186. How do you uncover your strengths? (f. Colleen Delvecchio)
Ever wonder what makes you different from the rest? ✨ This Brand Therapy episode will help you find out! Hosts Phil and Lauren meet with certified CliftonStrengths coach Colleen DelVecchio to discuss Gallup's StrengthsFinder assessment. You'll learn what CliftonStrengths is, why it's the leading standard of personality assessments, how to read your results, and ways to utilize your strengths in everything you do.
Episode transcription
Phil
Are you wondering why you're zapped? At the end of the day?
Lauren
Do you feel like you're on the edge of burnout?
Phil
Do you wish you could feel invigorated at every task you do?
Lauren
Then you're going to love this episode about the Clifton Strengths Assessment formerly known as StrengthsFinder.
Phil
In this episode, we meet with strengths coach and client, Colleen Delvecchio to talk about how to identify and apply your strengths.
Lauren
Let's get started.
Phil
Listener, you're in for a treat today, because we have one of our very, very, very, very, very favorite people. In this conversation. Let me just read a little something about our dear friend and client Colleen, she's a certified Gallup strengths coach, you're going to know what that means in a second. You may already know what it means, in which case, you're gonna love this conversation even more. She's a speaker. She's a strategist. We have been fascinated with Colleen and her work since day one since our intro call. So Colleen, welcome to Brand Therapy. We're so happy to have you here.
Colleen
Thanks. I'm so excited to be here today.
Phil
I just feel excited about the conversation, not just this conversation we're having and sharing with other people, but I feel like every conversation we've had with you is just so enlightening. Lauren, would you agree with me that that's a word to describe conversations with Colleen, enlightening?
Lauren
Completely, completely. Colleen is just so wise and I what I love about your approach, Colleen. And I promise this episode won't be as just complimenting you for like five minutes straight. But but we're buttering you up before we get out. But it won't be but it could be it could be no guarantees. What I love about your approach, Colleen is that you're really excellent at approaching personal development really, from both a macro and a micro level. And I think that's really, really valuable. Because you're great at taking kind of the big picture look at someone and being like, this is what you're excellent at. But then you're also able to give really tangible advice, the title, apply that in your real life. So that's what I love about our conversations.
Colleen
Me too. It's what I love about working with folks, right? I think if you just are constantly talking big picture, people go away thinking, oh, this was fun and fabulous, but how do I apply it every day in my life? Right? How do I get 1% better this week because of what I learned or anything like that, but just to your big picture of stuff that never bring it down to how do you actually implement it feel like that's kind of useless if we don't get to the, here's how you can use it piece.
Lauren
For sure. For sure. So let's kick things off by with almost an elevator pitch, if you will, a summary of what StrengthsFinder or CliftonStrengths is.
Colleen
Sure. So it is an assessment that was put together by a man named Don Clifton, gosh, it's going on 60 years ago now. So this is something that has been researched. It is owned by Gallup. And so Gallup is a research organization, first and foremost. So there's lots of great materials behind it. And really, to me, what it tells you is it really shows you what sets you apart from everybody else in the world. Right, it really says this is what you are in are particularly fabulous at. And this is your lens on the world. You know, I always think it, it's not a test that's gonna say, Lauren, you should be a aeronautical engineer, right? It's much more of an assessment that says, this is how you work and how you can be wildly successful. I think, to me, one of the big pieces that I think we do a very disjustice to folks constantly is that we tell people, they can be great at everything. And it's just not true. Like we all can be great at everything. And so this really shows you how you can focus in on the things that you are really great at and not worry so much about the areas that maybe aren't your strongest areas.
Lauren
If someone is taking the assessment for the first time, how many strengths are there? And what will the results tell them?
Colleen
Sure. So there are 34 strengths. And to me this is what also makes us way different than almost all the other assessments out there. There are 34 strengths, and they can come up in any combination for you when you take the assessment. So the chance of you and someone else having the exact same strengths in order one through 34 is one in 33 Point 1 million. The chances of you and someone else having the same outlook is pretty much zero. When you do the assessment, you have two choices when you take it you can get just your top five, or you say like that's kind of the entry. It's $20 you get your top five. For most people, these are their kind of dominant strengths. This is how they kind of go through life every day, and kind of how their lens is on the world. But then you can pay more $60 now I believe and get your strengths in order of one through 34. If you are a leader or a manager or work in sales, they also have specific versions of the report that you get for those areas to kind of shine the light on how you can be a better leader or a better manager or a better salesperson.
