In the previous segments of our Visioning Tips series, you took a look at twelve different steps for generating creativity and homing in on your vision. In this segment, you'll take a look at how you might transform and revitalize your enterprise by emphasizing and building upon your strengths. Need to catch up? Check the list of links below, or start from the beginning of the Ivy Sea Visioning Series.

From flawed to fabulous
BUILDING UPON A FOUNDATION OF YOUR STRENGTHS

Most strategies are based upon a traditional problem-solving approach honed over many years of linear thinking and rational thought geared toward avoiding errors. With an emphasis on the mistakes we've made or the goals we've not reached, we adopt a constructively critical approach to finding out what's wrong with our group, business, employee or selves. We look to ferret out the weak links, the problems, the missteps. We look to avoid our previous shortcomings or errors. This approach has its merits. If something is going sour, or has gone terribly wrong, it can be wise to set as a high priority sleuthing out the cause.

Yet the focus on fault-finding can also be overdone, and too often is. Think about it: Have you ever heard someone ask, "What's right?" Or do you more often hear, "What's wrong?" And both questions refer as easily to an individual or initiative as they do a whole department or an entire organization.

As a default strategic practice, it might be both wise and beneficial to identify and build on our strengths, whether individual or organizational, saving the fault-finding approach for where it can be a powerful tool: remedying specific problems that threaten or have surfaced and need to be addressed. By using both approaches in a complementary fashion, rather than focusing more exclusively on fault-finding, we avail ourselves to a richer, more complete (or whole) data pool.

Accentuate the positive

One excellent model for identifying your strengths, so you might then look to how you might reinforce and build upon them, is Appreciative Inquiry (AI). Though not alone in its emphasis on strengths, AI is all about looking for the best examples and using those examples to kindle a powerful vision of and enthusiasm for what is possible in the future.

What are your strengths, whether as an individual, a group, a department, an organization or other enterprise? Identify the best of the past, envision what you might in the best case bring about, and create a plan of action for building or reinforcing the bridge between where you are now and that powerful vision of what is possible.

For a good list of questions to get you started (in addition to the one key question listed in the previous paragraph), look back through Visioning Tips #2, #5, #7, #8 and #10.

Visit again next month for a round of new content to foster inspired leadership, vision and authenticity.

In case you've missed previous tips...

Visioning Series Kickoff — A few great reasons to bother with visioning

Visioning Tip #1 — Prime the pump: Loosen up with some "get-started" dialogue

Visioning Tip #2 —The reflection connection: What's most important?

Visioning Tip #3 — Activate your senses: Get your brain storming with creativity

Visioning Tip #4 — Identify your emerging themes

Visioning Tip #5 — Noticing where your key themes are already at work

Visioning Tip #6 — What do people call your company when you're not in ear-shot?

Visioning Tip #7 — How do your personal ethics affect your vision, and others?

Visioning Tip #8 — Is your vision based on someone else's standards?

Visioning Tip #9 — Getting clear on your "vision story"

Visioning Tip #10 — Powerful questions to energize your group

Visioning Tip #11 — Vision as an anchor in challenging times

Visioning Tip #12 — Transforming your vision so it serves as a guiding light

This information provides food for thought rather than counsel specifically designed to meet the unique needs of your organization. The most effective approaches are those that have been tailored to your unique needs and organizational culture, so don't hesitate to engage the assistance of an adviser whose perspective you trust and value. Have questions? Send us an email at info@ivysea.com