I doing, this is nuts?” This time I followed the project, all the way through— scheduled time on my calendar, got the information, help and support I needed to get the calendars interacting. It’s crazy how this seemingly small thing, which really was a very BIG thing, changed everything and saves me approximately 4 hours a week, half a normal working day!
One of my clients, likes to take notes while she’s coaching clients. Instead of the belaboring task of transferring hand written notes to an electronic version after sessions, she decided to learn how to touch type! Now she saves 3 hours a day, never misses an important facial expression or other body language cues that make her a masterful coach. She touch types during each session. At the end she simply hits the save and send buttons, and voila, she’s got her session record and her clients get their recap, stat!
Another client, with 4 kiddos and a home business, decided to hire someone to clean her house, and organized a carpool for the kids school rides. She was so relieved, reporting that she’d saved so much time and was able to make more money in her business. Plus she was a happier mama and that was the biggest win.
So what are your top 3 key result areas that are keeping you suffering? What’s your kryptonite and what’s the superpower you’ll implement to get the results you REALLY want.
You’ll see huge changes in your results when you identify your top 3 key weak result areas. Usually it’s something obvious that we just kinda forget about, or get used to the struggle of… Instead do this in 10 minutes and save countless precious hours, better your relationships, gain confidence and make more money in the process:
Identify and prioritize your top 3 weak areas
Brainstorm 25 solutions
Decide on a plan
Schedule it in your calendar
Obey your calendar and take action executing the plan!
Take a moment to feel all the feel goods once the stress is lifted off your shoulders. Confidence will be a natural byproduct of taking care of yourself this way!
Being willing to face our weak points is the only way to make progress. Let’s all flex and stretch a little, shall we? The gains are so worth it!