Lauren
If someone can unlock and pay to see all 34 strengths, is that something they should do, should they see what they're weak at?
Colleen
I always think of it as it's not necessarily to see what you're weakened, right? I think no matter what I do, every time someone gets the full 34, and I'm working with them, I begged them not to start, they're looking at their report by looking at number 34, which we all do, I admit I did. Right, I can tell you without missing a beat my bottom two strengths, because they are definitely not how I approach things. But if you do get the full 34, to me, the important part of that is not just your top five, but even your top 10. So for most people, it's not just our top five that are our top strengths. Whoo, for me, which is Winning Others Over is number eight. And what was that strength of right wanting to talk to everybody all the time, the whooers of the world, we are the ones who talk to you, when you sit next to us on an airplane, I probably have 100, LinkedIn connections of people that I've sat next to on airplanes, and some Facebook friends and some people I still go out to lunch with regularly. But what was number eight for me and so if I only got my top five, I would wonder where those strengths are of my strengths of being, you know, kind of the person who loves to talk to 500 people all at once. The other thing I love when you get your full 34 is you can look at, here's the things I'm really great at here are the things I'm good at and I can reach into and pull up if I need to read like positivity is number 12 for me. I don't lead every day with positivity. But when I'm in a situation that I need to be positive, I 100% can.
Lauren
I remember Colleen when we did our brand audit and you did a little mini session with Phil and me because we had our results, command is number seven for me. And I had never paid any attention to it. I was just focusing on what I was worst at and maybe what my best ones are.
Phil
You didn't pay attention to it, I pay attention to the command every day.
Lauren
I know, maybe this sounds a bit silly, but in a time where things are stressful and you don't know what to do or don't know how to take charge, I'll be like, okay, I got a call on my command strength and just make a choice. I got it. That's why I need to do that. And it brings me a lot of confidence, really. So I can see how looking at the top 10 is personally an experience how helpful that can be.
Phil
Well, it reaffirms or gives clarity to things that you probably know or have some inkling of. But it reaffirms that and I think that's really powerful. I would I have a bold statement to make. I think being aware of our strengths has made us a more successful business. I believe there's a correlation between our awareness of how we independently function and play to our strengths and work together as a team. I believe that has positively impacted our bottom line as a business
Colleen
100%. Right. And Gallup actually has the stats behind that Gallup I think, what's the productivity, right, the increased productivity when you know your strengths at about 14%. But I've seen companies who have put that number as high as 38%, right of the increase productivity. To me, the best thing of strengths is the ability to work together as a team. I'm constantly saying to people stay pointy, as an individual, right, as an individual be really great at the things you're great at, and then balance out your team and be well rounded as a team. Stop trying to be well rounded as a person, we're all not going to be good at 34 different things. Yeah. And so find the people who are and partner with one, get that powerful partnership.
And sometimes it might mean that it's strengths you don't have and other times it might be strikes you have and apply in different ways. My husband and I both have arranger and our arrangers are very different. His arranger is the ability to rearrange in the moment and go with the flow minds not quite so much that mine is definitely the future arranger. I'm the one who has my calendar plotted out for the next 18 months. I know where we're going on vacation. You know, I'm the one who loves to get things on the calendar ahead of time and kind of arrange things that way. So we just have different ways that all of these strengths show up for us individually, even if it's the same strength.
Lauren
Now, what makes StrengthsFinder different or potentially better than Myers Briggs or Enneagram?
