I once worked with a store manager who was a phenomenal salesperson.
She connected easily with customers, effortlessly engaged them with products, and consistently turned conversations into sales.
She was also a terrific coach. She knew how to help people improve and made them believe they could be even better.
Those were two valuable strengths.
The problem was that she didn’t manage her day in a way that let her use them enough.
Too much time went to operational tasks, whatever came up, and work other people could have handled.
Her strengths weren’t the problem. Her day was.
Knowing your strengths isn’t enough. You must create a day that gives them a chance to succeed.
1. Decide where your strengths matter most today.
Choose a priority where one of your strengths can have an outsized impact. Maybe it’s coaching someone, connecting with a top client, solving a difficult problem, or creating a new strategy to grow your business.
2. Lead from your strengths, not from what pulls at you.
Busy days have a way of changing who we become. The coach becomes the problem-solver. The strategic leader becomes the task-handler. The great salesperson gets buried in operational work. Decide which strength you need to lead with today, especially when other demands try to pull you away from it.
3. Create and protect the opportunity to use it.
Put the conversation, customer time, coaching, or focused work into your day. Then protect it from lower-value tasks that can be delegated, delayed, or simply left undone.
Your strengths only create value when you use them where they matter most.
When I helped that manager spend more time leveraging her strengths, her business and her people grew faster. The same can happen for you.
