Syllabus Descriiption:
The strengths philosophy is grounded in the work of positive psychology that tries to understand what is right with you (not necessarily what is wrong). With this in mind, the StrengthsQuest is a personality test that will help you to identify your talents (i.e., strengths). Knowing your strengths and the domains with which you lead can help you to better develop your skills and collaborate with others. The philosophy of strengths comes from the perspective that, rather than overly focus on fixing your weaknesses, you should be developing your strengths. A weakness is defined as anything that gets in the way of your success. The best way to overcome a weakness is to manage it effectively and to use your strengths to overcome it. Moreover, effective leaders know how to identify the strengths in others that help to complement their own. Take the Strengths Quest online at www.strengthsquest.com (Links to an external site.). If you have already taken the StrengthsQuest, you do not have to take it again, hopefully you remember your Signature 5 Themes, or just log-in again.
After reading and reviewing your profile, you will write an analysis in which you are to digest the meaning of the report. What does it mean to you? Was there something that surprised you or not? Why? What kind of action plan for development can you take now that you’ve discovered your strengths? Be specific. In your analysis, you will need to interview at least three individuals (ideally: one supervisor, one co-worker, and one subordinate). You’ll interview them about your strengths, do they see a strength that was identified in the report in you? Ask them to give you an example of when they have seen it in you. Be as detailed as possible. You can use the questions listed in the Strengths Text Handout (Chapter 6, found in Canvas Modules) to aid in your analysis.
If you are not currently working, or unable to contact supervisors and co-workers, you can interview classmates who know you well, friends, or family members.
Purpose: This assignment is meant to help develop your self-understanding. In order to better understand yourself, you must know yourself at a deeper level. Part of developing your executive skills is developing the specific skill of deeply thinking about how your behaviors and motives. Just asking you what motivates you isn’t enough, that’s only surface level. Taking a personality test like the StrengthsQuest can provide you with a deeper and richer understanding of what is really driving your behavior and what you can do to improve yourself. The purpose of this assignment is to assist you in developing your Executive Edge in all aspects of life, college, and beyond.
Skills: Skills are behaviors we perform (things we can do) and can be learned. With time, they can be refined, and we can become better at executing them. The purpose of this assignment is to help practice the following skills that are essential to developing your Executive Edge:
Developing an appreciation for deep reflection
Integrating ideas from the various readings and videos
Applying the information that you’ve learned in class
Connecting your learning with your actions and motives
Learning how to ask the right questions that will give you more insight into what makes a you particularly good at what you do
Listening to others’ talk about your strengths will help you to increase your insight into your actions and motivations
Evaluating how you can apply your strengths to various tasks
Knowledge: Knowledge refers to the recollection of facts and information. This assignment will help you to become familiar with the following:
Facts about your deeper motives (what makes you, you)
Information about how you are perceived by others that may or may not match up with how you think you see yourself
New vocabulary that will help you to better describe yourself and others and identify effectiveness
Task: Analyze yourself. You’ll need to think about what the results of your StrengthsQuest mean and how you identify (or not) with them. In addition, you’ll need to interview at least three individuals (ideally: one supervisor, one co-worker, and one subordinate). You’ll interview them about your strengths, do they see a strength that was identified in the report in you? Ask them to give you an example of when they have seen it in you. Be as detailed as possible. You can use the questions listed in the Strengths Text Handout (Chapter 6, found in Canvas Modules) to aid in your analysis.
Chpt 6–Strengths and Planning your Education.pdf
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Look over all the material that we’ve read and watched about Strengths
What were you most surprised by and why?
Were you not surprised, why?
Look to the Handout for ideas on questions you can ask yourself to help you better analyze your results
The general question you’re trying to answer is: what do the results mean to you?
Identify three individuals and show them the report that you got
Be sure to explain what each strength means, don’t just say the name
Develop at least five questions to ask them
Try not to ask yes/no questions
Try to ask follow-up questions, don’t just accept the response they give you, especially if it’s only one word!
Ask them to explain themselves
Explain to them some of the ideas we’ve discussed in class…what do they think of it? Can they give you and example of a time when…
You must use the readings and videos as a guide for the language
Make sure that you pull the vocabulary from the course material
Now comes the fun part: analysis!
This is the REALLY important part, DO NOT overlook it!
Breakdown and examine what you learned about yourself from this report
Look at all Strengths
do you see any patterns? Anything that was inspiring? Anything that seemed out of character for you?
Was there a discrepancy between your results and what you thought you were going to get?
What did people say about you? Did it give you some new insight into yourself and how you do your work?
Evaluate the results
Given what you’ve learned about effective management from this course, how do you plan on using what you’ve learned to become a more effective executive and to develop your executive skills?
Criteria for Success: Excellent work is characterized by depth of analysis. This means that you took some time to think about the implications of your results. You tried to connect different aspects and provide an explanation. In addition, you did more than just reiterate what the report says or what people in the interview told you. You connected, contrasted, and evaluated.
I want to you to show me that you understand and can apply the material from this course. Successful assignments (and those earning a higher grade) will have made an attempt to understand and explain all of the course material and demonstrate application of the course material.
Successful work will have the following characteristics:
Thoughtful responses that explain how you have understood the course material and you don’t just rewrite what the book or article said.
Provide depth of analysis and evaluation of yourself; it needs to be clear that you took some time to think about the implications of your results and that you spent time trying to understand and explain what you learned about yourself.
This assignment should not seem like it was slapped together the night before…come one folks, don’t try to bullshit a bullshitter…
Success is that you are not just checking off the boxes of the assignment, but that you are trying to get a deeper, richer understanding of how others manage.