Colleen
Sure, I've done both of those before I was certified in Myers Briggs way back in the early 90s. and used it exclusively for a long time. To me, right, particularly Myers Briggs, because I was more familiar with that, you know, there are 16 personalities that it says And so if you are one of 16 personalities and those directly linked to careers and jobs and what you should be doing every day, and to me that's just limiting. Whereas the StrengthsFinder assessment doesn't do that at all. It does not link at all to to particular areas. And sales is one of the areas that they kind of really double down on to look at with the idea that you can be a phenomenal salesperson with any of these strengths. Where I think a lot of times people look at them and think, oh, right, all salespeople should be Woo, if you have Woo, that ability to win others over, it's right, what the word means that you should be in sales. But you might be a phenomenal salesperson, because you have empathy, or you're phenomenal at sales, because you're an ideation person and you can really kind of think about what are the possibilities? So to me, there's the biggest difference where I think the the other assessments out there are just so narrow, right? The chance of you and someone else having the same MBTI area is only one in 16 were Gallup one and 33 point 1 million. To me, that sounds a little bit more realistic, that we all have a different take on the world, not that there's only eight or 4 or 16 different types of us.
Phil
You bring up an important point, the test is great. But the test on its own is not comparable to the experience of having someone like you who's not only experience with this, but as you mentioned, Myers Briggs, you have a whole history and coding experience. So like, listener, the test is great. And there's a lot you can read on an automatically generated report that might give you insight, but having Coleen actually interpret this for you takes it to the next level. I just wanted to clarify that because the test is great. The tests gave us lots of ideas, but even a five minute conversation with you, Colleen, where we said, Colleen, put you on the spot put you to work, we just want to see work. But selfishly, how great was it for you to actually look at ourselves and say, hey, Lauren, you really need to lean into your futurist, you know, Phil, I'm woo or positivity is your positivity. Yeah, it's my number one, which is going to shock no one that listens to this podcast routinely. Even if the world is on fire, I'll be like, well, here's a positive. Here's something. You know, Lauren, loves that. I'm sure every day.
Lauren
Yeah, I actually do. It's nice.
Colleen
I love positivity, right? People always think of positivity is just almost an attitude or an outlook on life. But really positivity is how you get stuff done. Yeah, I always want the positivity person on my team, because they are the one who could think of the possibilities. Right. To me, I connect those two words all the time when someone says, oh, I have positivity? And oh, you know, what does that do for me? Like, yeah, sure, it might make me happy. But it doesn't. I don't get stuff done with it. And I was like, absolutely not. Right, how the tivity is how you can influence others to look at what are the possibilities when people are stuck.
Phil
I found it to be helpful, like on strategy calls, I think I'm quite strong in a strategy call, where my goal not even consciously, it's just happens because it's who I am. I want to leave that person feeling better at the end of the call that at the beginning. So that's a really important function. I think within our business, not just strategy calls, actually standing on stage, giving a workshop for one to many is more of what I do, actually than one to one these days. Whereas something I don't, there's something I struggle a little more with is this like futurist mentality, which Lauren is really strong at. with our brand audit recaps, I barely touch them after the meeting, because I'm not really needed there and Lauren is so good at visualizing the future brand of a client, I sign off in you know, two and a half minutes, maybe I shouldn't admit that on a call where prospective clients are listening, but it's true.
Lauren
Phil I always run it past you, so this is what I'm thinking.
Phil
And, and the point being, we lean into where we're strong, and that has really helped us.
Lauren
Yeah, I don't know about the two of you, but for me, when I took the StrengthsFinder assessment, I was really, really surprised by my results, because I've been an overachiever my entire life for as long as I can remember, like, I just assumed that achiever would be my number one, just because I've, you know, that's just how I've always operated. And it wasn't I was really, really surprised to see futuristic as my number one. And it was interesting because that really again, from a confidence perspective, like I didn't realize that was a strength of mine. I never thought it was and I used to do these brand audits and say well, who am I to like, say, What's once feature is like, what who am I to like paint a picture like, I don't know anything. But then I actually realized like when I was reading more about futuristic, that it's not like I'm psychic or anything, but it's more that I can paint a picture that gets people really excited and invigorated about possibilities. So anyway, it just really helped but I am curious to know were both of you surprised by your results when you took the assessment?
Colleen
I was I wasn't I actually burst out laughing when I read it because everything from one to 34 I might have had different words for them but right my top five are very much who I am and my bottom two are very much who I am not.
Lauren
What are your bottom two?
