Leading with the Discipline StrengthsFinder Talent

From messy to under control

July 31, 2023
Discipled leader looking at laptop

Do you feel the drive to tame the chaos of the world by instilling order through discipline and process?

If so, you may have the strengthsfinder discipline talent. 

When you learn to leverage this discipline in your leadership, you won’t have to feel like you're making it up as you go or building the plane while flying it.

Instead, you can feel confident things are correct, leaning on a precise process even in complex situations and projects. 

Your Strengths Have AntiPatterns

Discipline StrengthsFinder TL;DR

The discipline StrengthsFinder talent means you thrive with structure and order.

A place for everything and everything in its place. That might be the mantra of someone with a solid strengthsfinder discipline talent. Your organizational skills are built on being both specific and diligent.

You can avoid wasting time or making foreseeable errors because of your attention to detail and consistency of effort.

If you’re already familiar with StrengthsFinder, you can skip over the next section.

What is StrengthsFinder?

SterengthsFinder, now CliftonStrengths, is an assessment based on strengths psychology. The fundamental premise is you will get farther by maxing out your strengths rather than trying to improve your weaknesses. 

I’ve seen numerous leaders grow as they identified their talents and turned them into well-developed strengths. But you don’t have to be a leader to benefit from StrengthsFinder, and you can apply it to more than just work. 

Understanding your strengths and weaknesses helps you better understand and live out your unique design.

Discipline is just one of the 34 different strengths measured by StengthsFinder. When you take the assessment, you will get back your top 5 strengths. You can pay for an ordered list of all 34, but I wouldn’t recommend that the first time you take the assessment.

Focus is critical to developing your strengths. Keeping just your top 5 in view helps you make meaningful growth in the areas of your life with the highest leverage and impact. 

How do you lead well with discipline in your StrengthsFinder top 5?

So you’ve taken the StrengthsFinder assessment, received your results and found discipline in the list. Now you’re wondering how to grow or leverage this strength in your leadership. 

I've seen the power of well-designed systems. Leading distributed and matrixed teams requires unique and adaptive structures and organization. I've seen the power of the discipline strength in my teams.

These are four strategies I’ve seen disciplined leaders use to bring order to the chaos.

  1. Look for those looking to improve.
  2. Keep it simple.
  3. Share your life hacks.
  4. Routines over rules.

Learn to recognize behaviors when you're over-leveraging your strengths to the point that they become liabilities. And discover the path back to health.

Look for those looking to improve.

Not everyone will share your same desire for order, but leaders who use the discipline talent are able to recognize and develop those with a similar strength. Create an environment where people can come together, share best practices and learn from each other.

This community will provide both motivation and support. You may even find a project you want to work on together.

Keep it simple.

A core tenet of using the discipline strength is keeping things as simple as possible while still producing quality results. Simplicity is its own type of order. You’ll end up bogged down in the process if you have too many rules and guidelines.

A place for everything and everything in its place.

Keep it simple by breaking projects or tasks into smaller, manageable steps. This discipline will help you tackle the project piece by piece and stick with a plan of action that you can actually follow.

Share your life hacks. 

We all have ways to do things faster and better. When you have a trick or shortcut that makes something easier, share it!

You'll be surprised to discover that what seems obvious to you may be game-changing to others.

Sharing what you observe is essential when leading a team, as they need to know what works and what doesn’t. Sharing these tips helps everyone stay organized and productive in their individual roles.

Routines over rules. 

Creating routines helps create a habit of doing things the same way each time. It will help you not just repeat tasks but also develop a consistent pattern of operating and thinking.

Your organizational skills are built on being both specific and diligent.

These routines become anchors that you can rely on when chaos takes over. They become ingrained in the culture over time and reduce the need for rules and regulations. 

As you learn to lead using your discipline strength, you can transform the world around you, moving it from chaos to order, or at least from messy to under control. 

Having discipline as part of your StrengthsFinder assessment means you have an innate need for order. Use these strategies to build a successful and well-ordered team, and don’t forget to leverage your other strengths as well. 

Simplicity is its own type of order.

By utilizing the discipline strength in tandem with your other talents, you can create a unique leadership style that will take your team and business to the next level. You'll be able to build an organized, efficient and successful team. So don't forget your discipline strength when it comes to leadership – it's an invaluable tool! 

Action Plan

Leaders with the strengthsfinder disciple talent can struggle with an antipattern of compulsivity or becoming a control freak. Learning the strengths antipatterns will allow you to continue growing as a healthy, intentional leader. 

You are on an extraordinary journey to living and leading from your strengths. You can explore the list below to learn about the rest of your top 5 strengths.

Frequently Asked Questions

StrengthsFinder

So do I totally ignore my weaknesses and just focus on my strengths?

Strengths-based growth doesn’t encourage you to ignore your weaknesses but not to spend too much time trying to turn them into strengths. Instead, you may need to find team members or systems to fill in your gaps.

Learn more about how StrengthsFind influences your leadership.

There are strengths I think I have; why didn’t they didn’t show up in my top 5?

For some people, their strengths ranked 5, 6 or 7 are almost even. You could also be misattributing a skill or behavior to a specific strength.

Learn more about how StrengthsFind influences your leadership.

Should I pay to see all 34 strengths?

Seeing your other 29 strengths can help give you a fuller picture. But initially, someone should focus on further developing those top 5 strengths rather than trying to give attention across the list. Once you have a good grasp on what it looks like to lead from your top 5, it can be helpful to explore the rest of the list.

Learn more about how StrengthsFind influences your leadership.

What’s the difference between a talent and a strength?

A talent is your natural way of thinking or behaving. A strength is a talent developed over time through knowledge, skills and practice.

Learn more about how StrengthsFinder influences your leadership.

Ready to level up your company? Get in touch today!