Discover your unique edge. Each of us has our own set of strengths, abilities and skills that allow us to shine and deliver exceptional results. These are our underlying qualities that energise us and we are great at (or have potential to become great at). But how do you understand and build upon your strengths and how do you inspire others to do the same? Optimize Your Strengths provides a proven strengths-based approach to achieving peak performance for you and your team. You'll discover your core strengths and learn how to use these to bring out the best in yourself and inspire passion, innovation and engagement in those you lead. Using the Stretch Leadership Model, leadership and organisational development experts, James Brook and Paul Brewerton, show you how to lead beyond boundaries and develop positive habits that drive you to continuously improve and take advantage of new opportunities. Through a fictional narrative that brings the subject to life; follow the journey of Joe (a leader facing both personal and professional crises), as you learn to: Discover, analyse and grow you and your team's natural strengths and abilities in pursuit of a compelling vision Develop an energising and powerful leadership approach based on strengths, solutions and possibilities Use a Stretch Toolbox of six step-by-step models to uncover your leadership edge and grow into an inspiring leader Get hands-on experience working through chapter exercises on an accompanying website Take real action to continually enhance your strengths and improve your weaknesses

Discover your unique edge. Each of us has our own set of strengths, abilities and skills that allow us to shine and deliver exceptional results. These are our underlying qualities that energise us and we are great at (or have potential to become great at). But how do you understand and build upon your strengths and how do you inspire others to do the same? Optimize Your Strengths provides a proven strengths-based approach to achieving peak performance for you and your team. You'll discover your core strengths and learn how to use these to bring out the best in yourself and inspire passion, innovation and engagement in those you lead. Using the Stretch Leadership Model, leadership and organisational development experts, James Brook and Paul Brewerton, show you how to lead beyond boundaries and develop positive habits that drive you to continuously improve and take advantage of new opportunities. Through a fictional narrative that brings the subject to life; follow the journey of Joe (a leader facing both personal and professional crises), as you learn to: Discover, analyse and grow you and your team's natural strengths and abilities in pursuit of a compelling vision Develop an energising and powerful leadership approach based on strengths, solutions and possibilities Use a Stretch Toolbox of six step-by-step models to uncover your leadership edge and grow into an inspiring leader Get hands-on experience working through chapter exercises on an accompanying website Take real action to continually enhance your strengths and improve your weaknesses

• A guide to achieving success through optimising strengths and reducing performance risks • Written by experienced business professionals who founded a professional business strength assessment and development strategy • The book links research with a wealth of business expertise to help employees at various levels and capacities – employees, leaders, managers, coaches, facilitators, HR professionals and consultants. During the past two decades, research has linked personality strengths to a wide range of positive work and life outcomes, including wellbeing and stress management, motivation, creative problem-solving and improved relationships, self-confidence, career success and teamwork. It has also shown the importance of addressing performance risk areas to achieve the best possible outcomes. Risk areas such as overuse or inappropriate use of strengths, or weaker areas that can disrupt/derail performance, should also be addressed to optimise success. This handbook is a practical guide to translating awareness from the Strengthscope® profile into behaviour change and successful results. It will also help readers improve their relationships with others through a better understanding of their strengths and performance risk areas. This book has been based on Brook’s and Brewerton’s Strengthscope® suite, an innovative strengths profiling system that helps improve performance. Backed by over 10 years of research, it is used by many leading organisations. The strategy helps people optimise their performance and energy by improving their understanding of: • Unique strengths and how to optimise these to achieve exceptional results • Risk areas to peak performance, together with powerful ways to reduce the impact of these • Positive ways of working that will improve confidence, motivation and success in any situation • How to strengthen relationships and work more better with people whose strengths are different from yours By understanding and optimising their strengths, energising them and enabling them to do their best work, will help supercharge readers’ performance.

Are you curious about why you have been effective sometimes and not at others? Does it bother you that you can't make a team with powerful individual strengths work effectively? Do you find that certain situations bring out the worst in you? Do you find you can't understand why some people never agree with you? Do you realize why some people don't listen to you, despite the fact you're trying to help them? The LIFO Method is designed to answer these questions for you. It was developed about your strengths and how you deal with them. It provides strategies for managing your strengths so you can achieve more satisfying results in your business and personal relationships. It shows you how to quickly discover other people's strengths and how you can integrate them into your team in a successful manner. It also gives you options for handling situations to make others more productive. It has been proven in Fortune 500 companies and more than 10,000 additional organizations around the world for forty years. It will work for you, too!

One of The Globe & Mail's Top 10 Business books of the Year! Rethink Everything You Know About Leadership Strengths "A must-read for anyone wanting to positively stand out in an organization or for leaders wanting to raise the overall performance of the organization." -- Cindy Brinkley, Vice President, Global Human Resources, General Motors "Zenger Folkman's findings related to companion behaviors is exciting. It enhances what's been presented in prior books and makes extraordinary leadership seem like an achievable goal. I would recommend this book to anyone committed to the journey." -- Pam Mabry, Director, Human Resources, The Boeing Company "The authors take the groundbreaking concept of driving leadership effectiveness by building our strengths to a whole new level of practical implementation, providing us with a brilliantly clear road map. I have found this body of work to be absolutely invaluable . . . I cannot imagine a person in a leadership role today who would not find value from reading this book cover to cover." -- Loren M. Starr, Senior Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer, Invesco Ltd. How to Be Exceptional is a milestone in the emerging business case for evidence-based management. Building on two decades of earlier research, the authors brilliantly lay out a simple, concrete, scientifically validated model for achieving consistently superior business results through leadership. . . . Its magic is its simplicity, pragmatism, and focus." -- Eric Severson, Senior Vice President, Talent, Gap Inc. "How to Be Exceptional is the best book on professional development I have read in decades. It reinforces the emerging wisdom that the path to greatness is really about building profound strengths, rather than through relentlessly focusing on one’s weaknesses. This is a great road map for any leader seeking to optimize their growth and impact." -- Michael A. Peel, Yale University, Vice President, Human Resources and Administration

Self-development system that synergistically merges organizational and personal strategic planning. Readers develop Values, Mission, and Vision Statements; define Goals; divide Goals into Projects; and create Focused Tasks using a 10-question One-page. Through 40+ worksheets, readers organize, plan, and implement Goals for their lives and organizations. CD includes e-book, plus Interactive Worksheets allowing editing, saving, printing, and passwording personal planning.

From the authors of the bestselling "StrengthsFinder 2.0" comes a landmark study of great leaders, teams, and the reasons why people follow them.