Colleen
So 34 is consistency. And oh, I am not a consistent person.
Lauren
That's shocking to me,
Colleen
I do not do things the same way twice. And so it's one of those things, it's everything from, you know, I did three trainings this week with pretty much, you know, devil, our PowerPoint deck, right? It's the same basic PowerPoint deck. But I customized my PowerPoint deck for every client that I work with. Because to me having the same thing every time doesn't make sense, it has to be much more individualized in my mind. So doing things the same way.
It's also I think, just a very basic thing, like taking vitamins in the morning. My mom is someone who hasn't done this assessment, but I guarantee you she did consistency is number one for her. She was someone who does things the same way all of the time. She does things in the same order. She very, very consistently takes her vitamins every single day. And when I make a comment, like oh, I, you know, I forget probably 50% of the time. And she was like, well just put your mind to it. You know, to me that doesn't work. So if it's something I had to do, right, if this was a medication that I had to take, I have to lean into my achiever. So achiever is number four for me, and my achiever. And most achievers love the to do list and love checking things off, right? It's like the dopamine rush of checking things off. So if I have to take a medication twice a day for 14 days, I make a checklist for it. I make a checklist on the bottle, I make one on my fridge. So when I take that I get to check to box. Right? Because to me, that's how I can get there.
But yeah, consistency. And then my other. My 33 is deliberative, which is folks who like to be slow and super thoughtful about making decisions really careful about making decisions. Where, to me, I'm strategic, and I am much more in the let's fail fast mentality, right. I'm a huge fan of piloting things. But I pilot things all the time, we're going to try this if it doesn't work, great, we'll try it a different way. One of my old colleagues, deliberative was number one for her. And we went toe to toe for about two years until we kind of realized this and figured out how to work together. And once we figured out how to work together and kind of understood each other's perspective, it was a lot better, because she complained to our boss all the time that I moved too fast, and was way too willing to fail. And I would complain about her going, oh my god, she moves so slow, and is not willing to take any risks.
Lauren
Well, deliberative is Phil's number 34 I have the results up, shocker.
Phil
Oh, God, even you just describing your colleague it gives me anxiety, make a decision.
Colleen
I think of how well how strengths made us work together. Once we realized this really dug into it. One day, I said, you know, when we make a decision at a meeting, how about I give you 48 hours to think about it? Because my biggest complaint was I would get an email that said, Dear Colleen, I've thought about it and and I would almost want to like throw my laptop across the room go and like when made a decision? What do you mean, like you thought about it, and now you have a different idea. So we started in this mindset of we had, we would have a meeting together on Monday. And then end of the day on Wednesday, we would communicate with each other what we're going to execute about what we talked about on Monday. And as soon as we got in that rhythm, we were fantastic partners. She stopped me from making probably some good public mistakes. And I was able to kind of throw some crazy ideas out there and get her to come up, you know, to kind of go along with things that were outside her comfort zone.
Lauren
So what happens if you don't operate within your strengths?
Colleen
Yeah, you know, I think it's draining. Usually when I'm coaching people, and we start talking, and they call me and they say they've started to talk to me because they feeling really burned out. They're exhausted all the time. They're drained at their work. I have them start by just literally keeping a notepad next to them with a list of energized are drained at the end of every day. Tell me how you feel at the end of every day, and what did you do? And usually, I find when people are exhausted, it's because they're trying really hard to do things that are just they're trying, they're using a different the wrong lens on it. Right? Like if I was trying to be consistent about everything, I'd be exhausted at the end of the day, if I was trying to spend all day trying to be really deliberative and careful with my decisions. I would be stressed all the time. So I get people to kind of switch their mindset on this.
Can you start thinking about, like, if you can change how you think of these things, consistency for me, it's totally achiever. I need to tick the box and I'll be happy. That's how I can get things done in that sense. And same for other folks, right? If they're really feeling stuck in this mode, it's can I help them figure out a different way to approach their work? Sometimes that might mean a different job, but sometimes you can do that exact same job and just approach it differently. I think when we get in that phase of being an lows, you know, bottom eight or nine or five or very, you know, your 34th strength. It just feels like you're swimming upstream all the time. It's that constant slog, and it wants to live their life that way.
