How to Play to Your Strengths

People remember criticism but being aware of their faults does not translate into bettering their performance.

Corrective feedback has its place but people respond to praise because the former makes them defensive and therefore more unlikely to change while the latter produces confidence and the desire to perform better.

This exercise focuses on the positive attributes of the person that reaps impressive results. This helps people develop a sense of their "personal best" and a chance to leverage their talents. It involves a great deal of commitment and follow-through as RBS is armed with a constructive, systematic process for gathering and analyzing data about your best self.

1. Collect feedback from people inside and outside of work so that you will be provided with a broader understanding of yourself.
2. It is helpful to create a table with the feedback you've collected and identify common themes.
3. Write a summarized description of yourself that weaves the themes from the feedback with your self-observations.
4. Having pinpointed your strengths, redesign your personal job description and build on the things you're good at.