Dad took me to yearly second hand book store to find cheap maths text books. We never had enough money to buy new books, $3 was the limit. I used to come home with 5 maths books every year. Every year, I had a goal to complete as much of my next year text book during my school holidays as possible. Dad used to tutor me on new techniques, mum fuelled my energy.

After years of doing this, I was one of the top students. What I learnt was hard work, determination and focus can change any weakness. However, this made me focus on improving my weaknesses rather than my strengths.

It didn’t even occur to me to refine my strengths until recently. There were so many things I needed to improve on and things I didn’t know to learn! The list was getting longer and longer. Then I read an article about focussing on your strengths not just your weakness. This has completely change my perspective.

I’ve only just started to try and find my strengths. Identify ways to improve them and spend a bit more time on these. I have found a Strengths Finder tool that I will try, but before I ‘find my strengths’, below is a summary of what I think I am good at:

• Influential skills
• Passionate about my work and charity
• Compassion, caring nature and empathy
• Easy to talk to, trust worthy
• Hard working, loyal and reliable. Strong work ethic.
• Truthful and honest
• Couple technology with business. Clearly articulating the problem and solutions.
• Find solutions for business and technical problems. Ability to bridge the gap between them.
• Communication
• Thinking outside the square. Innovative.

Let’s see if my results come out the same way… Have you been on a similar journey, I’d love to hear what worked for you.