Lauren
Yeah, for sure. I've got my right now my pot of Phil's gonna laugh when he here so so my bottom three, number 34 is adaptability.
Phil
Oh my god, I was one that is that true,
Lauren
When we have the plan, we stick with it. Number 33 is harmony. And then number 32 is Woo. And so in a client management role, that's really freaking tiring for me if we're not saying focused on like moving things forward. When we've had clients that are emotional or want to talk or their feelings are hurt or things like that. It's not that I don't care, but it's really, really exhausting. And, and same with the adaptability staff, like changing the plan, when we've got everything in motion is really difficult. And so we hired someone on our team, and we had her take the StrengthsFinder assessment before hiring her because we needed someone who was good at the executing, but also did possess those relationship building traits. And it's worked out great.
Phil
It's worked out great. She's actually a lot more balanced. For me. Yeah, across categories, which we had a chuckle about. People have actually commented in the past about how well Lauren and I work together. And Colleen, I was just thinking about this because you were talking about being you know, at odds with a co worker, but then when you learn to harness it, or you learn, I guess compromise the art of compromise or working together. I think Lauren and I because we've worked together for so long. We're really proud of the fact that we're both so totally different. A lot of Lauren strengths are my weaknesses. I don't know if you call them weaknesses, or at the bottom of the chart, let's say all the boring ones. In your mind. Okay. intellection context, snooze. Deliberative. Oh, you sound like fun. You know, I have positivity and woo and all of them. Well, yeah.
Colleen
I love gallops definition of a weakness. Their definition is, does it get in your way of your success? If it doesn't get in the way of your success. Who cares? Like don't worry about it. I think we go through life trying to fix things that don't really need fixing. Now, if it does get in the way of your success, okay, let's figure out how to do that right. Consistency number 34. for me, if I don't send in my timesheet, when I work for somebody else, I don't get paid. And right, I need to be consistent on that if I would like to get paid. So you just have to figure out other ways to shine your strengths that you do have on it, and figure out a way to kind of make those things work that way.
Lauren
What do you do or what should you do if you have a client or a boss who's asking you to do tasks in a way that aren't within your strengths? Like, for example, if a client wants to have a call with me to talk about feelings, and getting along? Or if like, if you had a boss, who was making you do like those consistent tasks every day, like how do you approach that?
Colleen
I usually start with like, is this actually necessary for your job? When I think of the timesheet example, when I worked for somebody else, I had to submit my timesheet on Fridays, where I did not get paid the following Friday, there was a simple consequence that happened there. Right. So I needed to figure out a way to do it. And I think there are times where you just have to do it, which is kind of leaning, do your best at it? And can you figure out a way? Or can you find someone to help you figure out a way to aim one of your strengths at it?
It was like any task that might feel like it takes the strengths that you don't have. So talking about feelings with somebody, you know, with having harmony or empathy and having those low, is there a way we can look at it from your current strengths to say, okay, for you to be able to be successful in your role you need to do this, how do we get you through? How do we kind of give you the tools? And so maybe it's from an intellectual standpoint, or if it's an input version.
Lauren
Those are actually in my top five, both of those Colleen.
Colleen
There you go, right. So I will say input is one of my favorite ones to use in situations like that. I've coached a lot of people who have been told at work or in their annual performance review, there's some piece about them not being a team player, or, you know, they don't have the whoo about them, right. So they're not going out love group and being the life of the party. And so I always say with input, people have high input are really good at almost hoarding information in their brain, they have so much information in their brain. And so when you meet people or have to interact with them, think of it about a way to share your input. And so think about what my you know, Phil be interested in you heard that Phil's going into the Bahamas next week. Great. Do a little research on the Bahamas and now you can start your conversation with here. Let me share the information with you. Right, so it gives you that chance to give your input which feels a lot more natural than trying to be the just naturally positivity person or the natural like win others over person.
Lauren
Yep. Or better yet I go to a party with fell and let him do all the talking and winning over while I quietly drink my wine behind him.
Phil
Easy. That sounds like fun to me.
