Empower Your Self, Team and Org

by Christine N. Lee

How can knowing your strengths empower your next level journey for your career and organization?

Further, what is the corporate value of having employees who truly understand - and lead with - their strengths? And what is the impact on a company when team members build synergy by leveraging one another’s diverse strengths, rather than competing with them?

Our modern work environment is shifting quickly and will continue to evolve quicker than we’d like. The reality is that just knowing the landscape of how things work in our industry or city will no longer be enough. In order to navigate your career and organization well, you have to know yourself better than before - and ultimately, lean into your particular strengths and intrinsic motivations, and become aware of your blindspots and manage them intentionally, all in order to lead yourself and your team more powerfully and intentionally.

The Five Voices Framework by GiANT Worldwide is a potent summary of your wired-in strengths and intrinsic motivations - both at work and in life. Simply put, you bring more value when you lead from what what matters most to you. By identifying your natural leadership strengths and core motivations, you can maximize your contributions to your organization. Paired with your technical skills, this self-awareness can truly help you develop your personal “hedgehog concept,” as described in Jim Collins’ Good to Great.

Further, the Five Voices framework will also empower you to intentionally lead others based on their Leadership strengths as well and elevate their leadership. And next to leading yourself well, developing an effective leadership pipeline in a healthy work culture is arguably the most important objective for thriving companies today.

The Five Voices Assessment uniquely stands out from other assessments in both efficacy and empowerment:

While the Working Genius and Strengths Finder identify person-to-task orientation, the Five Voices identify people-to-people orientation - this enables building effective teams who lead and communicate better and build powerful synergies, instead of working in silos.

EOS is a powerful implementer but less effective at the most important, early stages of aligning people with strategy and vision. Only after you have set the correct course with the “right people on the bus,” will implementation matter - otherwise, you can move quickly in the wrong direction and arrive at a place you never intended.

The DISC profile is similarly limited in observing external behaviors and short on training for development: Is everyone only meant to fall in line to further the Dominant style’s objective, or are there other clear, powerful next steps to growing and developing each person’s unique leadership and influence and building team alignment that multiplies not only impact for each individual but impact for the team - by leveraging synergies?

Lastly - Whereas MBTI and Enneagram fall short in applications to the workplace, the Five Voices assessments are designed for maximizing work team effectiveness and alignment while also having powerful implications for how we lead ourselves in all our spheres of life.

The Five Voices can empower you beyond your current role to maximize your contribution, leadership, and communication to the next level and build powerful teams and companies. Through our training, we have seen clients elevate team contributions and grow into impactful leaders at Northrup Grumman, Collins Aerospace, USBank, Daimler Truck North America, Sompo International, and more.

We also partner with groups to build thriving work cultures where intentional alignment of empowered voices elevates team deliverables and organizational performance for the long haul.

Imagine a work team where the Creative voice is able to help the team capitalize on future opportunities and communicate them clearly - the Guardian speaks into possible gaps in the creative vision and respectfully helps substantiate dreams into plans - the Pioneer strategizes and executes the new initiatives while letting others speak first - the Connector multiplies resources and impact by selling the deliverable to enthusiastic buyers - all the while the Nurturer operates as the relational oil for the team so that this dynamic troupe would want to work together for the long haul. This is the power of Five Voices—intentionality and synergy at work. And this example represents only one of many powerful outcomes within reach.

What’s more, because everyone possesses all Five Voices - just in different orders of strength - each person’s unique Voice Order creates an opportunity for intentional alignment with others on teams. Individuals can learn to elevate different Voices within themselves to better communicate with, understand, and collaborate with other various Voices represented in the room. This is powerful team alignment in action.

The Five Voices framework also offers meaningful pathways for individual growth and development. By intentionally strengthening a lower Voice, each person can expand their influence and increase their effectiveness - benefiting not only themselves, but also their team and the organization as a whole.

Take the leap and discover what Five Voices training can unlock in your leadership. You’re welcome to begin by taking the Five Voices assessment - keeping in mind that, if you provide “aspirational” answers, the results will not be accurate - instead, simply answer as you would behave “while at rest” or at home.

Knowledge and insights alone may not bring about change. New leadership muscles can instead be built through effective workout regimens. This may be the difference between music appreciation vs. being a formidable pianist, and the gap between having a big brain vs. having big muscles for carrying your leadership load - we can’t deny you actually need both - and Leaders Thrive is designed to help you move from insight into building muscle memory of powerful leadership behaviors well-suited to your particular Leadership Voice.

If you’d like to explore whether this training could be the catalyst to elevate your leadership, book a Discovery Call with me.

Because when Leaders Thrive, everyone benefits.