Many populist life-skills coaches promote the idea that you should concentrate on building your strengths, while ignoring your weaknesses. They argue that you are employed and rewarded for your strengths, not to work on your weaknesses.

This is nonsense. And it is also harmful.

If you promote one or two strengths then you will be valued exactly for that and little else. Specialists are seldom credited as team players or leadership material, and they are often feared for the power their special strength gives them. In a rapidly changing world, special strengths have a nasty tendency of becoming irrelevant.

Your strengths might make you a superstar for a while in one special area, but those same strengths might make you a dysfunctional manager, parent, or spouse.

In the end, you will be valued more for being balanced and well-rounded.

About the Author

James Henry McIntosh is a Chief Nonsense Officer. He advises executives on dealing with nonsense at work in the hope that this will make them, their teams and their organizations more effective. When this gets the better of him, he retreats to writing and public speaking until his confidence returns. He has been repeating this cycle for more than 20 years without seriously hurting anyone. Sign up for free newsletter on http://www.nonsenseatwork.com