Colleen
Yeah. So I think that's the other thing too, right is to collaborate with somebody, right team up, ask a partner to team up with you. One of my favorite exercises when I work with teams, as we call just powerful partnerships. How do you find the right person to partner with you for all the different tasks that you need to do? Lauren, where's relator? For you out of curiosity,
Lauren
Let me tell you, it's number 11.
Colleen
So that's not too far down for you, right? So people think women relator are very similar. They're really not right. So Woo, Winning Others Over. It's an influencing strength. Right? It is really that idea of Winning Others Over. It is not just like, ooh, where relator is a relationship building strength. And so people have high relator are really good at one on one conversations much more going deep with someone about something. So I would say when you have to show up to those parties, it's find the one person that you're going to talk to, latch on to them and give them your input. And don't feel like you even have to walk around like Phil trying to woo people, because that most likely is going to have you spend the whole night stressed out about it.
Lauren
For sure. That's such good advice.
Colleen
But if you can find the one person that you can give some input to right and kind of takes you down that road.
Lauren
Brilliant. I remember once Phil said, and this, Phil, you probably don't even remember saying this because it was probably like a decade ago, Phil one said, He loves meeting people because he thinks each person is like a little nut that needs to be cracked. He views it as a puzzle almost of winning people over which is like so opposite from my how my brain I like never ever thought that way about another person in my life.
Phil
And I guess also, I enjoy the process of cracking the nut, enjoy the process of figuring out how I can approach that person in a way that they're going to respond positively. I find that exciting.
Lauren
Yep.
Colleen
So funny. Such a weird trait, right? It's so different from relator. But again, I think most people when they look at the list, they think, oh, these are both the interrupting with people's strengths. But they did come in from such different angles.
Lauren
Now, I don't think we talked about this yet on this episode. But basically, for the listener, all of the strengths are kind of grouped into four different general categories. So there's executing, influencing relationship building and strategic thinking. So four of Phil's top five are an influencing four of my top five are in strategic thinking. And so we're very, like this filler classic filmora, and all or nothing, and whatever our area is. And so my question for you, Colleen is, if your strengths aren't well rounded? Should you try to find someone who fills your lowest strengths? Or should you try to find somewhat like a team member who shares some of your top strengths? How far away do you want to be in terms of like opposing strengths?
Colleen
You know, I hate always saying it depends on things. But there's no kind of quick and easy answer for this. When I think of those four areas, what I try to get people to not worry so much about is as an individual, worrying about where their strengths are. Because even Gallup will say that, even though we they figured out those four domains, it really doesn't come into play until you're looking at them as a team. For a while they call them theme dynamics. But they for the longest time, they used to call them team dynamics, because of this idea of right that it really you should be looking at being well rounded as a team.
Now, who's the right partner for you? It varies right, it varies, I think of a work you're doing. And like I was talking about my husband and I before about our arranger, you can have the same strength as someone and have it show up very different. So when my husband and I took this a was actually the first time I took Clifton Strengths was after my blind date with my husband, which is kind of really fun. He told me about it. And he knew what I did for a living and we started talking about it. I went home and did it. And then on our next date, I said, Look, here are my strengths, because you know, what else do you talk about on a second date. But he pulled his out and we had four out of the five. Oh, cute, right? And it was we both just had our top five at the time. And so we both had very similar approaches to things, but how we did them was different. So we both have Maximizer in our top five. And for me maximizer is about helping people maximize right I really maximize those that strength that's like take things good and make them great. I'm all about helping people get from good to great. At the time, my husband owned a small business he had a 30 person company, and he was all about all his Maximizer talked a lot about was maximizing the business maximizing the things and it was maximizing the people there. But it was maximizing the people there in order to maximize the business.
And so even though your strengths might be the same, they could show up differently. So finding the right partner for you, it depends on the situation and what you might need. So if I have to do something that's super analytical, and where I want to be really careful with my decision, and I really want to look deep into the numbers, I partner with someone who's a data person. And so I go in and make sure that I have the right partner when I'm looking at those numbers, because I'm going to look at them very differently than someone who has strengths of analytical and deliberative.
Lauren
Amazing. So you find out your strengths, now what?
