Psychology@Work

Strengths based leadership is getting a lot of interest these days and rightly so. When leaders enable the strengths of their teams, there is a large spike in engagement.

This can also lead to significant increases in productivity when taken into performance management conversations.

So the strengths based approach - managing and leading by focusing on others’ strengths - makes a human difference and a business difference. 

This episode looks at the unique qualities of leaders who lead with their strengths and how you, too, can become a more effective leader through strengths based leadership.

Read more:

https://www.strengthscope.com/what-is-strengths-based-leadership/

In this podversation, Paul Brewerton, the strengths guy, talks with sisters Roohi and Nida Mohiyuddin, two inspiring women who have just launched Nu(pw)R, a new business designed to empower women through a unique three stage process.

Roohi and Nida tell their story – what led them to set out on their journey and what difference they hope to achieve in the world.

They tell us about their programme – The Confident Empowered Woman – and provide some tips and advice on how women can

•  shut down their inner critic,
•  break down their barriers to success, and
•  turn their strengths into superpowers.

This is a very exciting podversation, what Roohi and Nida are doing is timely, powerful and hugely helpful for women seeking to build their confidence and become empowered. And it’s not only for women - everyone can take a lot away from this podversation.

Read more:

https://www.strengthscope.com/empowering-women/

This week, Dr Paul Brewerton (aka The Strengths Guy) welcomes Rebecca Christianson.

Rebecca’s been building her own people consultancy for some time. She’s an Executive coach and an expert on innovative People & Culture practices as she worked as an internal P&C senior leader and Executive for over 15 years. She coaches senior leaders to focus on mind-set shifts to thrive, using a strengths based and neuropsychology approach.

Rebecca is super passionate about harnessing the power of Millennial leadership capability which is the focus of this weeks podcast.

Read more:

https://www.strengthscope.com/managing-millennials/

https://www.strengthscope.com/self-management-personal-productivity/

Technology has made it genuinely challenging to deal with the pace and volume of information coming at us day to day. It affects our sleep patterns, our relationships, our stress levels.

With all those potential distractions surrounding you, how can you improve your self-management to keep on top of your personal productivity and stay in control?

Today's podcast looks at some practical tips for self-management in the digital era, including:

- Remember who's in control, you or the technology. Even though the technology is designed to keep you interacting, you still have the power of choice how much to use it.

- Being present in the moment and learning to push away distractions.

- Prioritise true human connection. Although the pandemic is making it harder to connect in person but we can still use technology to connect with friends, family, work colleagues in more meaningful ways.

- Build digital self management habits. Building good "digital detox" habits, such as no tech in the bedroom or at the dinner table, can be a great start at escaping the constant distraction presented to us by technology.

Technology can truly enrich our lives if used the right way and hopefully these tips will help you improve your self management and stay focused in these increasingly digital times.

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Read the article here: https://www.strengthscope.com/building-resilience-in-5-steps/

Online resilience course: https://www.strengthscope.com/resilience-course/

‘How can I develop resilience?’ is one of the questions we are most often asked at Strengthscope. Well, we’ve spent years in research and practice to discover the simplest and most effective ways to answer that question. 

In this podcast, I’m going to share with you the model that we’ve arrived at and the methodology that we’ve taught through our training courses for quite a few years now.

It’s a 5 step model, but building habits in any one of these areas will make a difference to your overall resilience, so the more habits you add, the more resilient you will become. 

The 5 steps to building resilience are:

• Taking charge and controlling the situation that is causing stress
• Mastering your mindset and making a choice how you perceive uncertain, unwanted or stressful
• Optimise your strengths and energy to increase the liklihood of a positive outcome
• Building a strong social support to act as a protective factor during stressful times
• Embrace the challenge and keep growing and developing

At the end of the podcast, I’ll let you into a little-known secret that we’ve been hiding away on our website for a while that will give you access to much more of our thinking and tools on resilience.

In Season 1, Episdode 4 I discussed 'How to give great feedback in 3 steps', both positive and negative, emphasising the importance of being respectful, listening well and asking clarifying questions. Although I touched on how to receive feedback, the main focus was on giving it well.

In this podcast, I want to go more in depth on how to handle negative feedback, in terms of its emotional impact, how to respond to it and potentially act on it.

