My Clifton Strengths Test Results

I had to take this test for work and it was pretty interesting. These are my top 5 strengths.

Achiever Your Achiever theme helps explain your drive. Achiever describes a constant need for achievement. You feel as if every day starts at zero. By the end of the day you must achieve something tangible in order to feel good about yourself. And by “every day” you mean every single day—workdays, weekends, vacations. No matter how much you may feel you deserve a day of rest, if the day passes without some form of achievement, no matter how small, you will feel dissatisfied. You have an internal fire burning inside you. It pushes you to do more, to achieve more. After each accomplishment is reached, the fire dwindles for a moment, but very soon it rekindles itself, forcing you toward the next accomplishment. Your relentless need for achievement might not be logical. It might not even be focused. But it will always be with you. As an Achiever you must learn to live with this whisper of discontent. It does have its benefits. It brings you the energy you need to work long hours without burning out. It is the jolt you can always count on to get you started on new tasks, new challenges. It is the power supply that causes you to set the pace and define the levels of productivity for your work group. It is the theme that keeps you moving.

This is supposed to be my strongest strength. In some ways I find this very true because I do take things as they come one day at a time. This probably wouldn't be true for me a few years ago but since my career has changed to a less stressful job, it's been a lot easier to not bring the stresses of work at home. One thing that makes me laugh about this is how it says I need to feel like I've accomplished something every day. This is 100% true if my goal for my days off are to do absolutely nothing! ha ha! I always have to be challenged at work or I get bored. Sometimes I feel like if I have a manageable work load or an easy work load, that I have nothing to do and end up finding more projects to do.

Responsibility Your Responsibility theme forces you to take psychological ownership for anything you commit to, and whether large or small, you feel emotionally bound to follow it through to completion. Your good name depends on it. If for some reason you cannot deliver, you automatically start to look for ways to make it up to the other person. Apologies are not enough. Excuses and rationalizations are totally unacceptable. You will not quite be able to live with yourself until you have made restitution. This conscientiousness, this near obsession for doing things right, and your impeccable ethics, combine to create your reputation: utterly dependable. When assigning new responsibilities, people will look to you first because they know it will get done. When people come to you for help—and they soon will—you must be selective. Your willingness to volunteer may sometimes lead you to take on more than you should.

I am known as being very responsible and do tend to take on more than I should. I'm not sure I agree with what it says about not being able to live with myself until I make restitution.

Developer You see the potential in others. Very often, in fact, potential is all you see. In your view no individual is fully formed. On the contrary, each individual is a work in progress, alive with possibilities. And you are drawn toward people for this very reason. When you interact with others, your goal is to help them experience success. You look for ways to challenge them. You devise interesting experiences that can stretch them and help them grow. And all the while you are on the lookout for the signs of growth—a new behavior learned or modified, a slight improvement in a skill, a glimpse of excellence or of “flow” where previously there were only halting steps. For you these small increments—invisible to some—are clear signs of potential being realized. These signs of growth in others are your fuel. They bring you strength and satisfaction. Over time many will seek you out for help and encouragement because on some level they know that your helpfulness is both genuine and fulfilling to you.

This strength is what I feel is least accurate. At work I feel like I'm a fault finder. It seems like there's always people lacking common sense, skill, and speed. I'm the kind of person that likes to push people out of the way when they are doing something slowly or wrong. It drives me nuts. It's like watching a child tie their shoe when you're in a hurry and you say "Here, let me do it." One of the managers at work pointed out that I'm more of a developer of processes than people and I can see that as true.

Maximizer Excellence, not average, is your measure. Taking something from below average to slightly above average takes a great deal of effort and in your opinion is not very rewarding. Transforming something strong into something superb takes just as much effort but is much more thrilling. Strengths, whether yours or someone else’s, fascinate you. Like a diver after pearls, you search them out, watching for the telltale signs of a strength. A glimpse of untutored excellence, rapid learning, a skill mastered without recourse to steps—all these are clues that a strength may be in play. And having found a strength, you feel compelled to nurture it, refine it, and stretch it toward excellence. You polish the pearl until it shines. This natural sorting of strengths means that others see you as discriminating. You choose to spend time with people who appreciate your particular strengths. Likewise, you are attracted to others who seem to have found and cultivated their own strengths. You tend to avoid those who want to fix you and make you well rounded. You don’t want to spend your life bemoaning what you lack. Rather, you want to capitalize on the gifts with which you are blessed. It’s more fun. It’s more productive. And, counterintuitively, it is more demanding.

I find it hilarious that it says that I choose to spend my time with people who appreciate my strengths. Who doesn't? ha ha! "You tend to avoid those who want to fix you and make you well rounded." Amen!

AdaptabilityYou live in the moment. You don’t see the future as a fixed destination. Instead, you see it as a place that you create out of the choices that you make right now. And so you discover your future one choice at a time. This doesn’t mean that you don’t have plans. You probably do. But this theme of Adaptability does enable you to respond willingly to the demands of the moment even if they pull you away from your plans. Unlike some, you don’t resent sudden requests or unforeseen detours. You expect them. They are inevitable. Indeed, on some level you actually look forward to them. You are, at heart, a very flexible person who can stay productive when the demands of work are pulling you in many different directions at once.

Like what I said about being an achiever. I find this one very true about living one day at a time or in the moment. I like to plan somewhat in advance but I pretty much like to go with the flow. Even with plans, things never turn out how you expect them so it almost seems pointless to waste too much time on planning.

This test is available in different books. The one I got it out of is How Full is Your Bucket? There's a code in the back of the book for you to take the test online. There's also the Strengths Finder 2.0 book and Now Discover Your Strengths.