Colleen
So for so many people, they do it once at like some team building event, and then never look at them again. It's why when companies ask me to come in and just do like, a one time two hour get to know your strengths. I'm always hesitant to do it, because it's like, okay, well, that was fun, right? Like, we've just easily could have made, you know, marshmallow towers for the day, and everyone could have gotten something out of it. In an ideal world, I think for folks, you learn your strength, you understand, and you start seeing them. I always tell folks, the first step of this is to do strength spotting for yourself. Do you see your strengths show up every day? Where do you see them showing up? Where do you see them getting in your way? All of our strengths are what we used to call them balconies and basements. Right? But now they kind of call them blind spots, the basement. But we all have those things that sometimes if we've taken our strengths too far or not far enough, it kind of takes us down the wrong road. So for Maximizer, for me, I become the perfectionist, it's never good enough. I will like I said, I change every PowerPoint every time I do it for somebody, which can be very time consuming and can get in this, you know, the art of perfectionism. But then, if you take your strengths and you start to see them, then you can start aiming your strengths at things like once you start knowing your strengths and how they show up for you. That's when you can start looking at Gosh, these are the things that I'm struggling with, how do I actually take my strengths and aim it at it? And then a lot of what I've been talking about lately is burnout, right? We've seen the World Health Organization even declare burnout and actual syndrome a year and a half or two years ago at this point. It is such a large issue right now. And so working with folks on how to mitigate and prevent burnout for themselves. And to me, the first step is know your strengths, know when you're in those energizing moments, and how do you start aiming those. If you get the full 34 report, you also get suggestions on take on ways to take action to maximize your potential in each of your strengths. So each individual strength, it gives you four or five different ways that you can really kind of aim your strengths at that. So for me when I think of Maximizer, which is number one for me, one of my suggestions on my report is help your friends and co workers recognize other people's talents and strengths. So they can then help maximize other people.
Phil
I just love listening to you. Hence the length of this episode longer than normal, because I just don't want to cut you off. Because I feel like every sentence you share, I learned something new. And I love that I just love that about you. Hopefully our listener is their interest has been piqued. And they probably heard of engrams. And they've heard of Iris praise. But really CliftonStrengths was something we knew about and we were excited about even before meeting you. So obviously when we met you and then we had the wonderful privilege of working together with you, it was just so wonderful start to finish. And we should send people to your brand new beautiful website it is maxady, maxady.com. And there you'll see Colleen, her services her perspective. And honestly, if I'm gonna brag a little bit, I think one of the most beautiful brands that we've ever built photography, brand identity messaging, I just, I get on that website, and I go, ahh, I love this.
Colleen
It is beautiful. And it's so me. It's how I perceive the world. It's how I'm out there. It has just made a big difference in my business. So thank you to you and Lauren for really kind of helping every day I get at least an inquiry from my website. My website traffic has skyrocketed since this.
Lauren
Oh my gosh, that makes me so happy.
Phil
That makes us really happy. Well, so your website, where else should people connect with you? If they're curious to connect? We send them to LinkedIn.
Yeah, I'm on LinkedIn. I talk a lot on LinkedIn recently started my Instagram and trying to get that moving a little bit more. So I'm on Facebook too, but definitely Instagram and LinkedIn, LinkedIn, I'm on probably an hour every day. All the work I do just always always tends to be there. I love connecting people. So even if it's not me, it's you know, I love kind of figuring out a way for other people to find each other. It's one of my goals every month I want to connect 50 people so I keep track of it.
Lauren
How cool I love that.
Colleen
That is great. My little post it with my connections for the month.
Phil
Well, it's been a pleasure you think. Thank you.
Lauren
Yes, thank you Colleen.
Phil
Colleen, thank you for hanging out with us on Brand Therapy. We'll chat soon.
Colleen
Thank you so much.
Phil
I am serious. I could listen to Colleen talk for hours. Colleen, thank you so much for hanging out with us on Brand Therapy listener. I hope you enjoyed this little riff. If you did, we would love if you took a few extra seconds to leave us a review five star five star that helps other people discover this podcast so we work hard to create for you and you know how it works. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Looking forward to it. See you then. Thanks for hanging out with us on Brand Therapy.