I'll bring in some personal examples from both work and home. Both are just as important as each other and involve emotions and well-being, for both parties.

In this podcast, I talk about:

- Preparing to receive feedback and making the time and space to hear it well;

- Being able to understand what the feedback means for the other person;

- Taking feedback postively, not personally;

- Using the feedback as a learning tool to help you evolve and grow.

Learning how to respond to negative feedback well is a valuable skill and and hopefully these tips will help you be able to get the best out of your every day.

Visit https://www.strengthscope.com/dealing-with-negative-feedback/ for more a full transcript and to sign up for exclusive Strengths Guy content

During times of uncertainty and at the start of the year, people often tend to focus on their personal and professional development.

As we move to the end of January, with the freshness of the New Year starting to wear off, could be time to reflect again on the important things in life and reaffirm the commitment to ourselves to do those things we’ve been promising ourselves we’ll do for years but have never quite been able to get round to it.

In this podcast, we look at five ways to help you take control and own your development for the year ahead:

• Check in with your purpose – your personal purpose and your work objectives – to find focus for your development
• Be realistic – can you keep it going, is it possible, how can you make sure that you stick at it?
• Use your strengths to do it your way – whatever your development goals, how can you energise your development plan so that you can make it strengths-based and you-shaped?
• Supercharge a strength – push your comfort zone into stretch in an area that up to now you may have taken for granted because there’s nothing wrong with it, so need to stretch it, right.
• Bring a friend – development becomes so much more real and achievable when you have a critical and supportive friend or friends who are there for your journey.

Hope you enjoy it and these tips help you get the best out of yourself in the year ahead,

Visit https://www.strengthscope.com/how-to-own-your-development-in-2021/ for more a full transcript and to sign up for exclusive Strengths Guy content

In this podversation, I chat with Larissa Batt about how to use the strengths approach in a sales context.

For the last few years, Larissa has been in various senior sales role at Strengthscope and in her current role, she leads on all corporate sales, so she knows lots and lots about strengths in a sales context.

This podcast will be of interest to anyone who ever needs to persuade or ‘sell’ anything to anyone ever. Which is of course everyone. And it will be of particular interest to people for whom selling in a commercial setting makes up a significant part of their role.

We chat about:

• the importance of using the strengths approach in sales
• the danger of overusing a particular strength
• whether certain strengths are needed to be successful in sales
• and 3 top tips for introducing the strengths approach into your own sales work or sales teams

Read more:

https://www.strengthscope.com/learn-to-influence-the-strengths-way-strengths-based-selling/

Today’s podcast is on growth mindset. Such a powerful concept. Central to positive psychology. 

Evidence links growth mindset to a variety of positive outcomes: higher goal achievement, motivation, lower stress, anxiety, depression, better work relationships and higher performance levels. 

There is so much science to back it up. Carol Dweck at Stanford University is the person to go if you want the science and the evidence on the power of growth mindset. 

And while Dweck’s research is focused mainly on promoting the development of growth mindset in schoolchildren, it is also possible to develop a growth mindset later in life, even if you come from a starting place of fixed mindset, as many of us do…including me.

In the podcast, I compare having a fixed mindset and a growth mindset and give 5 great tips for how you can develop a growth mindset, whatever stage of life you are at.

If you enjoy the podcast, and want to get more from your every day, head over to https://www.strengthscope.com/blog and sign up to get our emails for simple and practical tips on everything strengths and life.

Read more about developing a growth mindset:

https://www.strengthscope.com/how-to-develop-a-growth-mindset/

Start off 2021 on the good foot! 

In the first podcast of 2021, I look at several areas that will help you shape the next 12 months in a positive way:

• How did you cope with the life changes brought on by 2020, and what did you learn about yourself through that? How can you use what you learned to take control of 2021 and make it as fulfilling, as energising and as 'you-shaped' as possible?
• How will you use your strengths to drive value in the year ahead? Which strengths will define your year and specifically how will you use them, while avoiding the biggest risks tripping you up?
• What's the best way to manage your energy? How can you find your joy and build resilience to do this?

2021 is just starting, let's get set up to make it a year which is stronger than ever.